What we’re in the midst of, I suspect, is a pretty significant ideological realignment. The Republican party has already taken from classic liberalism (with a hefty dose of Marxism) the notion the the goal of foreign policy ought to be something akin to permanent revolution, and that the United States ought to have the altruism–indeed, that it has the moral responsibility–to be the World’s Liberator, deposing tyrants, righting wrongs, playing SuperCop, and essentially enforcing Western democracy and liberalism as a sort of One World Government rule, the standard by which all nations are judged and, if found wanting, punished or put back into line by we who have ultimate authority over them. This is no small leap from even the dominant Republican political thought circa 2000.
Example:
Bush 2000: “I’m worried about an opponent who uses nation building and the military in the same sentence.”
Giuliani 2007: “Part of what we have to do and we haven’t done right is take on that responsibility of nation-building.”
Bush 2000: “I think what we need to do is convince people who live in the lands they live in to build the nations. Maybe I’m missing something here. I mean we’re going to have kind of a nation-building corps from America? Absolutely not.”
Giuliani 2007: “Maybe we have to start thinking about some kind of hybrid organization of our military and our civilian agencies of the government. There’s a lot here that the Justice Department can bring to bear in places like Iraq and if we have to do another Iraq in the future. There’s a lot of skills that the Commerce Department can bring to bear, the Treasury Department, and a lot of our private businesses. This nation needs to get started again. Maybe we didn’t see that because this idea of nation-building is not one you want to undertake lightly. But whether we wanted to or not, it’s now our responsibity. We’ve got to get it done right.”
http://thecrossedpond.com/?p=851
Example:
Bush 2000: “I’m worried about an opponent who uses nation building and the military in the same sentence.”
Giuliani 2007: “Part of what we have to do and we haven’t done right is take on that responsibility of nation-building.”
Bush 2000: “I think what we need to do is convince people who live in the lands they live in to build the nations. Maybe I’m missing something here. I mean we’re going to have kind of a nation-building corps from America? Absolutely not.”
Giuliani 2007: “Maybe we have to start thinking about some kind of hybrid organization of our military and our civilian agencies of the government. There’s a lot here that the Justice Department can bring to bear in places like Iraq and if we have to do another Iraq in the future. There’s a lot of skills that the Commerce Department can bring to bear, the Treasury Department, and a lot of our private businesses. This nation needs to get started again. Maybe we didn’t see that because this idea of nation-building is not one you want to undertake lightly. But whether we wanted to or not, it’s now our responsibity. We’ve got to get it done right.”
http://thecrossedpond.com/?p=851