March 28, 2003
A KEEPER OF SHEEP AND A TILLER OF GROUND:
-ESSAY: Not in our name: this is a left-wing conflict and Conservatives should not support it (Peter Hitchens, 3/29/03, The Spectator)There is nothing conservative about war. For at least the last century war has been the herald and handmaid of socialism and state control. It is the excuse for censorship, organised lying, regulation and taxation. It is paradise for the busybody and the nark. It damages family life and wounds the Church. It is, in short, the ally of everything summed up by the ugly word "progress".
If you're a policy wonk, this war nearly justifies itself simply by the delightful spectacle of the conservative Hitchens brother opposing it and the Marxist Hitchens supporting it.
MORE:
THE BRUTES OF BAGHDAD: IF SADDAM RAISED HIS TWO SONS TO BE AS VICIOUS HE IS, THEY'RE DOING HIM PROUD (BARBARA LAKER, 3/28/03, Philadelphia Daily News)
ONE IS a sadistic playboy who rapes 12-year-old girls and tortures friends for amusement.The other is a methodical, ruthless enforcer who kills for political power, then has his victims buried in mass graves.
They are Saddam Hussein's infamous sons - two evil brothers with blood on their hands.
The Brutes of Baghdad.
Well, as Peter Hitchens has said: "as far as I am concerned Conservatism depends entirely upon the family and family values." Posted by Orrin Judd at March 28, 2003 6:32 PM
The strange part of the article is that Hitchens appears to miss the fact that *no* war is conservative as it always brings about drastic change.
Posted by: David Wilfinger at March 28, 2003 9:54 PMMr. Wilfinger:
I think he probably opposes them all (except the Falklands) for just that reason. H. W. Brands, in his book Strange Death of American Liberalism, makes a compelling argument that the endurance of the New Deal and the creation of Great Society programs was the price that hawks paid to doves for the Cold War. War does indeed feed the State.