Norman Podhoretz

Norman B. Podhoretz, pronounced pod-HOR-etz (born January 16, 1930) is an American neoconservative theorist and writer for Commentary magazine.http://www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/why-are-jews-liberals-a-symposium-15223 Post retirement in 1995, he is now an Adjunct Fellow with the Hudson Institute where he studies, writes and speaks on social, cultural and international issues. His latest 2009 talk on CSPAN Booktv focused on his book Why Are Jews Liberals?.http://www.c-spanarchives.org/library/index.php?main_page=product_video_info&products_id=288972-1http://www.hudson.org/learn/index.cfm?fuseaction=staff_bio&eid=PodhNorm
==Early life==
The son of Julius and Helen (Woliner) Podhoretz,Norman Podhoretz - NNDB Jewish immigrantsContemporary Literary Criticism | Norman Podhoretz from the Central European region of Galicia,Biography of Norman Podhoretz Podhoretz was born and raised in Brownsville, Brooklyn. Podhoretz's family was leftist, with his elder sister joining a Socialist youth movement.
Podhoretz received Bachelor's Degrees from both Columbia University — where he studied under Lionel Trilling — and the Jewish Theological Seminary. He later received a BA with first-class honors and an MA from the University of Cambridge. He also served in the United States Army (1953-1955) where he worked for the U.S. Army Security Agency.Profile: Norman Podhoretz
==Career==
Podhoretz served as Commentary magazine's Editor-in-Chief from 1960 (when he replaced Elliot E. Cohen) until his retirement in 1995. Podhoretz remains Commentary's Editor-at-Large. In 1963, he wrote the influential essay, “My Negro Problem — And Ours," in which he described the oppression he felt from African-Americans as a child, and concluded by calling for a color-blind society, and advocated "the wholesale merging of the two races [as] the most desirable alternative for everyone concerned."
From 1981 to 1987, Podhoretz was an adviser to the U.S. Information Agency. From 1995 to 2003, he was a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by George W. Bush in 2004. The award recognized Podhoretz's intellectual contributions as editor-in-chief of Commentary magazine and as a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.White House Personnel Announcement, Office of the Press Secretary, June 18, 2004. 
Podhoretz is married to author Midge Decter, and is the stepfather of Rachel Decter (Elliott Abrams' wife) and father of syndicated columnist John Podhoretz.
Norman Podhoretz was one of the original signatories of the "Statement of Principles" of the Project for the New American Century.
Podhoretz received the Guardian of Zion Award from Bar-Ilan University on May 24, 2007.
He served as a senior foreign policy advisor to Rudy Giuliani in his 2008 presidential campaign.Giuliani's War Cabinet The American Prospect, Sept. 25, 2007 The same year, he publicly advocated an American attack on Iran."His Toughness Problem—and Ours", by Ian Buruma
Podhoretz's book, Why are Jews liberals?, questions why Jews for decades have been dependable Democrats, often supporting the party by margins of better than two-to-one, even in years of Republican landslides.Norman Podhoretz, Jewish conservative, asks, 'Why are Jews liberals?
==Political views==
===Iraq===
In the leadup to the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, Podhoretz argued strongly for military intervention, claiming that Saddam Hussein posed a direct threat to the United States.Podhoretz N., "In Praise of the Bush Doctrine," Commentary Magazine, Sept., 2002
After the 9/11 attack and more than a year before the start of the War in Iraq, Podhoretz wrote in February 2002 that 
"There is no doubt that Saddam already possesses large stores of chemical and biological weapons, and may ... be 'on the precipice of nuclear power.' ... Some urge that we ... concentrate on easier targets first. Others contend that the longer we wait, the more dangerous Saddam will grow. Yet whether or not Iraq becomes the second front in the war against terrorism, one thing is certain: there can be no victory in this war if it ends with Saddam Hussein still in power."Podhoretz N., "How to Win World War IV,", Commentary Magazine, February, 2002
===Iran===
Podhoretz is currently arguing that the United States should attack Iranian nuclear facilities. According to The Sunday Times, Podhoretz believes that "Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran are merely different fronts of the same long war."Baxter, Sarah. "Neocon godfather Normal Podhoretz tells Bush: bomb Iran." The Sunday Times. Sept. 30, 2007 Podhoretz describes recent diplomatic efforts with Iran as similar to appeasement of Nazi Germany prior to World War II. He also contends that the War on Terror is a war against Islamofascism, and constitutes World War IV (World War III having been the Cold War), and advocates the bombing of Iran to preempt Iranian acquisition of nuclear weapons.Podhoretz N., "The Case for Bombing Iran," The Wall Street Journal, May 30, 2007. Accessed May 30, 2007. His book on that subject, entitled World War IV: The Long Struggle Against Islamofascism, was published by Doubleday on September 11, 2007.
In a more recent article, Podhoretz explicitly stated his view that Iran should be attacked: "In short, the plain and brutal truth is that if Iran is to be prevented from developing a nuclear arsenal, there is no alternative to the actual use of military force." He then went on to consider the consequences of bombing Iran:
===Vietnam===
In an editorial to the Wall Street Journal on the sixth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, Podhoretz contends that the retreat from Iraq should not be similar to the retreat from Vietnam. He argues that when the U.S. withdrew from Vietnam, it sacrificed its national honor.Podhoretz N., "America the Ugly" The Wall Street Journal, September 11, 2007. Accessed September 11, 2007.
In 1982, James Fallows wrote a review of Podhoretz's book, Why We Were in Vietnam, for the New York Times, in which he accuses Podhoretz of "changing his views" and "self-righteousness" on the subject of Vietnam, noting that in 1971 Podhoretz wrote that he would "prefer just such an American defeat to a 'Vietnamization' of the war."Fallows, James "In Defense of an Offensive War" The New York Times, March 28, 1982. Accessed January 3, 2008.
A larger quote from Why We Were in Vietnam which was included in the review is as follows:
===Soviet Union===
In the early 1980s, Podhoretz was extremely sceptical that fundamental reform was possible in the USSR, and sharply criticized those who argued that U.S. policy toward the Soviet Union should be one of détente. In his 1980 book The Present Danger, Podhoretz predicted that the United States was in danger of losing the Cold War and falling behind the Soviet Union as a global power.Norman Podhoretz, The Present Danger, New York: Simon & Schuster, 1980. Later he would express anger with President Ronald Reagan for "not establishing sufficiently strong policies toward the Soviets.""The Rise of Neoconservatism", The Virginia Quarterly Review, Spring, 1996
===George W. Bush===
Podhoretz has praised former United States President George W. Bush: "George W. Bush (is) a man who knows evil when he sees it and who has demonstrated an unfailingly courageous willingness to endure vilification and contumely in setting his face against it." He goes on to claim that Bush has been "battered more mercilessly and with less justification than any other in living memory."
== Books ==
* 1964: Doings and Undoings: The Fifties and After (essays on American writers)
* 1967: Making It (autobiography) ISBN 0-394-43449-8
* 1979: Breaking Ranks: A Political Memoir
* 1980: The Present Danger: "Do We Have the Will to Reverse the Decline of American Power?" ISBN 0-671-41395-3 
* 1982: Why We Were in Vietnam (history and argument) ISBN 0-671-44578-2
* 1986: The Bloody Crossroads: Where Literature and Politics Meet (essays on Camus, Kundera, Henry Adams, Kissinger, Solzhenitsyn, Orwell et al.) ISBN 0-671-61891-1
* 2000: Ex-Friends: Falling Out With Allen Ginsberg, Lionel & Diana Trilling, Lillian Hellman, Hannah Arendt, and Norman Mailer (memoir) ISBN 1-893554-17-1
* 2001: My Love Affair With America: The Cautionary Tale of a Cheerful Conservative (autobiography) ISBN 1-893554-41-4
* 2002: The Prophets: Who They Were, What They Are (about the classical Hebrew prophets) ISBN 0-7432-1927-9
* 2003: The Norman Podhoretz Reader: A Selection of His Writings from the 1950s through the 1990s, edited by Thomas L. Jeffers; foreword by Paul Johnson ISBN 0-7432-3661-0
* 2007: World War IV: The Long Struggle Against Islamofascism ISBN 0-385-52221-5
== Further reading ==
*Bloom, Alexander. Prodigal Sons: The New York Intellectuals & Their World, Oxford University Press, 1986. ISBN 978-0-19-505177-3
*My Negro Problem -- And Ours, 1963
*"The Norman Podhoretz reader: a selection of his writings from the 1950s through the 1990s", Norman Podhoretz, Thomas L. Jeffers; Simon and Schuster, 2004 ISBN 0743236610 
*"My Love Affair With America", Norman Podhoretz, Publisher Simon and Schuster, 2001, ISBN 0743205766, 9780743205764 
== References ==
== External links ==
*Podhoretz N., How to win World War IV, Commentary Magazine, February 2002. Unable to access online June 3, 2007.
*Podhoretz N., "World War IV: How It Started, What It Means, and Why We Have to Win," CommentaryMagazine.com, September 2004, Accessed October 1, 2007.
*Rago J., Unrepentant Neocon: Norman Podhoretz stands IV-square for the Bush Doctrine, Wall Street Journal, August 12, 2006.
*Podhoretz N., "The Case for Bombing Iran," The Wall Street Journal, May 30, 2007.
Category:1930 births
Category:Living people
Category:American columnists
Category:Columbia University alumni
Category:Galicia (Eastern Europe)
Category:Jewish American writers
Category:Jewish Theological Seminary of America alumni
Category:New York Republicans
Category:People from Brooklyn
Category:Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients
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