The most interesting thing about the current use of this term is that while it has come to be associated with today’s “right,” it has nothing conservative about it. The idea underlying it is that America should endeavor to spread its form of government around the world by intervening in other countries’ affairs. Claes Ryn has rightly noted that this is a Jacobinical idea reflecting impulses from the French, not the American, Revolution — one that was universally rejected by the Founding Fathers. Funny how the W administration perverted our language.
