Caligulan Abandon

It's not just that Matt Taibbi can write, it's that he's right:

The neocons may have been proven wrong in the particulars, and to ordinary people their legacy may turn out to be a nightmarish Middle East bloodbath and decades of debt, but in Washington they're still revered as canny operators who swept two election seasons with a drooling mannequin for a candidate and for years ruled Washington with almost Caligulan abandon. They were idiots in terms of how the world worked, but they understood power in the Beltway better than Nixon, better than Clinton, better really than any White House clan since the Roosevelt years. That's why they'll keep getting top billing on talk shows and invites to all the best Washington parties, even if, as seems likely, they leave office 18 months from now with half the planet in flames.

In Washington there is no shame in being wrong; there's only shame in losing. The neocons were wrong as hell, but they were also winners. That's why no one should expect them to go away now. That's especially true since their only real competition in the intellectual arena is the cynical third-way corporatism of the Democratic party, a tenuous and depressing alliance of business interests and New-Deal interest groups whose most persuasive "idea" is that it is not neo-conservatism. The neocons, wrong and stupid as they might be, at least represent a clearly-articulated dream of unchecked greed, power and big-stick foreign conquest that appeals in an elemental way to the dark side of the American psyche. Until America rejects that dream -- and don't hold your breath for that -- don't count on the Boltons and the Perles disappearing from view.

I remember reading once that Americans beltway pundits hated Jimmy Carter because he lost the 1980 election, but liked Richard Nixon because after resigning in disgrace he retooled himself as some sort of elder statesman. He was a classic Broderian "Comeback Kid." It didn't matter that he'd lied and cheated and wiped his rear end with the Constitution,. The point was, he came back -- and that's how he'll be remembered.

Anyway, as the French say, read the whole damn thing.

Update: In comments, sister of ye says that I should substitute the words "beltway pundits" for Americans above. She's right. I don't remember who the author of that particular "analysis" was, but I do remember that I read it on the opinion pages of the NYT.