Neoconservative logical fallacies: Melanie Phillips edition
Ok, yes, so criticizing neocons for their failures of logic is sort of like beating the Cowboys in a playoff game or the Italians in a war: sure it’s fun to win but, given the quality of the opposition, it’s neither especially challenging nor particularly rewarding.
The other day, however, I stumbled upon a nearly perfect example of a logical fallacy in a predictably hysterical and screeching rant by noted British neoconservative Melanie Phillips.
Towards the beginning of her attack on David Cameron, prompted by his somewhat harsh assessment of Israel’s treatment of Gaza and its relations with Turkey, Phillips says:
This was because Cameron had no knowledge of or interest in foreign affairs, and so was always likely merely to reflect the most politically expedient views he encountered – which, given the current poisonous attitude within the British establishment and intelligentsia, were likely to push him into appeasing Britain’s mortal enemies in the Islamic world and dumping on Israel, Britain’s strategic ally in that great struggle.
This is a standard and instantly recognizable neoconservative trope, that corrupt, decadent, dastardly, cosmopolitan, and morally relativist “elites” are constantly backstabbing their own countries by actively collaborating with a truly bewildering variety of “mortal enemies” (Communists, Islamists, Tom Cruise, etc.) Indeed hated of “the elite” is such a standard refrain of neoconservative boilerplate that it wouldn’t surprise me if Phillips didn’t even need to think as she wrote the paragraph: she’s been bemoaning the “poison” in the British “establishment” so frequently for such an extended period of time that her fingers surely know how to type out the words without any special prompting from her cortex.
I don’t want to wade into the accuracy of this “thesis” of elite depravity, though I will note that like most conspiracy theories it’s pretty light on evidence and pretty heavy on innuendo, I merely want to highlight another part of Phillips’ article that suggests (shockingly!) that she has no principled stance against elitism whatsoever.
Barely three paragraphs after bemoaning the depravity and wickedness of Britain’s own elite, Phillips approvingly quotes a Wall Street Journal editorial by Turkish political economy professor Dani Rodrik. Phillips then sarcastically asks:
Into which category of prejudice would Cameron place the horrified Professor Rodrik – Turkish protectionist, Turkish culture warrior, or Turkish Islamophobe?
Phillips is, apparently, unaware that she is basing her argument about Turkey’s decline into tyranny almost solely on the opinions of a man who not only does not live in Turkey but who was educated at both Harvard and Princeton. Indeed Rodrik didn’t just go to Harvard, something that even a liliputian ignoramus like me can claim, he is a full tenured professor there.
It would be virtually impossible to find someone whose opinion is less representative of Turkish society than an expat Harvard professor, but that is exactly what Phillips has done. Without even the barest hint of self-awareness, and literally within 200 words, she has managed to simultaneously demonize her own country’s elite as almost uniformly corrupt and treasonous while glorifying the elite of another country (one which she roundly despises) as being perfectly honesty and forthright.
This neocon trick (“Our elites are full of effeminate, weak, anti-semitic, and terrorist-appeasing jackals…but the elites of other countries are full of courageous promoters of democracy!”) is endlessly perplexing to me. Isn’t it much simpler to expect that, human nature being what it is, elites everywhere will be self-serving and corrupt? That if you’re going to distrust the internationalized and cosmopolitan elite of country X you should be similarly wary of the internationalized and cosmopolitan elite of country Y? That if you consider the intellectuals in country X to be lily-livered cowards then it makes little sense to paint the intellectuals of country Y as lion-hearted warriors?
While I think that neoconservatism’s undue obsession with elite hatred is very damaging, I am in complete sympathy with the idea that elites must be closely watched and constantly held to account. Elites, like any group, will look after their own interests and these frequently diverge from those of society as a whole. What I still can’t understand is neoconservatism’s constant need to latch onto totally obscure and entirely unrepresentative elite figures (e.g. Gary Kasparov or Ahmed Chalabi) and to take whatever bromides they utter at face values.
Post Your Comment
You must be logged in to post a comment
T/S Members
Log in with your True/Slant account.
Quote: “First, ‘neo-conservative’ is a codeword for Jewish. As antisemites did with big business moguls in the nineteenth century and Communist leaders in the twentieth, the trick here is to take all those involved in some aspect of public life and single out those who are Jewish. The implication made is that this is a Jewish-led movement conducted not in the interests of all the, in this case, American people, but to the benefit of Jews, and in this case Israel.”
-Barry Rubin
Let’s see.
1. Mr Adomanis constantly attacks random people and calls them “neoconservatives”, which, according to Rubin, is anti-Semitism.
2. Mr Adomanis has been noticed criticizing Israel’s policies, which is a well-known sign of anti-Semitism.
3. Mr Adomanis has mentioned several times “pro-Israel lobby”, which is a common myth, invented by anti-Semites, based on “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion”.
4. Mr Adomanis has been called an anti-Semite by a respected True/Slant blogger.
5. Mr Adomanis has Lithuanian ancestry, Lithuania is a country with known history of anti-Semitism.
I rest my case.
You found me out!!! I knew you Russians were crafty!
In response to another comment. See in context »Who the fuck taught you how to think?!
In response to another comment. See in context »Lenny Dykstra.
In response to another comment. See in context »No, not you Mark, the guy with the list.
In response to another comment. See in context »The sad part is that I just imitated the discourse of numerous American and Israeli politicians and scholars.
In response to another comment. See in context »“What I still can’t understand is neoconservatism’s constant need to latch onto totally obscure and entirely unrepresentative elite figures (e.g. Gary Kasparov or Ahmed Chalabi) and to take whatever bromides they utter at face values.”
To legitimize their own self-interested policies. Chalabi (who also happened to be a Iranian mole) provided justification for occupying Iraq, with many of the world’s remaining unexploited high-EROEI oil reserves. Kasparov provided an ideological justification for pushing a New Cold War against a country that broke free of the “international community”, i.e. the Western sphere. Furthermore, as soon as they guys are no longer needed, they are dismissed: the Moor has done his duty the Moor can go.
Anatoly,
Maybe I’m just old fashioned, but I think there’s something more than simple self-interest going on here. Sure for someone like Paul Wolfowitz self-interest was probably the deciding factor. Yes, he concocted some pleasant-sounding political rationale for the war, but in retrospect it’s pretty clear he was looking out for #1 and any benefits to democracy, while welcome, were incidental.
For someone like Melanie Phillips, though, I don’t think it’s nearly as cut and dry. Indeed maybe it’s the residual neocon in me, but sometimes people say exactly what they think even if it’s nonsensical or crazy. In this case, I have no reason whatsoever to doubt Phillips’ sincerity. If you’ve ever read any of her stuff before you’d know that she is either 1) a brilliant, Oscar-quality, actress putting on one hell of a show or 2) she’s exactly what she seems, which is a very angry, very arrogant, and very nasty woman with an overriding, and somewhat unhealthy, preoccupation with Israel.
Determining the identity of the true believers of a movement as opposed to the “careerists” who attach themselves to it is very hard (Lenin and Stalin never figured out how to do it). While there are certainly purveyors of neocon ideology who are just in it for the money, power, and fame, quite a few of them are in it because they REALLY think that the West is under mortal danger from Islam, that military force is the solution to most international issues, and that anyone who advocates dialogue and diplomacy is self-loathing and decadent appeaser.
In response to another comment. See in context »I think it’s very dangerous, and perhaps very Russian, to assume that it’s all just an act, and that these people could all be bought off if a sufficient number of Gazprom stock options were bandied about.
I will go with Mark’s interpretation here. Every movement consists of very different people. Very few are either pure believers or calculating opportunists, but the main body is everything between those two. For instance, I suppose that Kasparov and Nemtsov sincerely think that all their babbling is true and there is nothing wrong in mangling statistics to prove it. A small lie for the greater good, that kind of thing. As well as accepting grants from foreign NGO, and using them to buy a penthouse. But that’s a very slippery way, for it’s very destructive to the idea they think they’re fighting for. That was true for the revolutionaries in France, Communists in Russia, and in this case, neoconservatives. All those movements started as very progressive, with clear, rational ideas in their hearts. And ended miserably, having inflicted great sufferings on many random people.
Where I differ with Mark, I think, is whether neocon supporters can realize the flaws of their argumentation. That would mean, for example, that killing of a thousands of people in Iraq was for nothing. Nobody will like the thought, and the likes of Melanie Phillips will firmly cling to their ideas till the end.
Mark astutely noted much wider acceptance of various conspiracy theories in the Russian society, but who can blame Russians, when the people have faced so many about-turns in ideology and were deceived so many times. Severe cynicism and distrustfulness are quite natural.
In response to another comment. See in context »Well, ex-Prez George W. Bush was the spiritual leader of the neo-cons, and he’s not Jewish.
Who the hell is Lenny Dykstra?
Yalensis,
I thought darth was talking to me and went into full sarcasm mode. Lenny Dykstra is an American baseball player who played for the Phillies (my team) among a few others. He chewed a lot of tobacco and did A LOT of steroids. After an offseason in which he gained something like 30 lbs of muscle he was asked if he used performance enhancing drugs. His answer: “no, just real good vitamins.”
In other words, he’s a genius.
In response to another comment. See in context »Oh, okay. Well, this Lenny sounds like a great guy! I’ll be sure to root for him if I’m ever in Philadelphia.
In response to another comment. See in context »Mark and kovane: I know it’s fashionable nowadays to diss all revolutions as being monstrously failed endeavors, but sometimes they ARE necessary. I won’t go into the Russian Revolution right now, because it’s “too soon” and emotions are still raw. But at the very least you must admit that the FRENCH Revolution was not all bad. At least “le peuple” were able to cleanly get rid of their inherited monarchy and lay the groundwork for democracy. By contrast, pity the poor British people: they still have to financially support those super-rich, bloated retards. I think a date with “Madame de Guillotine” would be just the thing for these parasites; and, as a bonus, the British government could raise a boatload of money by selling tickets to watch the beheadings on pay-per-view.
Oops, I hope MI-5 is not monitoring this forum; just kidding, guys…. heh heh
yalensis,
I think you’re missed my point. Of course, both French and Russian revolution were objectively necessary. But they were conducted by the people who had something far greater in mind. Instead of just solving agrarian question in Russia, they tried to create some new man, organize the world revolution, etc. In other words, they were unrealistic. And it was common people who payed the huge price for their mistakes.
You’re wrong about England. They were first who executed their king, Karl I.
In response to another comment. See in context »http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_I_of_England
And I doubt that they spend too much money on the Royal Court. A nice tradition, in my opinion.
Yalensis,
Usually I don’t micromanage the comments (people are free to speak for themselves and I think I make my own personal opinions pretty clear) but if there’s one thing I’ve become increasingly convinced of as I get older it’s that violence is an exceedingly poor way to solve problems due to its myriad, and often totally unpredictable, unitended consequences. I think (hope) you were joking about guillotining the British royals, but this sort of attitude (if only we could destroy group X then things would be better!) is deeply destructive.
In response to another comment. See in context »On the other hand, sometimes group X really is out to get you. Everyone loves to use the French revolution as a “bad example” of one. And yes it did lead to Dictatorship. But you can’t deny that the french peasantry were a lot better off under Napoleon than they ever were under the Sun Kings. The mercantile class of Europe loved Napoleon; whenever he rolled into town the first thing he did was cut taxes. The people loved it.
Scared the shit out of the royals, though.
In response to another comment. See in context »Okay, Mark, it’s your blog, so I’ll follow your rules and henceforth refrain from inciting the guillotining of aristocrats. I guess I was just in a frisky mood (too much caffeine). Kovane: thanks, yes, I had forgotten the key fact that the British originally invented regicide. But then Oliver Cromwell turned out to be such a sourpuss that they decided to go back to having decadent kings!