Neocons, Ukraine and neoliberalism

Patrick Smith has quite an interesting piece in Salon considering the issues of Ukraine and the Greek depression together in the context of neoliberalism, Neoliberalism is our Frankenstein: Greece and Ukraine are the hot spots of a new war for supremacy 02/12/2015.

One of the striking things about current Western policy is that while NATO countries are supposedly backing Ukraine in a military confrontation with Russia and Russian proxies, the IMF is also requiring neoliberal austerity policies in Ukraine, the same sort that have proven so effective in wrecking Greece and other eurozone periphery countries.

The neocons are hot for escalation in Ukraine. Neocon publicist James Kirchick advocates for just that in What Germany Owes Ukraine Foreign Policy 02/05/2015.

Kirchick is a staunch neoconservative and that viewpoint (and sneering style) comes across in this article. The neocons have a well-established record of accomplishment: pretty much 100% of what they've accomplished when their policies were enacted has been disastrous. And with Victoria "F**k the EU!" Nuland heading the US diplomacy on Ukraine as Asst Secy of State for Europe, Obama has at least nominally put the neocons in charge of US policy there. Of course Kirchick sneers at the Germans for being suckers for "Russian propaganda" - or as Nuland has taken to calling it in her signature diplomatic manner "Moscow b******t" - because they're dubious about going to war over Ukraine. In the neocon world, it's always 1938, Chamberlain is always on the verge of making a deal with Hitler over Czechoslovakia, and anyone who opposes rushing to war is a coward or fool.

This from Kirchick is priceless: "Simply put, most Germans, already averse to violence in the first place [those pussies!!], cannot countenance the idea of German weapons being used to kill Russians." Because nobody in Germany remembers a time when Russia looked like an enemy, right? This kind of make-it-up-on-the-fly history is at least a contributing factor to the outcomes neocon foreign policy produces. And his sneering attitude toward authoritarianism in Hungary is icing on the cake. Neocons love to talk about the moral value of democracy - when they're trying to gin up a war. Wwhich is 24/7. But actual democracy, they don't give a flying flip about that.