Tomorrow evening, I’ll be joining the Intercollegiate Studies Institute’s Daniel McCarthy and Johnny Burtka in New York for a discussion on the political Right and foreign policy. We’ll be at Sovereign House, 185 E. Broadway, at 7:00 p.m. Details here.
To help set the table, Daniel McCarthy has written an essay charging that left- and right-leaning liberals have had a near monopoly on foreign policy since the end of the Cold War and that their strategies have failed inasmuch as they have been built on liberal myths rather than cold realities:
Liberals are capable of learning from conservatives, and vice versa. But the near monopoly that liberals—including Republican and “conservative” liberals—have enjoyed in precincts where foreign policy is discussed and made has encouraged liberals to believe their own myths about their rivals. After thirty years, it’s hard for liberals to remember what conservatism and non-liberal realism contributed to the strategies that made America successful in the Cold War. Those strategies accepted the world and humanity as inherently imperfect, took account of the persistence of religion and nationality, and recognized that many less than fully liberal and democratic regimes and movements would be needed as allies against Soviet influence. Countering radicalism, not promoting a counter-radicalism, was typically the aim.
The conservative sees in revolution the potential for the dissolution of all order, with the attendant chaos causing even greater suffering than the typical dictator might inflict. And the most likely exit from chaos involves a return to the harshest form of order. A revolution against one wicked regime clears the way for another, with all the more bloodshed in the interval between despots.
I hope to see you there.