Month: August 2017 – י״ט באב תשע״ז

The Neocon Confidence Trick

Hey Bill Kristol, Consider Rebranding as “Alt-Left!”

By 

August 10, 2017

NeverTrumper Bill Kristol, a staunch Republican neoconservative who self-styled as a conservative for decades, particularly during the Bush II years, now calls for his fellow NeverTrumpers to “rebrand” as “liberals.”

The significance of this can’t be overstated, for Kristol, a figure whose ideology is of a piece with that of the Republican Party of which his was an especially audible voice for much of this young century, has vindicated what some of us have been saying for quite some:

The GOP is not, as it insists, “conservative.”

It is neoconservative.

And between neoconservatism and classical or traditional conservatism, there is a difference not merely in degree, but in kind.

Bill’s own father, Irving, was explicit on this score.  In contrast to traditional conservatives, he wrote, neoconservatives embrace “the welfare state.”  They enthusiastically endorse “social security, unemployment insurance, some form of national health insurance [i.e. “universal healthcare” or “socialized medicine”], some kind of family assistance plan, etc.”

Nor, Irving Kristol continued, will neoconservatives hesitate “to interfere with the market for overriding social purposes.”

Neocons do not want to “destroy the welfare-state [.]”  Quite the contrary, they seek to “reconstruct” the welfare-state “along more economical and humane lines.”

Neoconservative Nathan Glazer goes so far as to suggest that neocons are essentially socialists.  “It’s very hard for us,” for neocons and socialists, “to define what it is that divides us, in any centrally principled way.”  While they may disagree over policies, there doesn’t appear to be any “principles that separate us [.]”

In his book on this subject, neoconservative Douglas Murray underscores the immensity of the divide between traditional conservatism and his ideology of choice.  He explains, rightly, that “socially, economically, and philosophically,” neoconservatism differs in kind from conservatism.  The former, Murray says, is “revolutionary.”

The Bill Kristols of the world decided to rebrand once before when they immigrated from the Democrat Party, their original home.  In the late 1960’s, the Party of the Jack Ass began drifting too far to the left for their taste.  The fortunes of “conservatism” as a label were rising just as those of “liberalism” were beginning to experience a reversal.

It was time to cash in.

As if overnight, these anti-communist liberal Democrats became “conservatives.”

Those of their critics who objected to this attempt to hijack conservatism as a concept and burgeoning post-World War II political movement would be dismissed, purged. Critics would be demonized as “racists,” “anti-Semites,” and, in short, “extremists.”

However successful these smear campaigns against their enemies proved to be—and they were indeed successful much more often than not—they could not alter the reality that neoconservatives were and remain soft (and not always so soft) leftist liberals.  In light of this thesis, the last couple of decades begin to make more sense, putting the lie to the notion that the neocons’ home, the Republican Party, was ever a vehicle for true conservatism.

That, scandalously, Republicans have failed to keep their pledge to repeal Obamacare may have something to do with their animosity toward President Trump.  There is, though, another reason to account for their infidelity:

Republicans don’t mind Obamacare.

Continue reading…

From Lewrockwell.com, here.

Israel’s Existence Is a Rebuttal of Cursedianity

In An ‘Ultimate Cause’ of Holocaust Denial we mentioned:

… a successful Jewish renascence (Ed., Israeli sovereignty), counter to every Mohammedan/Cursedian anti-Judaism false prophecy…

I wish to add this is even worse (for them) in the Cursedian case than it sounds.

  1. The existence of Israel debunks their mainstream “replacement theology“.
  2. It shows they lack revelation and predictive powers.
  3. Worst of all, their whole strategy was for us to Shmad ourselves (God forbid) upon seeing their comparative success (don’t cf. the Nude Testament, Romans 11:11-12). So how’s that working out for them?

Even from afar, it is easy to see the crises they were and are plunged into with the beginning of the return to Zion, with many new sects and exegesis. If we build the Temple, too, their heads will explode. We ought to do so for this reason alone!

This sounds like triumphalism.

Who says that’s a bad thing? Kedushas Tzion’s writers use it all the time.

Leibowitz says even the Emancipation posed a problem:

The call for the obliteration of Judaism was not something grafted upon Christianity as a result of some historical development, something which Christianity is capable of overcoming and even rejecting.  It is of the very essence of Christianity since the day on which the Christian god appeared on earth.  It is nothing but the denial of the right of Judaism to exist; in a sense, a denial of its very existence.  The relationship of Christianity to Judaism is unlike that of other religions or faiths, whether pagan or Islamic, which deny the Torah of Israel and would nullify it.  Christianity does neither, but claims that it is Judaism and there is no Judaism apart from it.  On this claim it bases its very legitimacy, and therefore, can never concede this point.  From the standpoint of Christianity, the existence of Judaism apart from Christianity has ceased to be legitimate.  Its continued existence can only be interpreted as a deviation from the proper divine order of the world.  The Church could be reconciled to the continued existence of the Jewish people only to the extent that this existence was severed from the proper existence of mankind, that of the Christian world, whose members are the ‘true Jews.’  The Jewish people could be permitted to exist only if their existence were disfigured, cursed, and degraded.  The entry of Jews into the mainstream of the life of Christian society while still remaining Jewish, a process which began with the emancipation, must appear in the eyes of the Church as a challenge to the very root of Christianity.  Christianity regards itself as the legitimate heir of Judaism, and the heir cannot take possession of the inheritance while the testator is still alive.

Rabbi Kanievsky on Restoring Prophecy

What does Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky think of prophecy returning before Mashiach (and proactive efforts in that direction)?

In his “Orchos Yosher“, chapter 26 on Rua’ch Hakodesh (p. 82), we read this:

דמה שאמרו בגמ’ נסתלקה רוה”ק מישראל הכונה על נבואה ממש שזה נסתלק עד שיבא אליהו כו’ והיינו שמעתה לא יהא נבואה רק בתורה תמצאו הכל והנבואה לא תחזור עד שיבא אליהו לפני משיח כמשאחז”ל (עירובין מ”ג ב’)…

Where does Gemara Eruvin say anything about prophecy in general? The verse refers only to the news of the Redemption. The Gemara adds nothing to that.