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is just bizarre. Why, because you disagree with him? Whatever else you want to think about Hitchens, the conservative label fits him not at all, in any way.
Read his book about Mother Teresa, for example, or anything he has written about the Kurds.
by Ohiobama on Sun Apr 13, 2008 at 03:33:58 PM PDT
[ Parent ]
Hitch sure sounds like a conservative much of the time. But I did put it in scare quotes meaning it was a questionable classification.
Read UTI, your free thought forum
by DarkSyde on Sun Apr 13, 2008 at 03:43:06 PM PDT
That is mainly where the conservative label comes from. He is also an ex-Trotskyist who became disillusioned with the movement and moved away from it ideologically, which is also true of many in the neoconservative movement. He's definitely a lot more conservative than he used to be, but he's still not a "conservative".
His role as one of the "Four Horsemen of Atheism" earns him my respect.
by sidwood on Sun Apr 13, 2008 at 03:58:32 PM PDT
on support for Kurdish independence from a perspective of left internationalism. In no way was that akin to the neocon rationale for the war.
Hitchens still thinks Kissinger should be tried as a war criminal -- is that conservative?
"Sounding like" something is not a basis for labeling.
by Ohiobama on Sun Apr 13, 2008 at 04:04:11 PM PDT
Words, i.e. "sounding like," is one of only two legitimate basis I can think of for ideological classification, the other being of course actions. That I even have to point out that self evident point is a tad weird.
by DarkSyde on Sun Apr 13, 2008 at 04:41:21 PM PDT
He was a big Bush guy.
I would call him a conservative. There are no conservative ideas anymore. Barry Goldwater wouldn't be a conservative today.
mrick
by Mrick on Sun Apr 13, 2008 at 05:28:12 PM PDT
He says that Bush got "one big thing right" that we are at war with radical Islam and that we have to fight this war by killing them because there's no other way. Not just in Iraq (and he is critical of Bush's managing of that war), but he supports the fundamental premise of the entire war on terror.
by camipco on Sun Apr 13, 2008 at 09:42:42 PM PDT
And their hold on the republican party. In particular, he's been very critical of Bush and the religious right using "faith" as a measure of character. But I think the point of the diary was not to point to a shortcoming of Hitchen's but of the debate in general. Why was the topic never even brought up?
by camipco on Sun Apr 13, 2008 at 09:33:21 PM PDT
wide narrow
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