neo con rats " entrench themselves ever more deeply into institutional Washington. "

[donsu]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JA29Ak04.html


Neo-cons shaken, but not deterred


Almost exactly five years after it reached its zenith with the invasion of Iraq, the influence of neo-conservatives has waned sharply in Washington, as their nemeses, the "realists" in the national security bureaucracy, have increasingly asserted control over US foreign policy.

While battered, however, neo-conservatives have not yet been forced from the field. And while their hopes that President George W Bush would "take out" Iran's nuclear program before leaving office appear to have diminished substantially, their hawkish voice is still heard loud and clear both in the White House - courtesy of Vice President Dick Cheney's office and Deputy National Security adviser Elliott Abrams - and in this year's Republican presidential race, where neo-conservative favorites include former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani, Senator John McCain, and, until earlier last week, Fred Thompson.

Indeed, as pointed out in Jacob Heilbrunn's new book They Knew They Were Right: The Rise of the Neo-cons (Doubleday), the neo-cons, despite the fiasco in Iraq, are already trying to detach themselves from both Bush and the Mesopotamian adventure they so avidly championed and entrench themselves ever more deeply into institutional Washington.
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and the next prez will suffer rat bites where ever he/she turns in DC