Bill Kristol

[[File:Bill Kristol by Gage Skidmore.jpg|thumb|right|165px|He loves that we get a little crinkle over our noses when we look at him like he's nuts.]]
[[image:chickenhawks.gif|left|thumb|165px|They so proudly wear this insignia.]]
{{pundits}}{{cquote|You could probably [have] a reasonably successful foreign policy by just seeing what Bill Kristol is advocating, and doing something else.<ref>[http://freethoughtblogs.com/dispatches/2012/07/02/more-foreign-policy-problems-for-romney/#comment-118844 Comment by daved], "More Foreign Policy Problems for Romney."  ''Dispatches from the Culture Wars''.  2012 July 2.</ref>}}
'''William "Bill" Kristol''' {{lived|1952}} is an American [[neoconservative]] triumphalist, pundit, "analyst," and "strategist."  In 1995, he founded the now-defunct journal of opinion ''{{wpl|The Weekly Standard||.}}'' He also was its editor-in-chief until 2017.<ref>[https://archive.ph/wDHnH "Who Killed the Weekly Standard"] by Benjamin Wallace-Wells, New Yorker, 2019 January 3, archived on 2023 April 24</ref> His father is {{wpl|Irving Kristol||,}} the man who also fathered the [[neoconservatism|neoconservative]] movement. 

Irv was actually a shrewd guy who said conservatives had "nothing left" to fight for once the Soviets collapsed. His son, on the other hand? "It's not going to happen. This is going to be [[Iraq War|a two-month war.]]"<ref>[http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/174894 Jonathan Schwarz, Bill Kristol’s Obscure Masterpiece]. Tom Dispatch, 14 February 2008.</ref> "A [[Sarah Palin|spectre]] is haunting the liberal elites... able to invigorate a McCain administration and to govern beyond it."<ref>William Kristol, [https://web.archive.org/web/20120114000816/http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/015/500wrhjq.asp Let Palin Be Palin]. Archived from ''The Weekly Standard'', 8 September 2008.</ref> "No objective evidence [Palpatine] was 'evil.'"<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20151210055951/https://twitter.com/BillKristol/status/656477320182636544 No objective evidence Empire was "evil." A liberal regime w meritocracy, upward mobility. Neocon/reformicon in spirit.] Bill Kristol, archived from Twitter, 10 December 2015.</ref> And so on.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20150413152156/https://twitter.com/jamisonfoser/status/526418593282818048 Hi Bill did you know Irving Kristol?] Jamison Foser, archived from Twitter, 26 october 2014.</ref>

Bill appeared with regularity, several times a year, on ''[[The Daily Show with Jon Stewart]]'', where he displayed good humor in response to Stewart's rapier wit.

He was the only significant member of the Republican scribbling class to actively embrace [[John McCain]] in 2008, in contrast to others (e.g. [[David Brooks]], [[David Frum]], and even [[William F. Buckley]]'s only son, for God's sake!) who appeared to retain possession of their faculties.

He is also a noted [[chickenhawk]], even after the Iraq debacle.

==Trump era==
Since the 2016 election cycle, Kristol [[Stopped clock|has been one of the most vocal]] "Never Trump Republicans", and called [[Donald Trump]] a "bigot". He proposed putting together a conservative third party to run against Trump, but the plan failed due to lack of support. Everyone who neocons ever appealed to was the sort of bigot that Kristol claimed to be against, and no one else was right-wing enough to support neocons.

In 2017, Kristol suggested that Trump-era conservatism was genuinely pushing him to the left:

{{cquote|The GOP tax bill's bringing out my inner socialist. The sex scandals are bringing out my inner feminist. Donald Trump and [[Roy Moore]] are bringing out my inner liberal. WHAT IS HAPPENING?|||Kristol in a 2017 post<ref>John Bowden (November 21, 2017). [https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/361443-conservative-writer-trump-and-moore-are-bringing-out-my-inner/ "Bill Kristol: Trump and Moore 'are bringing out my inner liberal'"]. ''The Hill''.</ref>}}

In early 2019, Kristol and conservative talk show host {{wpl|Charlie Sykes}} founded ''{{wpl|The Bulwark (website)|The Bulwark|,}}'' a [[centrism]] oriented anti-[[Trumpism]] opinion news website, which per Sykes had a core mission of "pushing back against some of the [[trolls]] and grifters on the right".<ref>[https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/04/media/weekly-standard-the-bulwark/index.html "Former Weekly Standard staffers find new home at The Bulwark, a conservative site unafraid to take on Trump"] by Oliver Darcy, CNN, 2019 January 4</ref> By 2025, The Bulwark had become one of the more popular U.S. political websites on {{wpl|Substack||,}}<ref>[https://archive.ph/x75oL "Top U.S. Politics Substacks"], Substack.com, archived on 2024 August 22</ref> with a corresponding [[YouTube]] channel that as of February 4 2025 had nearly 950,000 subscribers.<ref>[https://archive.ph/d2t7D The Bulwark,] YouTube channel, archived on 2025 February 4</ref>

==See also==
*[[Fractal wrongness]]

==References==
{{reflist|2|80%}}

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[[Category:Centrism]]
[[Category:Chickenhawks]]
[[Category:Educators]]
[[Category:Jews]]
[[Category:Journalists]]
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:Neoconservatives]]
[[Category:Political pundits]]
[[Category:Right-wing activists]]
[[Category:Rightists who turned left with age]]

Categories: Centrism, Chickenhawks, Educators, Jews, Journalists, Living people, Neoconservatives, Political pundits, Right-wing activists, Rightists who turned left with age