Liberal College Kid

The New York Times has announced that William Kristol, one of the most outspoken neoconservatives in Washington, will begin writing an Op-Ed Column for the Times starting January 7th. The decision to hire Kristol is an interesting one in light of the strained relationship between he and the paper in the past, one that has seen Kristol repeatedly criticising the integrity of the publication.

Why would the New York Times want Kristol as a columnist? It’s very likely that this move is a response to voices who like to classify the paper as biased and liberal. By showcasing one of the more recognizable conservative figures, they may be trying to distance themselves from that image and appear to be a more “balanced” newspaper. This, of course, is a noble motive, if it is sincerely an attempt to provide an equal voice to opposing points of view and not simply trying to present a facade of objectivity.

But before Kristol publishes his first piece, we can confidently predict the flavor of his column. He is not, as opposed to many of the contributors to the Times Op-Ed page, a sincere observer, aimed only at framing the facts for the benefit of the public good. Kristol is a former student of Leo Strauss along with Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz. These men, among others, are the primary shapers of the neoconservative agenda in Washington, an agenda that has little concern with arbitrary concepts like the “truth.” One of the central doctrines of Straussian political theory, in addition to an extreme mistrust and indictment of liberalism, is that of “necessary lies”: the idea that in order to create a good, prosperous and moral society, the vast majority of the public must sometimes be tricked into believing the reality constructed by its leaders, regardless of whether the picture they paint has anything to do with the truth. One of these necessary lies, in the views of Kristol and the other neoconservatives, is religion. Another is the “American myth,” the idea that the United States has a unique destiny in the world and is the possessor of the only political structure that can ever result in anything but chaos, moral bankruptcy and evil. The logical extension of this thinking is that any and all efforts to convert the non-American population of the world into mirror images of itself is justified, no matter how gruesome the tactics or egregious the lies needed in order to attain this hegemony.

Kristol has spent his entire career, which has included punditry, a seat at the Project for the Republican Future, and the job of chief of staff to Vice President Quayle, perpetuating these ideas and myths. Nothing will change when he begins his weekly New York Times column. Rather than being a column containing Kristol’s opinions, it will be a device through which he can further attempt to shape the American psyche into seeing the world as he does: a world divided into good and evil, where America is the only shining light, the only possessor of truth. His commentary was integral to the build up of the Iraq war and the overall “War on Terror” through his use of blatant falsehoods and misleading innuendos. The New York Times knows as well as anyone else what motives Kristol has and that this position will simply allow him to express his “opinions” in an even more legitimate-seeming forum than he can now (he is most prominently featured on Fox News, a network that agrees with Kristol that the truth is irrelevant). Here’s to hoping that either the readership of the Times will be able to see past his rhetoric, or that one of their other columnists will openly criticise his lies which are sure to come.

 (For More on Leo Strauss’ influence on Kristol, Wolfowitz, Perle and other leading neoconservatives, see Adam Curtis’  film The Power of Nightmares.)

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The Pakistan People’s Party, formerly headed by Benazir Bhutto, will be lead following her recent assassination by both her son and husband. Her son, Bilawal, age 19, is currently a student at Oxford and will be the full time leader of the party after he completes his studies. In the interim, Bhutto’s husband, Asif Ali Zardari, will apparently hold most of the leadership powers.

It is not difficult to see why the succession of power has fallen to relatives of Benazir Bhutto. Her father was the founder of the party, and this latest move is a tactic aimed at preserving its dynastic qualities. During the press conference announcing the succession it was revealed that Bhutto herself wished that control of the party be given to her husband and son. Bhutto was arguably the most popular political figure in Pakistan; allowing her husband and son to take control is an effort to transfer her popularity onto people who are seen as having been close to her, and therefore likely to embody the ideals that she stood for. This method will most likely work, at least in the short term. However, one could question the logic of allowing someone as young as Bilawal to take control of a party that has such a profound influence on politics in Pakistan. I suspect that the move is more symbolic than anything else. I’m sure that Bilawal is a highly intelligent person. Simply by virtue of having as tremendous a mother as Bhutto, he is also likely to have a relatively firm grasp on world and Pakistani politics. But not only is he young and inexperienced, very soon he will also be absent. How will the common member of the Pakistan People’s Party feel about him going back to Oxford to finish studying,while the events unfolding in their own country are so volatile? Isn’t the current situation there more than enough for him to take a leave of absence in order to stand next to his countrymen and fellow party members? If not, then the leadership of the party should be bestowed onto someone else. Surely, whoever assumes this role is in a great amount of danger - as made painfully obvious by Bhutto’s highly public assassination. But they should follow her lead and refuse to back down in the face of peril.

On a related note, Bilawal and Mr. Bhutto Zardari have expressed that they will not except any conclusions made about Bhutto’s death that are the result of a Musharraf-backed inquiry. Instead, they would like the UN to take on the task of investigating her assassination through an international effort. If the statements made by Musharraf’s government are any indication of how a further investigation might look, then Bhutto’s successors are completely justified in not trusting a domestic inquiry into her death. It seems there have already been three theories of her death given by Musharraf officials(She was shot. Wait, the bullets missed but she was killed in the explosion. Wait, she was killed when she hit her head off her sunroof and her skull was cracked). Although a United Nations investigation will undoubtedly be more objective than one could possibly be if run by the Pakistani government, the truth is that the real answers will probably never be known or made public. Of course, Al Qaeda will be blamed despite little evidence pointing to their involvement and despite the fact that Bhutto herself warned that should anything happen to her, Musharraf’s own security forces would be the likely culprits. We must all question the official explanations given by Pakistan’s government and our own, and ask if certain conclusions are more beneficial to them than other more unsettling ones. More than forty years later we are still debating the specifics of the Kennedy assassination (which was also caught on tape and witnessed by scores of people). Sadly, Bhutto’s death is likely to receive the same fate and be shrouded in historical ambiguity.

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Note: I wrote this post two weeks ago but because of the aforementioned (i.e. two posts ago) blacklisting couldn’t get this posted until today.

Hey there; long time no see. How is everyone? Good? Good.

I’ve been away for the last couple of months and for that I apologize. In my defense, though, I was gone because law school doesn’t really lend itself to blogging, keeping up with the news, having a social life, or anything outside of reading and outlining, just ask my roommates they’ll vouch for me on that one.

If anyone is interested, I love law school. If you had told me six months ago what I’d be doing on a daily basis (the amount of reading, the lack of sleep, the stress and anxiety, the paper cuts, sweet Lord all the paper cuts!) I’d have yanked all of my applications and headed for Canada so that, even though my Poli. Sci. degree could only get me a job at McDonald’s, I’d at least get cheap health care. It’s been a great experience, though, and one which I had pondered blogging about but, alas, there was no time. In any event, I’ve been absent from LCK at time that has proved fertile for blog fodder.

It was awfully coincidental, I suppose, that I’ve been away during the final ramp up to the primaries. I’ve missed posting articles on the inevitability of Hillary, Obama’s drug use, Mitt’s “Kennedy Moment”, the country finally realizing that Rudy has nothing to offer it and the Republican frenzy/cluster-fuck that followed, the sudden un-inevitability of Hillary and Barack’s late surge, the Ron Paul online revolution, and (most interestingly?) the emergence of Mike Huckabee as a viable candidate in the views of Republicans . . . well, some of them at least. I’m sure I’ve missed a lot more than that and hopefully I can manage to get a number of posts up here on LCK during my break to make up for my absence. In a time where there is so much going on domestically it only makes sense to start my brief return to LCK by talking about a small, unimportant, foreign story – right?

A week ago France, or perhaps more accurately it’s president Nicolas Sarkozy, “welcomed” Libyan leader Mummar Gaddafi to Paris. One of my favorite writers, Charles Bremner, covered the visit on his blog and if you’d like to read about the less than favorable reaction Parisians gave Gaddafi you can do so here. In short it turns out that Sarko bit off a little more than he was able to chew in inviting the mercurial Libyan leader to town and the mostly-popular President took his first major round of politically related flack (i.e. not having to do with the break up of his marriage) since his inauguration. However I think the act of Sarko welcoming Gaddafi to Paris has a lesson in it for American politicians as the Iowa caucuses approach.

Months ago Barack Obama was lambasted on both sides of the aisle for suggesting that he would actually sit down and talk with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, opposing the prevailing view that the rational thing to do is simply to cut off ties and threaten to bomb Iran back into the stone age unless they comply with American demands. “Logic” holds that by talking to a leader like Ahmadinejad all you do is legitimize him and his ideals but by threatening him you give him the option of complying with your demands or risk becoming nothing more than a peripheral footnote in foreign affairs reports. A surprising number of Democrats (judging by candidates responses in past debates) subscribe to this train of thought along with a predictably large segment of the GOP populous. However this theory is fatally flawed and recent developments prove it.

Just today Russia delivered its first shipment of fuel for a nuclear reactor in Iran. The Iranian’s are going to push ahead with their plans to get a reactor up and working, and they won’t be dissuaded from doing this because America gives them the cold shoulder. Ahmadinedjad has plenty of other nations in his ear, agreeing with and encouraging him in hopes of getting their hands on the oil he’s sitting on. More important than that Iran wants to become a nuclear power because of the exclusive club that it would then be a member of. Getting into that club is legitimization enough to convince the Mullahs, Ahmadinedjad and the Iranian people to pursue nuclear capabilities. When the United States says it won’t sit down and talk to Iran the country and its leaders won’t be stop what it’s doing because The Great Satan won’t talk to them unless they halt their operations. The U.S. has not and will not ever get anything by not speaking with Iran. By simply refusing to talk to Iran the U.S. is only digging itself a hole that will be inescapable should Iran end up builing a nuke.

Why not engage Iran now? Even if one-on-one talks were unsuccessful in getting Tehran to shut down its nuclear program isn’t it better to have open lines of communication with the Iranians and gain knowledge as to what their nuclear capacities are and, more importantly, what their intentions are with those capacities? Sarko invited an annoying, unconventional leader who has engaged in acts of terrorism against France in the past to Paris for five days; the least we as a nation can do is refrain from chastising Obama when he dares to suggest that we talk directly to Iran.

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What a crazy year! Of course, I will especially remember 2007 for many reasons. One of which is certainly that LCK started in March of 2007. Rather than go through all of the stories we’ve posted on here, though, I thought I would go through the biggies whether or not anything about them appeared on our site.

* Where better to start than with the Presidential Election that seemed to kick off way too early?

This picture is great because it really shows that despite all of the added time this race has gotten it really hasn’t made that much difference. Well, maybe except in the case of Huckabee who inextricably is moving up the charts in the hearts and minds of Republicans. Other wise, though, the 08 race is exactly where it was at the start of 2007. Despite my best attempts, Kucinich is still waffling on the bottom of the heap and the Obama vs. Clinton match up that everyone was calling in January seems to be exactly what’s on the horizon.

* February was a great month in the news because of one person, Lisa Nowak. To be honest, I felt kind of bad for her. The story as I first heard it seemed like a love story of sorts, two astronauts who fell in love at zero gravity. How romantic right? That is, until it came out that she wore the adult diapers astronauts wear in space on her drive from Texas to Florida to stalk her man.  Nothing says I love you like a soiled diaper…

<Hottie!>

* Then of course is my pick for person of the year: Larry Seidlin. The infamous judge of the Anna Nicole Smith trial, who told stories of his days as a tennis player, his relationships in the past, orange juice, his college days… Words fail me, so here is a good highlight reel of the madness that was the Anna Nicole case:

* The story that perhaps most rocked college students this year was the Virginia Tech tragedy where Cho Seung Hui killed 32 of his peers and then killed himself. The way he went about it, however, is perhaps the most distressing. He sent his own press kit to NBC, depicting him with guns, in camouflage and many other violent and frightening images. The political fall out around this issue is of course unfortunate, with some on the right claiming that had other students been allowed to have guns on campus this killer would not have claimed so many victims. I don’t understand this logic at all, but, in 2007 everything whether it was political in origin or not, became political.

* On August 1st a suspension bridge spanning the Mississippi River in Minnesota collapsed and killed 13 people. This tragedy came with some baggage though. Minnesota and the Twin City area in particular had just approved a tax payer funded new home for the Minnesota Twins. Money was going to building a new baseball stadium rather investing in infrastructure. Of course, immediately after this reports came out that perhaps as many as 3 in 4 bridges in America were not structurally sufficient which led me to one question: why can’t we be building bridges here and not just in Iraq?

* In August, Larry Craig made us all reconsider our public restroom behavior. There were two truly horrible things about this event. The first was how Craig handled the whole thing. He has been and continues to be a bigot actively campaigning against gay rights. And second, who wants to have sex in an airport bathroom? It’s hard enough to bring yourself to just use the facilities in an airport bathroom, you know? Despite all of this, he is staying in office… Good luck with your reelection Larry.

* The evil genius, the architect, Bush’s brain… Call him what you will 2007 saw the end of the great Bush & Rove partnership. Despite him being wrong, in my opinion, on virtually every political front, I will certainly give Karl his props here. He got an idiot elected Governor and then President, then convinced the entire nation that his party would be better for them because of “morals” and “values” which should have been read “profit margin” and “tax break.” Rove may be one of the most brilliant men to ever work in the White House, and he was never elected nor approved. Nonetheless, he was a terrible dancer and rapper. And Karl, for me you will always be MC Rove!

* Our boy Al Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize! How sweet is that? He won it, of course, for his work with An Inconvenient Truth and shared the award with the UN group responsible for coming out with the report on global climate change.  Gore has taken the issue beyond a partisan debate to make it a sticking point on both sides of the asile and he has now accomplished something very few Americans have: he is a Nobel Peace Prize winner.  You go Gore!

* And then finally and tragically 2007 ended in catastrophe in Pakistan. Benazir Bhutto was assassinated less than a month from the first formal election since 1999.  She was campaigning for that race when she was killed.  She had been living abroad for the last 8 years after General / President Musharraf seized control of the government in a military coup.  The two had reached an amnesty agreement and had agreed to restore democracy to the country.  Now, however, while the election appears to still be coming on January 8th questions still surround the assasination.  Of course Al- Qaeda is claiming it and there are numerous reports of their pressence in Pakistan.  However, Musharraf has had nothing but support from the US since he seized power and while Bush has condemned the act as cowardly it still bodes well for our strong military alliance in Pakistan as we continue the War of Terror.  Sorry, War on Terror.

Well folks, there it is!  2007 was our first year at LCK and while it had its ups and downs we hope that you will continue to read us from time to time, post some comments about how we’re too young to understand anything, and get into great debates about a Dennis Kucinich  Ron Paul campaign.  Cheers and Happy New Year!

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Greetings and Happy Holidays.

A funny thing happened over the last month, perhaps you noticed that we didn’t post anything at all… Believe it or not, one of our internet security programs decided to boot everyone of our users!  Because of this it has been impossible for anyone to log in to LCK, much less post on it.  You will be happy to know, however, that this has been fixed and that we at LCK can finally begin posting a new.

On a final note, there are two things you have to look forward to here at liberalcollegekid.com.

1. The year in review LCK style which will be posted soon

2. My official New Year’s resolution is to not let my classes depress me to the point that I don’t think its worth blogging.  In other words: to post more frequently on LCK!

Thanks so much for your support of LCK, and check back more often because we will most certainly have content up!
Take care,
liberalcollegekid

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