Not even Bill Kristol, probably the most hated of all the neocons, calls himself a neoconservative. It should be noted that today, no one who is or has been criticized as a neoconservative would use that term to describe his or her political beliefs. Neoconservatism is…a ‘persuasion,’ one that manifests itself over time.” In his essay “The Neoconservative Persuasion,” Kristol laid out what a neoconservative was, and those conservatives who want to continually criticize it should take note of what he said, “Neoconservatism is not a ‘movement,’ as the conspiratorial critics would have it. He didn’t view neoconservatism as a movement, or even an ideology, but as a persuasion.
He is the “godfather” of neoconservatism, a nickname he didn’t coin. Let’s go back to Irving Kristol for a moment. When the war went bad, neoconservatives were left standing in support for both the war and President Bush that’s where the criticism originated. They became famous for their support for the Iraq War, but the truth of the matter is that so did everyone else. Bush presidency did we see the new focus on foreign policy from the neoconservatives. Her essay contributed mightily to the foreign policy of Ronald Reagan, yet no conservative today would criticize for Reagan being a “neocon.” Irving Kristol’s The Public Interest was the first neoconservative journal, but it didn’t touch foreign policy its focused on domestic affairs. It was not until future United States Ambassador to the United Nations Jeanne Kirkpatrick wrote an essay for Commentary in 1979 that some form of a “neoconservative” foreign policy was articulated. In fact, in Irving Kristol’s, “What is a ‘Neoconservative’?” essay, he admitted that neoconservatives did not even have a view on foreign policy: “On specific issues of foreign policy, however, the neoconservative consensus is a weak one.”
The reason why the right hates neoconservatism is because of their views on foreign policy, but it is interesting to note that neoconservatives did not even have any opinion on foreign policy when these former Trotskyites moved over to the right.
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