SHADIA DRURY ON LEO STRAUSS

Her book, The Political Ideas of Leo Strauss, is a good introduction and critique of oneof the intellectual fathers of American neo-conservatism and the preface in the June 2005 edition is a good overview of prominent Straussians. In it (p. xi), we learn that Arbram Shulsky, for former director of the DoD's Office of Special Plans, was a student of Strauss and that at Harvard, William Kristol studied with Harvey Mansfield who in turn studied with Strauss.

Drury (p. xxxi) quotes Donald Kagan¹ on power and the proper use of power:

When a state's power grows, the deference and respect in which it is held are likely to grow as well. But the opposite is also true: even when its material power appears to remain the same, it really declines if in some manner these attitudes toward it change. This happens most frequently when a state is seen to lack the will to use its material power.

This reminded me of war whore Michael Ledeen's statement:

"Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business"

¹ Originally in Donald Kagan, On the Origins of War and the Preservation of Peace (New York: Doubleday, 1995), p. 8