"These trials will be a stunning blow to the rugged image of the abstract American."

Until recently, the phrase "transnational Left" only appeared in print every once in a while (and then only in articles that also granted the existence of global Jewish banking conspiracies). Lately, it seems impossible to read an article by a mainstream conservative that doesn't assume Obama is a figurehead for this amorphous child of the First International. For example, the very serious Blane McDonnagh Andrew McCarthy argues that Obama's decision to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in accordance with the laws of the land

will provide endless fodder for the transnational Left to press its case that actions taken in America's defense are violations of international law that must be addressed by foreign courts. And the intelligence bounty will make our enemies more efficient at killing us.

Obama and Holder are not trying to reestablish the rule of law, they are engaged in a game of political chicken with their real constituents (the transnational Left) and, because they blinked, they owe a tribute of American lives to their overseas masters. The problem with such paranoid stylings is that 1) Mohammed and his compatriots were tortured and 2) the entire world already knows that. What can these men say against the United States that hasn't already been published by international news syndicates?

These trials will not be a farce intended to give the bogeyman that is the transnational Left the leverage it needs to prosecute the previous administration. Former Presidents are only kidnapped and tried overseas in spy novels and Chile, and I doubt conservatives want their icons compared to Pinochet. Central to this deluded argument is the notion that the current administration would prosecute these terrorists for reasons other than being terrorists:

[T]he great hope of the terror-backing neo-communist left, at home and worldwide, is that the Obama administration will continue to build a case for torture trials for former Bush administration officials.

Suffice it to say that when a professor of political science conflates American liberals and most of the rest of the world with communist revolutionaries, he should be taken very seriously, especially when said professor happens to be "an umatched competitor whose tactical elan would make Machiavelli proud." Because a political science professor who compares himself to the colloquial mascot* for the scorched earth method of maintaining political power is exactly the sort of person who would never argue in bad faith were it expedient ... except when the professor in question is Donald Douglas, in which case it's best to assume he's a tendentious braggart.

Simply put, there is no singular "terror-backing neo-communist left" that the administration seeks to appease with these trials, and those who claims otherwise are being disingenuous in the service of a small-minded version of what constitutes "American interests." Rehabilitating our reputation as a just arbiter in world affairs might compromise the masculinity of the American brand, but it'll also make the world a safer place for living, breathing Americans.

*Machiavelli was a far more interesting figure than his contemporary caricature would suggest. See the section on authorial duplicity and The Prince in Gale Carrithers and James Hardy's Milton and the Hermeneutic Journey for more on that.

Comments

[Gary Farber]

I think one may have to actually give some "credit" to Steven Den Beste and his "USS Clueless" (I am not making this up) essays of such length during 2002-3; he had a great influence on the rightwing blogosphere in his theorizing, however chowderheaded, and he got a lot of discussion on those blogs with his maunderings about the "transnational left" back then.

[Gary Farber]

Wait, his actual push was for "transnational progressivism," fwiw. Same thing, though.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transnational_progressivism

http://denbeste.nu/cd_log_entries/2003/10/Democraticcontradictions.shtml

http://denbeste.nu/external/Fonte01.html

[Ahistoricality]

Former Presidents are only kidnapped and tried overseas in spy novels and Chile

No, sometimes we invade with a medium-sized strike force, blast them with horrific music until they surrender, then arrest and try them in our country.

Simply put, there is no singular "terror-backing neo-communist left" ...

No, we are multitudes, in their eyes; all of us contributing our teaspoon of sand to the great dune that will overwhelm the Great Wall of civilization.

[P.T. Smith]

A member of the transnational Left would deny the existence of the transnational Left, so you have only proved its existence.