1 Boring Old Man

Bush To Give Keynote Address Honoring Federalist Society’s 25th Anniversary

In 1982, conservative legal scholars such as Antonin Scalia and Robert Bork held the Federalist Society’s first National Student Symposium, launching an organization meant to advance the “rule of law.” This week, the organization will celebrate its 25th anniversary with a three-day convention, featuring speakers such as Clarence Thomas and John Yoo, along with Scalia, Olson, and Bork. The Federalist Society has experienced a golden era under President Bush, who will, not surprisingly, be giving the keynote address at the organization’s black tie gala on Thursday. It has served as a gateway for judges and legal aides who strive to work inside the administration, in effect promoting individuals who have dedicated themselves to enforcing a right-wing ideology rather than the law.

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In 2005, the White House seemed to recognize the dangers in associating too closely with the conservative society. It aggressively resisted media efforts to (accurately) characterize then-Supreme Court nominee John Roberts as a member of the group, going so far as to call and pressure reporters to report otherwise.

Surrender Is Not an Option: John Bolton

For too many in diplomatic circles in Washington and New York, diplomacy and multilateralism have become ends in and of themselves, rather than tools to achieve vital national security priorities. In his new book, Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations and Abroad (Threshold Editions/Simon & Schuster, November 2007), AEI senior fellow John Bolton, former U.S. permanent representative to the United Nations (UN) and under secretary of state for arms control and international security, paints a picture of an American Department of State mired in bureaucratic inertia and a UN concerned less with weapons proliferation and human tragedy abroad than with protection of personal perks and political sacred cows.

In Surrender Is Not an Option, Ambassador Bolton recounts his appointment in 2005 and lessons learned from his Senate confirmation battle, and he offers insight into international crises such as North Korea’s nuclear test, Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, the genocide in Darfur, the month-long negotiation that produced the controversial end of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, and more. Detailing both his successes and frustrations in taking a hard line against weapons of mass destruction proliferators, terrorists, and rogue states, he also exposes the UN’s bias against Israel and the United States and the operational inadequacies that hinder the UN’s effectiveness in international diplomacy.

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Please join the American Enterprise Institute for a presentation by Ambassador Bolton, with commentary from two of the nation’s leading foreign policy authorities, Senator Joseph Lieberman (I-D-Conn.) and Senator Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.). Senator Lieberman is the chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee; Senator Kyl is the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security and chairman of the Senate Republican Conference. Most recently, both led the Senate to adopt the Kyl-Lieberman Amendment to the Defense Authorization Bill, which calls on the U.S. government to designate Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization. Each has played key roles in the crucial national security debates detailed in Surrender Is Not an Option.

We think of them as Conservatives or Republicans, but that’s not what they are. They’re the political arm of the Capitalist Shadow Government. What’s good for business is good for – well it’s good for just about everything. While people who start things like The Federalist Society talk about "the rule of law," their salaries are paid by the likes of the Hudson Institute [Robert Bork] or the American Enterprise Institute [John Bolton] – conservative think tanks devoted to the coffers of the businessman. Losing the Congress in 2006 didn’t stop them. Losing the White House in 2008 won’t stop them. They’ll just go underground like they did after Nixon or after Reagan/Bush. I expect losing actually helps them. They don’t really have to take responsibility for what they’ve done – like run up the national debt, or crank up the Military Industrial Complex. Take your profits and run.

It’s an old story. We know about it from the first part of our last century. Capitalism run rampant resulting in a disasterous Depression that lasted until after World War II. It took that Depression to bring it to and end. For a time, the memory of those days kept us honest – fifty years, maybe. But now we’re off and running, headed to relearn the lesson that our grandparents learned in spades and passed on to our parents. But now, we apparently need to learn it again. One interesting thing to me – they take one of their lessons from the most liberal of them all, F.D.R. The thing that really ended The Depression was a good war, so they’ve added war to their regular technology – like the kings of old. Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan/George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush/Dick Cheney have each chipped away at the post-Depression checks and balances put in place to stop what happened back then – to keep Capitalism in bounds. It’s as if they’re accelerating our race to disaster with a purposful short-sightedness. Why?

The answer is as old as mankind – greed…

  
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