Bill Kristol was wildly wrong about a lot of things, but that’s because he was *wrong*. He wasn’t trying to bullshit in service of some ulterior motive.
Many of his NR colleagues eventually caved to populist/Trump pressure, but Kristol has stuck with his principles. Whether I agree with him or not on any given topic, I respect him.
I've followed Bill Kristol long enough to go from deep dislike, to wary respect, to thinking he's a stand up guy, to believing we could be friends. It's been a fair but winding path.
bill krystol speaks in lying slogans. Ask him who funded the bolsheviks. With money from england, through ohio. So that he could sit there and act like he's analyzing somebody else.
@BillKristol - Says the man who was one of the founders of Project for the New American Century. A think tank which helped install Bush Jr as president and create a "new Pearl Harbor" incident so that the GWB regime would have reason to invade Afghanistan and Iraq. You're a piece of trash! 😡
"Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise.
I know, l've tried to deal with them." Barry Goldwater
The Problem is more fundamental than that. We don't have capitalism and free markets. We have Crony Capitalism (which effectively has nothing to do with Capitalism). We don't have fair and proper regulation, we have regulation that picks winners and losers. The System is rigged.
Remember kids, socialism is when the government does stuff.
There are so many of these goop brained idiots who criticize a completely fictional straw man version of socialism without any idea of what it actually is or how it works. Socialism isn’t just some “government run economy”
Are we pretending that capitalists don't always side with authoritarians- who organise everything to let them keep and build their exploitation hoards?
As a class, they definitely do, but there are always (more or fewer) members of the class who cross the lines for their own reasons. Those people are interesting to observe!
Sitting here working on quantum physics, polariton phase singularities.
*Reads post about economy*
That post's intellectual wordslop indicates someone's head is in a superimposed state with their ass.
It’s weird seeing people like him actually reason out in their own head the current moment. So many of them still have their head in the sand but somehow bill Kristol figured it out
If you showed this tweet to 2002 Bill Kristol he’d have agreed with it 100%—but he’d assume you were talking about some other country or a dystopian hypothetical. 🙃
Guys there's only one way to stop this shit and it's us (American people)! Our Fathers and Grandparents fought, now it's our turn. This is a peaceful protest, we need 3.5 %. For God sake!, Be an American! SHOW the FUCK UP!! No one is coming to save us!!!!!
I'm shocked! Bill is a reasonable man after all. The thing is when there are two choices a d you have to pick the better one, you weigh it out and pick the better one.
I have never heard of him before, but from what I am reading here, he actually has been saying some very important things, and has stuck to principles when all around him were betraying them for a sniff of power. I am sure he has said many awful things too, but... damn. This smells of hope!
You know, I am partial in this, but I think one ought to offer some credit to the NeverTrumps that they did actually have principles and (rightly or wrongly) really did believe their model would produce a better, freer, more prosperous country.
So, obvious failure isn't relevant?
As long as you believe that you are right then you can ignore the facts of life?
I took my daughters out of that phase when they were 2/3 years old, yet it appears to mollify fragile America today, truth is what you would like it to be, really!
Maturity awaits.
Michael Berube noted the phenomenon of former liberals/left wingers going off the deep end with the phrase "Everything changed for me on September 11. I used to consider myself a Democrat, but thanks to 9/11, I’m outraged by Chappaquiddick.”
Those guys hung out with rwers and ended up right wing.
Serious never Trumpers are now in the orbit of the liberals/left and so are gradually adopting their policies because that's how humans work imo, we become convinced of the beliefs of those around us.
Yes and no? I actually think this split is really interesting and you can see it really clearly in the Bulwark/Dispatch split. I think the Bulwarkers are drifting into becoming 'conservative democrats' whereas the Dispatchers are visibly not.
I think what he's trying to say is that, of conservatives who believed in something other than power, some believed in free markets for freedom, while others believed in a conformist democracy. The market people have flipped on social issues, because that's not why they were conservative.
There is the Tim Miller, I always leaned moderate and I will hold my tongue on what I perceive to be bad policy unless it’s really bad until Trumpism is gone.
There is Steve Hayes, I’m not moving an inch from where I was before.
yeah the nat-sec/neocon wing of the party turned out to have a spine in a way that the so-called libertarians and the christian wing absolutely did not.
no we really don't have to hand it to them they put all their effort into making a very steep slope and making it as slippery as practicality would allow, its nuts to give them credit for not personally falling down it
Fucking Roger Stone stole the 2000 election and was heavily involved in Trump's crimes, to the point he was pardoned for them. This is the same shit it's always been, it just got undeniable
exactly!! and you know bill kristol was one of the ones cheering on the program to abduct people and ship them to offshore torture camps, which Trump is now happy to use
Bill Kristol said 'I believe in these things' and when it came to it, he abandoned his party, sacrificed his position of influence at The Weekly Standard, forewent a running river of MAGA cash and made alliances with folks like AOC who he opposed because he really did believe in 'those things.'
This was genuinely the most surprising part of all of this for me - there were/are actually true believers like Kristol. I assumed they were all, in fact, grifters.
When former congressman Joe Walsh said the same in 2017, I genuinely thought he'd back track in short order, because Republicans are so rarely honorable when they're pushed even the slightest bit. I was shocked as hell when he kept (and is still keeping) his word.
Equally revelatory, of course, is how few in the old GOP coalition, when it came down to it, when there was a cost, really did believe in those things.
I'm shocked by how few, to be honest. I wonder if the Dems would do better if so tested; I hope so.
I've been very down on the GOP for quite some time, and I'm *still* shocked at how little resistance they've put up in Congress, given how few of them it would take to make a big difference.
The Biden admin was their chance to show their commitment and they took every opportunity to play the same failing game as directed by the DNC for their own sense of smugness.
I saw someone say after his first podcast episode that newsom is on a one man campaign to prove his marriage to Kimberly guilfoyle wasn't all that weird.
Yeah Kristol always confused me because he would talk about policies that I would never agree with and many were monstrous in their outcomes like the wars in the Middle East but he never presented himself like the Mucinex Monster like the rest of the GOP.
Even the old Republicans were better. McCain was tested thusly, and at least stood up to his own supporters and told them no when they were being racist against Obama.
The current Fascist party would expel him. (I'm not saying he was great)
That's a great question. And I have no confidence in my ability to spot a fake before they're tested. Because I was, for a time, an Edwards guy in 2008.
Since then, I see fakes everywhere. Even where they aren't.
It was. It was also *your* opportunity to show your commitment to those principles, and you've also failed.
There's a reason BlueMAGA is a thing, because "vote blue no matter who" got us a whole pile of "no matter who," and it turns out they are worth less than my ball hairs.
It really was, man. When the ICC declared that Isreal was under investigation for war crimes and genocide, continuing to sell them arms became both a violation of international and US law, yet the Biden admin persisted in supplying arms to the still-rogue aparthied state.
No, you failed spectularly to understand history, foreign policy, trade, insurgent warfare, the 15 to 25 year cycle, regional power structure, and most importantly the philosophy of the least worst option. Unless of course you're an accelerationist, so it's just Jenga you fail to understand.
OK, but what their model actually produced was over two decades of carnage in the Middle East, a dramatically expanded national security state, and legal states of exception that the current fascists are gleefully using. I'm afraid Bill still belongs in an Iraqi prison.
Look, if libs start believing the expanded national security state is bad, they might start questioning why Obama further expanded it and then this whole house of cards starts falling down
I mean there were actual NeoCon historians right? There are no real MAGA historians. NeoCon ideology could attract people who we could at least argue with, even if they were always wrong. MAGA ideology is just yelling at us that we’re wrong because we were not in JSOC
I know Kaplan argued that a democratic country showing strength would lead to more democracies and a democratic country appearing weak would do the opposite. It is greatly over simplified, but I don't think it's crazy to think countries emulate success.
Their model was riddled with southern strategy and trickle down economics that paved the way for the trump fanaticism we have today. What a shame we all have to pay for them seeing that model arrive at its logical end.
Social democracy is better than the magical free-market ideology that undermines regulations and the welfare state—even before capitalists side with authoritarians. After all, it’s that very ideology that helped authoritarians gain the support of oligarchs in the first place.
I think Capitalism is an adequate system most of the time but it doesn't plan well, build basic infrastructure and it doesn't work for minorities. These need to funded through the State and taxation.
Capitalism is like the engine of a car; it makes the car go fast. You still need steering, brakes, passenger features, roads, traffic lights, speed limits, etc. or the engine is worthless. It's not about capitalism versus socialism; it's about how much capitalism and how many social protections.
Yes. Capitalism needs to be regulated to be sustainable. It is not black or white, capitalism vs. socialism. Government needs to be separated from both religion and business. It's role should be regulatory & operate in the interest of its people, protecting democracy & freedoms for all above all.
Health and Education should be socialized,(not completely but as a base standard) as a Turkish citizen benefitting from socialized health care for years and recently suffering the privatization of health care system I can vouch for this personally.
You cannot support democracy /and/ the the free market. The free market is democracy where money buys you more votes, a democracy is a free market where every vote carries the same weight.
Corporatist authoritarianism is fascism, according to an expert, Benito Mussolini — 'Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power.'
It annoys me how you never publicly see someone make the argument that you can do both, in one degree or another. Under democratic socialism, you can be rich. Hell, you can have more money than you or generations of you will ever need. You just can't be a billionaire.
Gridlock government wasn't great but forced the two sides to bring their best ideas and compromise for the good of the country.
One party rule over the past 11 weeks shows us the perils in a personality cult tearing down the Separation of Powers and enacting profoundly bad ideas without opposition.
And this was even in January of 2024! (Not today!) Wild stuff.
Kristol will never live down his role in the Iraq war in my book, although I think it's become clear that he & some of his fellow die-hard neocons were at least acting out of a good faith belief in spreading democracy to the oppressed.
I mean that's the thing, maybe having your entire economic system relying on the idea of "I sure hope that the richest people don't turn out to be evil" might be a bad idea.
It's like saying Monarchy is a fine system as long as you only have good and just kings.
False binary much, Bill? We already have entrenched socialism for unaccountable corporations. Many healthy countries have proven that affordable programs that give a majority of regular citizens a fair shot at a decent life have nothing to do with uninformed and dated "red scare" references.
Maybe the whole concept of Capitalism has come full circle, perhaps wealth shouldn't be the desire of those who truly are interested in success of America
Even his criticism or disagreement with Ds comes off as more good faith and genuine than others that still insist on playing the infinite wrong rock game, or blaming Ds for not being Rs.
I constantly find myself trying to imagine telling twenty-year-old me that in twenty years, Kristol will be the resistance leader, and he'll be all for it. He'll probably think the state has reprogrammed me.
Some of the Baltic countries are good examples of a workable mix between socialism and capitalism. The government provides healthcare, college…. But everything else runs like we do in America. I bet the actual cost per patient is much less than in US. Too many middlemen in our insurance system.
We have a state run economy now with winners and losers chosen by a maniac tv personality. Who knew this was what conservatives wanted. I suppose it was a tell that conservatives only lauded the free market when the government intervened on behalf of the poor.
Socialism is the next phase, it is post-capitalism. Capitalism is being clung too by the rich who run the show, and now using force to hold on to it. That is why China is already 40 years ahead of the rest of the world. That is why american pensioners live in Vietnam. Oh the irony.
Koch, acting through Musk & Trump, will utterly destroy health care in America, and with it the economy that survives Trump's tariff attacks; this is just Koch's attack on Medicaid:
Comments
"Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise.
I know, l've tried to deal with them." Barry Goldwater
💙🫶🏼🦋🤗
There are so many of these goop brained idiots who criticize a completely fictional straw man version of socialism without any idea of what it actually is or how it works. Socialism isn’t just some “government run economy”
*Reads post about economy*
That post's intellectual wordslop indicates someone's head is in a superimposed state with their ass.
the issue is nobody cares or pays attention
or rather people don't know how to care or participate
here, you take advantage of the football fans or you don't
im accepting it, USA was designed to farm humans
Need more than just a tweet to give a shit abt anyone in a tie ATP.
https://aiwillybillhuman.substack.com/p/the-rogue-state-how-the-us-government
to
BILL KRISTOL IS OUR STRONGEST SOLDIER
Meanwhile, the 2025 Republican Party is now a just horde of deranged honey badgers.
TAKE A LOOK AROUND.
HOW'S THAT NOTION WORKED OUT SO FAR?
And you can tell because they've stuck to it.
As long as you believe that you are right then you can ignore the facts of life?
I took my daughters out of that phase when they were 2/3 years old, yet it appears to mollify fragile America today, truth is what you would like it to be, really!
Maturity awaits.
Those guys hung out with rwers and ended up right wing.
The key axis seems to be social conservatism.
He’s definitely one of the reasons I turned MSNBC off. His post debate bullshit was gross.
There is the Jen Rubin, 180 degree flip.
There is the Tim Miller, I always leaned moderate and I will hold my tongue on what I perceive to be bad policy unless it’s really bad until Trumpism is gone.
There is Steve Hayes, I’m not moving an inch from where I was before.
Live and learn.
I'm shocked by how few, to be honest. I wonder if the Dems would do better if so tested; I hope so.
Because some day they may be.
The current Fascist party would expel him. (I'm not saying he was great)
Since then, I see fakes everywhere. Even where they aren't.
Some conservatives actually believe in capitalism and free markets et al., some of them just want Blacks to get hurt worse than Whites.
We can work with capitalists, we can't work with world burning racists.
There's a reason BlueMAGA is a thing, because "vote blue no matter who" got us a whole pile of "no matter who," and it turns out they are worth less than my ball hairs.
Again.
I'm not complaining but... what
10000% unironically.
You need a Hoover to get an FDR.
F*ck him.
https://www.politico.com/story/2013/01/bill-kristols-big-plans-start-with-hagel-nomination-085816
If your system only works until a single authoritarian shows up, its a shit system no matter how good it felt before that point.
Kristol is late to his understanding.
People who supported Social Democratic parties knew this in our bones.
The ideas are incompatible.
https://politicalresearch.org/2005/01/12/mussolini-corporate-state
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/1221518-fascism-should-more-appropriately-be-called-corporatism-because-it-is
Hey, check it out, it’s the guy who thinks freedom means ability to exploit others!
Tell me, what freedoms will people have less of when they have control of their working lives, futures, and means of production?
One party rule over the past 11 weeks shows us the perils in a personality cult tearing down the Separation of Powers and enacting profoundly bad ideas without opposition.
Kristol will never live down his role in the Iraq war in my book, although I think it's become clear that he & some of his fellow die-hard neocons were at least acting out of a good faith belief in spreading democracy to the oppressed.
It's like saying Monarchy is a fine system as long as you only have good and just kings.
The TLP guys being grifters, ofc. He never associated with them. Kept his own separate org.
That’s Canadian!
So in summary , democratic socialism is far and away the best system unless your a millionaire FACT
As capitalist parasites load the tax payers with insurmountable debt Norway have a $trillion surplus
Scandinavia the happiest countries in the world
didn't Kristol read Project 2025?