Max Boott’s Sad Descent into Loserdom

Writes Tom Woods:

If you don’t know Max Boot, good.

Until recently, he was one of the worst neocon military adventurists around. He even had kind words for the suppression of the Philippine insurrection of 1899-1902, which wound up with 200,000 dead.

Naturally he’s no fan of your host here. Max, like most neocons, has always supported the comic-book version of U.S. history that’s no different from the one peddled by the New York Times — which, like the rest of the establishment, couldn’t care less if someone is bellicose in foreign policy, as long as he doesn’t hold any opinions the Times has forbidden to us.

During the 2016 election he warned that Donald Trump would govern like a “strongman.”

But Woods, you say, I think Trump has indeed governed like a strongman!

Well, if the neocons hadn’t cheered and promoted every precedent by which the imperial presidency has been erected, it would have been a teensy bit easier to take Boot’s sudden concern seriously.

So I replied to Boot, with gentle sarcasm: “Max Boot, on the other hand, has always favored mild executives who humbly execute the laws.”

Theodore Roosevelt, whom Boot and his neocon buddies love, issued a whopping 1,006 executive orders (when his immediate predecessors had issued only a handful) and treated Congress contemptuously. He said that he, after all, was the unique representative of the American people, so it was his job to implement their will, regardless of what any other body had to say about it.

Remember the last time Boot, or any neocon, or anyone in the GOP establishment, warned us that Teddy wasn’t a good role model?

Me neither.

But now that Boot has written a book about his departure from conservatism, his downhill slide has accelerated.

He’s beating himself up over his white privilege.

My reply to a New York Times reporter commenting on Boot:

Someone observing these exchanges:

And now Boot is really impressed by — wait for it — Beto O’Rourke, the nothingest empty suit ever to appear on a debate stage:

Poor Max Boot. He’s allied himself with practically everyone at this point. Won’t someone please love him already?

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