From a CBS News interview with William F. Buckley, one of the longtime icons and a founder of 20th-21st century conservative movement:
Buckley finds himself parting ways with President Bush, whom he praises as a decisive leader but admonishes for having strayed from true conservative principles in his foreign policy.
In particular, Buckley views the three-and-a-half-year Iraq War as a failure.
“If you had a European prime minister who experienced what we’ve experienced it would be expected that he would retire or resign,” Buckley says.
Of course, that has been said about many Presidents when they’ve faced a melt-down in the polls and/or headed administrations with policies that seemed to fail or be inffective. But then there’s this coming from the founder of the conservative magazine National Review:
Asked if the Bush administration has been distracted by Iraq, Buckley says “I think it has been engulfed by Iraq, by which I mean no other subject interests anybody other than Iraq. … The continued tumult in Iraq has overwhelmed what perspectives one might otherwise have entertained with respect to, well, other parts of the Middle East with respect to Iran in particular.”
Despite evidence that Iran is supplying weapons and expertise to Hezbollah in the conflict with Israel, Buckley rejects neo-conservatives who favor a more interventionist foreign policy than he does, including a pre-emptive air strike against Iran — and its nuclear facilities.
“If we find there is a warhead there that is poised, the range of it is tested, then we have no alternative. But pending that, we have to ask ourselves, ‘What would the Iranian population do?'”
Buckley does support the administration’s approach to the North Korea’s nuclear weapons threat, believing that working with Russia, China, Japan and South Korea is the best way to get Pyongyang back to the negotiating table. But that’s about where the agreement ends.
“Has Mr. Bush found himself in any different circumstances than any of the other presidents you’ve known in terms of these crises?” Assuras asks.
“I think Mr. Bush faces a singular problem best defined, I think, as the absence of effective conservative ideology — with the result that he ended up being very extravagant in domestic spending, extremely tolerant of excesses by Congress, and in respect of foreign policy, incapable of bringing together such forces as apparently were necessary to conclude the Iraq challenge,” Buckley says.
Asked what President Bush’s foreign policy legacy will be to his successor, Buckley says “There will be no legacy for Mr. Bush. I don’t believe his successor would re-enunciate the words he used in his second inaugural address because they were too ambitious. … So therefore I think his legacy is indecipherable.”
“He must be a RINO…”
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.