Those Visionary Neocons

Peter Carlson takes at look at “America’s funniest right-wing magazine,” the Weekly Standard, as it prepares for its ten-year anniversary next month.

The “Rupert Murdoch-owned, right-wing, warmongering magazine” (if you’re not a frequent reader, think Fox News in print…and without the blondes) has offered some visionary essays. Many of the essays have been collected in the magazine’s new book, a 560-page behemoth “reader” spanning the years since the 1995 debut.

The most notable comes from the magazine’s founder, Bill Kristol, in a November 1997 piece “Saddam Must Go,” outlining an invasion of Iraq, conquering of Baghdad, and overthrow of Saddam for expelling weapons inspectors. Good thing we didn’t act on this…that could have turned ugly.

The magazine also looks at more hard-hitting issues such as:

• “Pro Wrestling and the End of History”–profiling a “sport” that allows much of America “to cope with the emotional letdown that followed upon the triumph of capitalism and liberal democracy.”

• “The New Phys Ed and the Wussification of America”–where Matt Labash leaves his newsroom (a visionary idea in-and-of itself) to explore politically-correct gym classes.
• “Welcome to Canada: The Great White Waste of Time”–a synopsis of our northern neighbor and its inability to establish a legitimate place in world politics.

Ten years later, just another part of Mr. Murdoch’s ever-expanding media empire: taking over the world one war at a time.

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