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If you are the slightest bit offended by this, then you are a neocon.
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CFT88cMlQo[/youtube]
A video created by the John Birch Society has some sort of Scripture-like authority?
I try to be careful and wary of my emotions. Being offended is something I reserve for more significant things.
I waded about half way into the ~16 minute video. Up to that point it never defined what a Neocon believes in practical terms, not in a way that would distinguish Ronald Reagan or Teddy Roosevelt from a Neocon.
Why did I bail out at the half-way point? The fallacies and disingenuity got more than I could tolerate.
Example of a fallacy in the video: Irving Kristol represents all Neocons? Or is
THE icon of Neocons? The video failed to give evidence that Kristol truly is representative of Neocons. He may be, but the lack of evidence is sloppy. Or Kristol might be but one of numerous, divergent, voices - and this JBS video sloppiness compounded with ignorance.
"Disingenuity" is a strong word, a synonym of dishonesty. At around 6:00, the video introduces a quote from Kristol about his
"having been" a Trotskyite. Kristol was ~20 when Trotsky was assassinated. The quote in the video is one sentence, if that much. No context is given. One would have to hunt down Kristol's book and root through some 500 pages of it to find the quote, all to learn whether Kristol was saying that he still agreed with Trotsky. Or whether he had largely rejected Trotsky's ideas. I don't have the book, have no inclination to buy it, nor to see if the local library stocks it. The old saying that,
"A text out of context is a pretext," was never more true than in this video. The Kristol quote does indicate that Kristol had to a large degree abandoned/rejected Trotsky's ideas. His words, "having been", which I emphasized above are past tense. IOW, Kristol used to be a Trotskyite, but at the time he wrote his book no longer was.
But the video, dishonestly, treats the quote as if Kristol were, more or less to the end of his life, a Trotskyite. It's account of Trotsky's and Stalin's relationship is not very accurate, but that's not significant, except as a very minor example of the sloppiness of the video. FWIW, several of my great uncles died at the Soviet Communists - long before I was born. How, exactly, my family never learned, but I have zero sympathy for Communism. In sheer numbers slaughtered, Stalin was the second worst monster in history, IMO, second to Mao.
Then after the brief history of Trotsky's participation in USSR monstrosity, the video introduced a quote from John B. Judis, linking Neoconservatives to Trotsky. While listening to this, I noticed that, while Judis is not anywhere close to a household name, the video said nothing about him. The watcher/listener is given no idea whether Judis was an ally of Neoconservatives, a neutral observer, or an enemy of Neoconservatives. It's another, "text without context." At that point I'd smelled enough rats and ceased watching/listening. But I did one more thing. I found out who John B. Judis is. Among other things, John B. Judis has written for Mother Jones magazine, and is an editor-at-large for the reliably Lib/Prog and disingenuous Talking Points Memo. IOW, saying that John B. Judis is an enemy of Neoconservatives who may be inclined to smear them with falsehood would likely be an understatement.
FWIW, referring to one supposed attribute of Neocons mentioned by the video, I am not and never have been a member of the Democrat Party, nor have I ever been registered as a Democrat.
As for that JBS video,
Make what you will of this post of mine and it's content.
