Fools to the Left of Me, Neoconservatives to the Right

George Will:



[Kerry] needs to resuscitate his campaign by making himself an interesting alternative to Bush. However, he seems incapable of mounting what the nation needs—a root-and-branch critique of the stunningly anticonservative idea animating the administration’s policy. The idea, a tenet of neoconservatism, is that all nations are more or less ready for democracy. So nation-building should be a piece of cake—never mind the winding, arduous, uphill hike the West took from Runnymede and Magna Charta in 1215 to Philadelphia in 1787. …



…neoconservatives alarm almost everyone who isn’t one—and especially dismay real conservatives. …[Robert] Kagan, a highly intelligent and very representative neoconservative, evidently believes it is in Bush’s power to determine Russia’s fate.



Lurking there is the idea behind foreign-policy overreaching—the anticonservative delusion that political will can control the world. And Kerry has nothing to say about it.