my term paper on Conservatives and the Cold War (long)

[sweetjazz]

waxie, I only had a chance to skim the paper, but it looks like an impressive work. Congrats on the effort you put into this fine product.

Just one comment I thought I would make: I think the conservative criticism of Roosevelt's handling of WWII after the fact might be closely analogous to the liberal criticism of Bush's handling of the war in Afghanistan. (Those who still say that it was an unnecessary or illegal war. Some of whom went as far as to claim that Bush caused 9/11 in order to start a war with Afghanistan.) I don't know how much of a fringe view the criticism of WWII was (as the criticism of the war in Afghanistan is), but otherwise the analogy seems to me at first glance to be pretty good. (Of course the scope of the wars is also not comparable at all either.)

My point is that opposition to a largely popular war is often based more on irrational dislike of the person in power than an ideological view. (Since both conservatives and liberals objected to wars that were very similar in how they were started -- a domestic attack that was linked to a particular foreign government.)