Thanks to Bob Capozzi at Free for All for bringing to our attention neocon Shelby Steele’s claims that the war party is restrained by white guilt:

“Steele walks us through how “western guilt,” even WHITE western guilt, seems to hold “us” back from doing the job “we” should do. I can’t say for sure, but I get the distinct vibe that Steele is a kind of American crusading jihadist, wanting to civilize the rest of the world.

Perhaps I’m from another planet, but Steele shockingly writes this:

“Possibly white guilt’s worst effect is that it does not permit whites–and nonwhites–to appreciate something extraordinary: the fact that whites in America, and even elsewhere in the West, have achieved a truly remarkable moral transformation.”

I see. We “white Americans” are, what, the next stage in evolution, and therefore we are justified, I presume Steele means, to intern Japanese Americans, incinerate innocents with the only nuclear weapons ever used, engineer revolutions in Iran and elsewhere, invade Vietnam and Iraq with dubious cover stories, etc., etc., etc.?

I would like to know what Steele means by “moral transformation,” but even if it were so (and I’m NOT buying), his ideas here are simply repellent.

Still, Steele has done us a great service, exposing the very darkest side of neocon thought for all to see.”