NEOLIBS AND THE WAR….This is sort of inside-baseball-ish, but Mickey Kaus makes a point about neoliberalism that’s worth sharing:
The word “neoliberalism,” at least in its domestic context, was coined by The Washington Monthly’s Charles Peters in 1978. (It didn’t start, as David Brooks declared, with a Kinsley tax editorial in 1981). Recently, the editors and former editors of Peters’ magazine, The Washington Monthly, had a dinner to celebrate his 80th birthday. Out of the approximately 45 Peters proteges there, how many supported the Iraq War? My guess is no more than 8, Peters himself certainly didn’t support the war. Neither did Kinsley. Monthly alum James Fallows (who wasn’t at the dinner) tried to stop it with cautionary articles in The Atlantic. The war’s a New Republic thing–and a David Brooks thing–not a Washington Monthly thing.
Admittedly, it’s sort of self-serving to reprint this. But whether you love or hate neoliberalism, don’t tar it with being too hawkish. Neolibs were all over the map on national security issues.
