Charles Krauthammer, MD (ˈkraʊt.hæmər; born March 13, 1950) is an American
Pulitzer PrizeThe Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
–winning syndicated
columnistAn op-ed, abbreviated from opposite the editorial page , is a newspaper article that expresses the opinions of a named writer who is usually unaffiliated with the newspaper's editorial board...
, political commentator, and physician. His weekly column appears in
The Washington PostThe Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
and is syndicated to more than 275 newspapers and media outlets. He is a contributing editor to the
Weekly Standard and
The New RepublicThe magazine has also published two articles concerning income inequality, largely criticizing conservative economists for their attempts to deny the existence or negative effect increasing income inequality is having on the United States...
. He is also a weekly panelist on the
PBSThe Public Broadcasting Service is an American non-profit public broadcasting television network with 354 member TV stations in the United States which hold collective ownership. Its headquarters is in Arlington, Virginia....
news program
Inside WashingtonInside Washington is a political roundtable show hosted by WJLA news anchor and chief political reporter Gordon Peterson. It is produced by Allbritton, owner of WJLA, and distributed to PBS stations nationwide by American Public Television...
and a nightly panelist on Fox News's
Special Report with Bret Baier.
Life and career
Krauthammer was born on March 13, 1950 in New York City. He was raised in
MontrealMontreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
,
QuebecQuebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
, where he attended
McGill UniversityMohammed Fathy is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university bears the name of James McGill, a prominent Montreal merchant from Glasgow, Scotland, whose bequest formed the beginning of the university...
and obtained an honors degree in
political sciencePolitical Science is a social science discipline concerned with the study of the state, government and politics. Aristotle defined it as the study of the state. It deals extensively with the theory and practice of politics, and the analysis of political systems and political behavior...
and
economicsEconomics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...
in 1970. He was a Commonwealth Scholar in politics at
Balliol College, OxfordBalliol College , founded in 1263, is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England but founded by a family with strong Scottish connections....
, 1970–1971. He later moved back to the United States, where he attended
Harvard Medical SchoolHarvard Medical School is the graduate medical school of Harvard University. It is located in the Longwood Medical Area of the Mission Hill neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts....
. Suffering a paralyzing diving accident in his first year of medical school, he was hospitalized for a year, during which time he continued his medical studies. He graduated with his class, earning a
Doctor of MedicineDoctor of Medicine is a doctoral degree for physicians. The degree is granted by medical schools...
from Harvard Medical School in 1975, and went on to complete a residency in psychiatry at
Massachusetts General HospitalMassachusetts General Hospital is a teaching hospital and biomedical research facility in the West End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts...
. In 1984 he became
board certifiedBoard certification may refer to:* Board certification, for physicians in an area of medical specialization.* Nursing board certification, for nurses who obtain additional specialty training....
in Psychiatry by the
American Board of Psychiatry and NeurologyThe American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, Inc. is a nonprofit corporation that was founded in 1934 following conferences of committees appointed by the American Psychiatric Association, the American Neurological Association, and the then Section on Nervous and Mental Diseases of the American...
From 1975 to 1978, Krauthammer was a
residentResidency is a stage of graduate medical training. A resident physician or resident is a person who has received a medical degree , Podiatric degree , Dental Degree and who practices...
and then a chief resident in Psychiatry at the
Massachusetts General HospitalMassachusetts General Hospital is a teaching hospital and biomedical research facility in the West End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts...
. Whilst chief resident, he co-discovered a form of
maniaMania, the presence of which is a criterion for certain psychiatric diagnoses, is a state of abnormally elevated or irritable mood, arousal, and/ or energy levels. In a sense, it is the opposite of depression...
resulting from a concomitant medical illness, rather than a primary inherent disorder, which he named "secondary mania" and co-authored an important chapter (with Gerald Klerman) on the epidemiology of manic illness for the first worldwide textbook of Manic Illness edited by Baron Shopsin. Frequent reference to his work appears throughout the 2007 textbook Manic-Depressive Illness, edited by Fred Goodwin and Kay Jamison, a standard reference for bipolar disorder.
In 1978, Krauthammer quit the practice of psychiatry and came to Washington to direct planning in psychiatric research under the Carter administration. He began contributing articles about politics to
The New RepublicThe magazine has also published two articles concerning income inequality, largely criticizing conservative economists for their attempts to deny the existence or negative effect increasing income inequality is having on the United States...
and in 1980 served as a speech writer to
Vice PresidentA vice president is an officer in government or business who is below a president in rank. The name comes from the Latin vice meaning 'in place of'. In some countries, the vice president is called the deputy president...
Walter MondaleWalter Frederick "Fritz" Mondale is an American Democratic Party politician, who served as the 42nd Vice President of the United States , under President Jimmy Carter, and as a United States Senator for Minnesota...
. In January 1981, Krauthammer joined
The New Republic as both a writer and editor. In 1984, his
New Republic essays won the "National Magazine Award for Essays and Criticism". In 1983, he began writing essays for
TimeTime is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
magazine, one of which first brought him national acclaim for his development of the "
Reagan DoctrineThe Reagan Doctrine was a strategy orchestrated and implemented by the United States under the Reagan Administration to oppose the global influence of the Soviet Union during the final years of the Cold War...
"...a term that endures to date (see below herein under "Cold War"). In 1985, he began a weekly column for
The Washington PostThe Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
, which in 1987 was awarded the
Pulitzer PrizeThe Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
for commentary. In 1990, he became a panelist for the weekly PBS political roundtable,
Inside WashingtonInside Washington is a political roundtable show hosted by WJLA news anchor and chief political reporter Gordon Peterson. It is produced by Allbritton, owner of WJLA, and distributed to PBS stations nationwide by American Public Television...
. For the last decade, he has been a political analyst/commentator for Fox News.
In 2006, the
Financial TimesThe Financial Times is an international business newspaper. It is a morning daily newspaper published in London and printed in 24 cities around the world. Its primary rival is the Wall Street Journal, published in New York City....
named Krauthammer the most influential commentator in America, saying "Krauthammer has influenced US foreign policy for more than two decades. He coined and developed 'The Reagan Doctrine' in 1985 and he defined the US role as sole superpower in his essay, 'The Unipolar Moment', published shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Krauthammer's 2004 speech '
Democratic Realism', which was delivered to the
American Enterprise InstituteThe American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research is a conservative think tank founded in 1943. Its stated mission is "to defend the principles and improve the institutions of American freedom and democratic capitalism—limited government, private enterprise, individual liberty and...
when Krauthammer won the
Irving Kristol AwardThe Irving Kristol Award is the highest honor conferred by the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research.The award is given for "notable intellectual or practical contributions to improved public policy and social welfare" and named in honor of Irving Kristol. It replaced the Francis...
, set out a framework for tackling the post 9/11 world, focusing on the promotion of
democracyDemocracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...
in the Middle East."
In 2009,
PoliticoThe Politico is an American political journalism organization based in Arlington, Virginia, that distributes its content via television, the Internet, newspaper, and radio. Its coverage of Washington, D.C., includes the U.S. Congress, lobbying, media and the Presidency...
columnist
Ben SmithBen Smith is an American political journalist and blogger for the news outlet Politico, which was frequently cited during the 2008 presidential election. He formerly wrote for the Wall Street Journal Europe, the New York Sun, the New York Observer and wrote a political column for the New York Daily...
wrote that Krauthammer had "emerged in the Age of Obama as a central conservative voice," a "kind of leader of the opposition...a coherent, sophisticated and implacable critic of the new president."
The New York Times columnist
David BrooksDavid Brooks is a Canadian-born political and cultural commentator who considers himself a moderate and writes for the New York Times...
says that today "he's the most important conservative columnist." On July 29, 2011, former congressman and
MSNBCMSNBC is a cable news channel based in the United States available in the US, Germany , South Africa, the Middle East and Canada...
host
Joe ScarboroughCharles Joseph "Joe" Scarborough is an American cable news and talk radio host, lawyer, author, and former politician. He is currently the host of Morning Joe on MSNBC, and previously hosted Scarborough Country on the same channel...
said that Krauthammer "is, without a doubt the most powerful force in American conservatism. He has [been] for two, three, four years."
Apart from the Pulitzer Prize and the National Magazine Award for Essays and Criticism, Krauthammer has received numerous other awards, including the
People for the American WayPeople For the American Way is a progressive advocacy group in the United States. Under U.S. tax code, People For the American Way is organized as a tax-exempt 501 non-profit organization.-Purpose:...
's First Amendment Award, the Champion/Tuck Award for Economic Understanding, the first annual ($250,000) Bradley Prize, and the
Eric Breindel Award for Excellence in Opinion JournalismThe Eric Breindel Award for Excellence in Opinion Journalism, also known as the Eric Breindel Journalism Award, is an annual award commemorating Eric Breindel, a former editorial page editor of the New York Post. It is given to "the columnist, editorialist or reporter who best reflects the spirit...
, an annual award given by the
Eric Breindel FoundationEric M. Breindel was a neoconservative writer and former editorial page editor of the New York Post.He died of liver failure, having suffered from health problems throughout adulthood, as a result of AIDS, according to Michael Wolff in his book The Man Who Owns The News: Inside The Secret World Of...
.
Former president
Bill ClintonWilliam Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
called Krauthammer "a brilliant man" in a December 2010 press conference. Krauthammer responded,
tongue-in-cheekTongue-in-cheek is a phrase used as a figure of speech to imply that a statement or other production is humorously intended and it should not be taken at face value. The facial expression typically indicates that one is joking or making a mental effort. In the past, it may also have indicated...
, that "my career is done" and "I'm toast".
Cold War
Krauthammer first gained attention in the mid-1980s when he first used the phrase "
Reagan DoctrineThe Reagan Doctrine was a strategy orchestrated and implemented by the United States under the Reagan Administration to oppose the global influence of the Soviet Union during the final years of the Cold War...
" in his
Time magazine column. The phrase was a reference to the American foreign policy of supporting anti-communist insurgencies around the globe (most notably
NicaraguaNicaragua is the largest country in the Central American American isthmus, bordered by Honduras to the north and Costa Rica to the south. The country is situated between 11 and 14 degrees north of the Equator in the Northern Hemisphere, which places it entirely within the tropics. The Pacific Ocean...
,
AngolaAngola, officially the Republic of Angola , is a country in south-central Africa bordered by Namibia on the south, the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the north, and Zambia on the east; its west coast is on the Atlantic Ocean with Luanda as its capital city...
and
AfghanistanAfghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
) as a response to the
Brezhnev DoctrineThe Brezhnev Doctrine was a Soviet Union foreign policy, first and most clearly outlined by S. Kovalev in a September 26, 1968 Pravda article, entitled “Sovereignty and the International Obligations of Socialist Countries.” Leonid Brezhnev reiterated it in a speech at the Fifth Congress of the...
and reflected a U.S. foreign policy that went beyond
containmentContainment was a United States policy using military, economic, and diplomatic strategies to stall the spread of communism, enhance America’s security and influence abroad, and prevent a "domino effect". A component of the Cold War, this policy was a response to a series of moves by the Soviet...
of the
Soviet UnionThe Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
to
rollbackIn political science, rollback is the strategy of forcing change in the major policies of a state, usually by replacing its ruling regime. It contrasts with containment, which means preventing the expansion of that state; and with détente, which means a working relationship with that state...
of recent Soviet influence in the
Third WorldThe term Third World arose during the Cold War to define countries that remained non-aligned with either capitalism and NATO , or communism and the Soviet Union...
. The policy, which was strongly supported by
Heritage FoundationThe Heritage Foundation is a conservative American think tank based in Washington, D.C. Heritage's stated mission is to "formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong...
foreign policy analysts and other conservatives, was ultimately embraced by Reagan's senior national security and foreign policy officials. Krauthammer's description of it as the "
Reagan DoctrineThe Reagan Doctrine was a strategy orchestrated and implemented by the United States under the Reagan Administration to oppose the global influence of the Soviet Union during the final years of the Cold War...
" has since endured.
In "The Poverty of Realism" (
New Republic, February 17, 1986), he developed the underlying theory "that the end of American foreign policy is not just the security of the United States, but what John Kennedy called 'the success of liberty'. That means, first, defending the community of democratic nations (the repository of the liberal idea), and second, encouraging the establishment of new liberal policies at the frontier, most especially in the Third World." The foreign policy, he argued, should be both "universal in aspiration", and "prudent in application", thus combining American
idealismIn the American study of international relations, idealism usually refers to the school of thought personified in American diplomatic history by Woodrow Wilson, such that it is sometimes referred to as Wilsonianism, or Wilsonian Idealism. Idealism holds that a state should make its internal...
and realism. Over the next 20 years these ideas developed into what is now called "Democratic Realism".
Post–Cold War
In the lead article in
Foreign Affairs, titled "The Unipolar Moment" Krauthammer coined the term "unipolarity" to describe the world structure that was emerging with the fall of the Soviet Union. Conventional wisdom of the late 1980s was that the bipolar world of the Cold War would give way to a multipolar world in which the U.S. was one of many centers of power, co-equal to the
European UnionThe European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
, Japan, China, and others. Krauthammer predicted that instead, a unipolar world would emerge dominated by the United States with a power gap between the most powerful state and the second-most powerful state that would exceed any other in history. He also suggested that American hegemony would inevitably exist for only a historical "moment", lasting at best for three or four decades.
Hegemony gave the United States the capacity and responsibility to act unilaterally if necessary, Krauthammer argued. Throughout the 90s, however, he was circumspect about how that power ought to be used. He split from his neoconservative colleagues who were arguing for an interventionist policy of "American greatness". Krauthammer wrote that in the absence of a global existential threat the United States should stay out of "teacup wars" in failed states, and instead adopt a "dry powder" foreign policy of nonintervention and readiness.
Krauthammer opposed purely "humanitarian intervention" (with the exception of overt genocide). While he supported the 1991 Gulf War on the grounds of both humanitarianism and strategic necessity (preventing
Saddam HusseinSaddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...
from gaining control of the
Persian GulfThe Persian Gulf, in Southwest Asia, is an extension of the Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.The Persian Gulf was the focus of the 1980–1988 Iran-Iraq War, in which each side attacked the other's oil tankers...
and its resources), he opposed American intervention in the Balkan wars on the grounds that America should not be committing the lives of its soldiers to purely humanitarian missions in which there is no American national interest at stake.
9/11, Iraq and the War on Terror
He laid out the underlying principle of strategic necessity restraining democratic idealism in his controversial 2004
Kristol AwardThe Irving Kristol Award is the highest honor conferred by the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research.The award is given for "notable intellectual or practical contributions to improved public policy and social welfare" and named in honor of Irving Kristol. It replaced the Francis...
Lecture: "We will support democracy everywhere, but we will commit blood and treasure only in places where there is a strategic necessity—meaning, places central to the larger war against the existential enemy, the enemy that poses a global mortal threat to freedom."
The 9/11 attacks, Krauthammer wrote, made clear the new existential threat and the necessity for a new interventionism. On September 12, 2001 he wrote that, if the suspicion that al Qaeda was behind the attack proved correct, the United States had no choice but to go to war in Afghanistan. He supported the Iraq war on the "realist" grounds of the strategic threat the Saddam regime posed to the region as UN sanctions were eroding and of his alleged weapons of mass destruction; and on the "idealist" grounds that a self-sustaining democracy in Iraq would be a first step towards changing the poisonous political culture of tyranny, intolerance and religious fanaticism in the Arab world that had incubated the anti-American extremism from which 9/11 emerged.
In October 2002, he presented what he believed were the primary arguments for and against the war, writing, "Hawks favor war on the grounds that
Saddam HusseinSaddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...
is reckless, tyrannical and instinctively aggressive, and that if he comes into possession of nuclear weapons in addition to the
weapons of mass destructionA weapon of mass destruction is a weapon that can kill and bring significant harm to a large number of humans and/or cause great damage to man-made structures , natural structures , or the biosphere in general...
he already has, he is likely to use them or share them with terrorists. The threat of mass death on a scale never before seen residing in the hands of an unstable madman is intolerable – and must be
preemptedA preemptive war is a war that is commenced in an attempt to repel or defeat a perceived inevitable offensive or invasion, or to gain a strategic advantage in an impending war before that threat materializes. It is a war which preemptively 'breaks the peace'. The term: 'preemptive war' is...
."
"Doves oppose war on the grounds that the risks exceed the gains. War with Iraq could be very costly, possibly degenerating into
urban warfareUrban warfare is combat conducted in urban areas such as towns and cities. Urban combat is very different from combat in the open at both the operational and tactical level...
".
"I happen to believe that the
preemption schoolA preemptive war is a war that is commenced in an attempt to repel or defeat a perceived inevitable offensive or invasion, or to gain a strategic advantage in an impending war before that threat materializes. It is a war which preemptively 'breaks the peace'. The term: 'preemptive war' is...
is correct, that the risks of allowing
Saddam HusseinSaddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...
to acquire his weapons will only grow with time. Nonetheless, I can both understand and respect those few Democrats who make the principled argument against war with Iraq on the grounds of
deterrenceDeterrence theory gained increased prominence as a military strategy during the Cold War with regard to the use of nuclear weapons, and features prominently in current United States foreign policy regarding the development of nuclear technology in North Korea and Iran. Deterrence theory however was...
, believing that safety lies in reliance on a proven (if perilous) balance of terror rather than the risky innovation of forcible disarmament by preemption."
On the eve of the invasion, Krauthammer wrote that "[r]eformation and reconstruction of an alien culture are a daunting task. Risky and, yes, arrogant." In February 2003, Krauthammer cautioned that "it may yet fail. But we cannot afford not to try. There is not a single, remotely plausible, alternative strategy for attacking the monster behind 9/11. It’s not Osama bin Laden; it is the cauldron of political oppression, religious intolerance, and social ruin in the Arab-Islamic world—oppression transmuted and deflected by regimes with no legitimacy into virulent, murderous anti-Americanism." Krauthammer in 2003 noted that the
reconstruction of IraqInvestment in post-2003 Iraq refers to international efforts to rebuild the infrastructure of Iraq since the Iraq War in 2003.Along with the economic reform of Iraq, international projects have been implemented to repair and upgrade Iraqi water and sewage treatment plants, electricity production,...
would provide many benefits for the Iraqi people, once the political and economic infrastructure destroyed by Saddam was restored: "With its oil, its urbanized middle class, its educated population, its essential modernity, Iraq has a future. In two decades Saddam Hussein reduced its GDP by 75 percent. Once its political and industrial infrastructures are reestablished, Iraq's potential for rebound, indeed for explosive growth, is unlimited."
In a speech to the Foreign Policy Association in Philadelphia, he argued that the "
Arab SpringThe Arab Spring , otherwise known as the Arab Awakening, is a revolutionary wave of demonstrations and protests occurring in the Arab world that began on Saturday, 18 December 2010...
" that had brought the beginnings of democratization in the Arab world had been met in 2006 with a "fierce counterattack" by radical Islamist forces in Lebanon, Palestine and especially Iraq, which witnessed a major intensification in sectarian warfare. In late 2006 and 2007, he was one of the few commentators to support the surge in Iraq.
Ideology
Within the American political spectrum, Krauthammer has been called a
conservativeConservatism in the United States has played an important role in American politics since the 1950s. Historian Gregory Schneider identifies several constants in American conservatism: respect for tradition, support of republicanism, preservation of "the rule of law and the Christian religion", and...
, . However, on domestic issues, Krauthammer is a supporter of
legalized abortionAbortion in the United States has been legal in every state since the United States Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade, on January 22, 1973...
; an opponent of the
death penaltyCapital punishment in the United States, in practice, applies only for aggravated murder and more rarely for felony murder. Capital punishment was a penalty at common law, for many felonies, and was enforced in all of the American colonies prior to the Declaration of Independence...
; an
intelligent designIntelligent design is the proposition that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." It is a form of creationism and a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for...
critic and an advocate for the
scientific consensusScientific consensus is the collective judgment, position, and opinion of the community of scientists in a particular field of study. Consensus implies general agreement, though not necessarily unanimity. Scientific consensus is not by itself a scientific argument, and it is not part of the...
on
evolutionEvolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
, calling the religion-science controversy a "false conflict;" a supporter of embryonic stem cell research using embryos discarded by fertility clinics with restrictions in its applications; and a longtime advocate of radically higher energy
taxesThe United States is a federal republic with autonomous state and local governments. Taxes are imposed in the United States at each of these levels. These include taxes on income, property, sales, imports, payroll, estates and gifts, as well as various fees.Taxes are imposed on net income of...
to induce
conservationEnergy conservation refers to efforts made to reduce energy consumption. Energy conservation can be achieved through increased efficient energy use, in conjunction with decreased energy consumption and/or reduced consumption from conventional energy sources...
.
Meg GreenfieldMary Ellen Greenfield was a Washington Post and Newsweek editorial writer and a Washington, D.C. insider known for her wit and for being reclusive....
,
editorialAn opinion piece is an article, published in a newspaper or magazine, that mainly reflects the author's opinion about the subject. Opinion pieces are featured in many periodicals.-Editorials:...
page editor for
The Washington Post who edited Krauthammer's columns for 15 years, called his weekly column "independent and hard to peg politically. It's a very tough column. There's no 'trendy' in it. You never know what is going to happen next."
Hendrik HertzbergHendrik Hertzberg is an American journalist, best known as the principal political commentator for The New Yorker magazine. He has also been a speechwriter for President Jimmy Carter and editor of The New Republic, and is the author of ¡Obámanos! The Rise of a New Political Era and Politics:...
, a former colleague of Krauthammer's at
The New Republic during the 1980s, said that when the two first met in 1978, Krauthammer was "70 per cent
MondaleWalter Frederick "Fritz" Mondale is an American Democratic Party politician, who served as the 42nd Vice President of the United States , under President Jimmy Carter, and as a United States Senator for Minnesota...
liberal, 30 per cent 'Scoop Jackson Democrat,' that is, hard-line on Israel and relations with the Soviet Union;" while in the mid-80s, he was still "50-50: fairly liberal on economic and social questions but a full-bore foreign-policy neoconservative." Hertzberg now calls Krauthammer a "pretty solid 90-10 Republican."
Krauthammer's major monograph on foreign policy, "Democratic Realism: An American Foreign Policy for a Unipolar World," is critical both of the neoconservative Bush doctrine for being too expansive and utopian, and of foreign policy "realism" for being too narrow and immoral; instead, he proposes an alternative he calls "Democratic Realism." In a 2005 speech (later published in
Commentary Magazine) he called neoconservatism "a governing ideology whose time has come." He noted that the original "fathers of neoconservatism" were "former liberals or leftists". More recently, they have been joined by "realists, newly mugged by reality," such as
Condoleezza RiceCondoleezza Rice is an American political scientist and diplomat. She served as the 66th United States Secretary of State, and was the second person to hold that office in the administration of President George W. Bush...
, Richard Cheney, and
George W. BushGeorge Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
, who "have given weight to neoconservatism, making it more diverse and, given the newcomers’ past experience, more mature." In "Charlie Gibson's Gaffe" in
The Washington PostThe Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
, September 13, 2008, Krauthammer elaborated on the changing meanings of the
Bush DoctrineThe Bush Doctrine is a phrase used to describe various related foreign policy principles of former United States president George W. Bush. The phrase was first used by Charles Krauthammer in June 2001 to describe the Bush Administration's unilateral withdrawals from the ABM treaty and the Kyoto...
in light of Gibson's controversial questioning of Republican Vice-Presidential candidate
Sarah PalinSarah Louise Palin is an American politician, commentator and author. As the Republican Party nominee for Vice President in the 2008 presidential election, she was the first Alaskan on the national ticket of a major party and first Republican woman nominated for the vice-presidency.She was...
regarding what exactly the Bush Doctrine was, as if there was a single definition. Palin was criticized for her response. Krauthammer states in the article that "The Bush Doctrine" has had "four distinct meanings, each one succeeding another over the eight years of" the Bush Administration. Krauthammer states that the phrase "Bush Doctrine" originally referred to "the unilateralism that characterized the pre-9/11 first year of the Bush administration." He states that "There is no single meaning of the Bush Doctrine. He also states "the fourth and current definition of the Bush doctrine, the most sweeping formulation of the Bush approach to foreign policy and the one that most clearly and distinctively defines the Bush years: the idea that the fundamental mission of American foreign policy is to spread democracy throughout the world."
Religion
Krauthammer describes himself as Jewish but "not religious." In a
Jerusalem Post interview he reflected on how he had been influenced by his study of
MaimonidesMoses ben-Maimon, called Maimonides and also known as Mūsā ibn Maymūn in Arabic, or Rambam , was a preeminent medieval Jewish philosopher and one of the greatest Torah scholars and physicians of the Middle Ages...
at
McGillMcGill may refer to:People:* McGill , a common surname of Scottish and Irish origin and list of for individuals with the surname McGill* McGill family , a prominent early Americo-Liberian family...
with Rabbi David Hartman, head of Jerusalem's Hartman Institute and professor of philosophy at McGill during Krauthammer's student days, to see the grandeur of Jewish culture.
Krauthammer is a critic of
intelligent designIntelligent design is the proposition that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." It is a form of creationism and a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for...
, and wrote several articles in 2005 likening it to "tarted-up
creationismCreationism is the religious beliefthat humanity, life, the Earth, and the universe are the creation of a supernatural being, most often referring to the Abrahamic god. As science developed from the 18th century onwards, various views developed which aimed to reconcile science with the Genesis...
."
He has received a number of awards for his commentary related to religion, including the
People for the American WayPeople For the American Way is a progressive advocacy group in the United States. Under U.S. tax code, People For the American Way is organized as a tax-exempt 501 non-profit organization.-Purpose:...
’s First Amendment Award for his
New RepublicThe magazine has also published two articles concerning income inequality, largely criticizing conservative economists for their attempts to deny the existence or negative effect increasing income inequality is having on the United States...
essay "America's Holy Wars" in 1985, and the
Guardian of Zion AwardThe Guardian of Zion Award is an annual award given since 1997 to Jews who have been supportive of the State of Israel. It is awarded at the Ingeborg Rennert Center for Jerusalem Studies at Bar-Ilan University, where the prize recipient gives the keynote address....
of
Bar-Ilan UniversityBar-Ilan University is a university in Ramat Gan of the Tel Aviv District, Israel.Established in 1955, Bar Ilan is now Israel's second-largest academic institution. It has nearly 26,800 students and 1,350 faculty members...
in 2002.
Krauthammer opposed the Park51 Islamic community center project in
ManhattanManhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
for “reasons of common decency and respect for the sacred. No commercial tower over Gettysburg, no convent at Auschwitz - and no mosque at Ground Zero. Build it anywhere but there.”
President's Council on Bioethics
Krauthammer was appointed to President
George W. BushGeorge Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
's President's Council on Bioethics in 2002. He supported relaxing the Bush administration's limits on federal funding of human embryonic stem cell research. But he has opposed
human experimentationHuman subject research includes experiments and observational studies. Human subjects are commonly participants in research on basic biology, clinical medicine, nursing, psychology, and all other social sciences. Humans have been participants in research since the earliest studies...
, human
cloningCloning in biology is the process of producing similar populations of genetically identical individuals that occurs in nature when organisms such as bacteria, insects or plants reproduce asexually. Cloning in biotechnology refers to processes used to create copies of DNA fragments , cells , or...
and
euthanasiaEuthanasia refers to the practice of intentionally ending a life in order to relieve pain and suffering....
. He has warned that scientists were beginning to develop the power of "creating a class of superhumans." A fellow member of the Council, Janet D. Rowley, insists that Krauthammer's vision is still an issue far in the future and not a topic to be discussed at the present time. In March 2009, he was invited to the signing of the executive order by President Obama at the White House but declined to attend due to the "door being left open" as to the cloning of human embryos and the creation of normal human embryos solely for purposes of research. He also contrasted the "moral seriousness" of Bush's stem cell address of August 9, 2001 with that of Obama's address on stem cells.
End of life care
Krauthammer is critical of the idea of living wills and the current state of
end of life counselingIn medicine, end-of-life care refers to medical care not only of patients in the final hours or days of their lives, but more broadly, medical care of all those with a terminal illness or terminal condition that has become advanced, progressive and incurable....
in the U.S. He has written:
Miers nomination
Krauthammer criticized President
George W. BushGeorge Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
's nomination of
Harriet MiersHarriet Ellan Miers is an American lawyer and former White House Counsel. In 2005, she was nominated by President George W. Bush to be an Associate Justice of the U.S...
to succeed
Supreme CourtThe Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
Justice
Sandra Day O'ConnorSandra Day O'Connor is an American jurist who was the first female member of the Supreme Court of the United States. She served as an Associate Justice from 1981 until her retirement from the Court in 2006. O'Connor was appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1981...
. He called the nomination of Miers a "mistake" on several occasions. He noted her lack of constitutional experience as the main obstacle to her nomination.
On October 21, 2005, Charles Krauthammer published "Miers: The Only Exit Strategy," in which he explained that all of Miers' relevant constitutional writings are protected by both
attorney-client privilegeAttorney–client privilege is a legal concept that protects certain communications between a client and his or her attorney and keeps those communications confidential....
and
executive privilegeIn the United States government, executive privilege is the power claimed by the President of the United States and other members of the executive branch to resist certain subpoenas and other interventions by the legislative and judicial branches of government...
. This presented a unique face-saving solution to the mistake: "Miers withdraws out of respect for both the Senate and the executive's prerogatives". Six days later Miers withdrew, employing that argument. She stated her respect for "the strength and independence of our three branches of government" and noted that the "protection of the prerogatives of the Executive Branch and continued pursuit of my confirmation are in tension." Therefore, "I have decided that seeking my confirmation should yield."
The same day, NPR noted that "Krauthammer's scenario played out almost exactly as he wrote." Columnist E.J. Dionne wrote that the White House was following Krauthammer’s strategy "almost to the letter." And a few weeks later, the
New York Times reported that Krauthammer's "exit strategy" was "exactly what happened" and that he "has subsequently gotten credit for giving [the Bush administration] a plan."
Israel
Krauthammer strongly opposed the
Oslo accordsThe Oslo Accords, officially called the Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements or Declaration of Principles , was an attempt to resolve the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli conflict...
, predicting that Palestinian Liberation Organization leader Yasir Arafat would use the foothold it gave him in the
West BankThe West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
and
GazaGaza , also referred to as Gaza City, is a Palestinian city in the Gaza Strip, with a population of about 450,000, making it the largest city in the Palestinian territories.Inhabited since at least the 15th century BC,...
to continue the war against
IsraelThe State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
which he had ostensibly renounced in the Israel – PLO Letters of Recognition. In a July 2006 essay in
Time, Krauthammer asserted that the
Israeli–Palestinian conflictThe Israeli–Palestinian conflict is the ongoing conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. The conflict is wide-ranging, and the term is also used in reference to the earlier phases of the same conflict, between Jewish and Zionist yishuv and the Arab population living in Palestine under Ottoman or...
was fundamentally defined by the Palestinians' unwillingness to accept compromise.
During the Israel–Lebanon war in 2006, Krauthammer wrote a column, "Let Israel Win the War," saying: "What other country, when attacked in an unprovoked aggression across a recognized international frontier, is then put on a countdown clock by the world, given a limited time window in which to fight back, regardless of whether it has restored its own security?" He later criticized the Israeli Prime Minister
Ehud OlmertEhud Olmert is an Israeli politician and lawyer. He served as Prime Minister of Israel from 2006 to 2009, as a Cabinet Minister from 1988 to 1992 and from 2003 to 2006, and as Mayor of Jerusalem from 1993 to 2003....
's conduct, arguing that he "has provided unsteady and uncertain leadership. Foolishly relying on air power alone, he denied his generals the ground offensive they wanted, only to reverse himself later."
Krauthammer supports a
two-state solutionThe two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the consensus solution that is currently under discussion by the key parties to the conflict, most recently at the Annapolis Conference in November 2007...
to the conflict. Contrary to many conservatives, he supported Israel's Gaza withdrawal as a step toward rationalizing the frontiers between
IsraelThe State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
and a future Palestinian state. He believes a security barrier between the two states' final borders will be an important element of any lasting peace.
Krauthammer called
Richard GoldstoneRichard Joseph Goldstone is a South African former judge. After working for 17 years as a commercial lawyer, he was appointed by the South African government to serve on the Transvaal Supreme Court from 1980 to 1989 and the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of South Africa from 1990 to 1994...
’s
U.N. report on the 2008 Gaza warThe United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, known as the Goldstone Report, was a team established in April 2009 by the United Nations Human Rights Council during the Gaza War as an independent international fact-finding mission to investigate alleged violations of international...
, which states that Israel deliberately targeted and then killed Palestinian civilians, "a blood libel, ranking with the libels of the 19th century in which Jews were accused of ritually slaughtering children in order to use the blood in rituals."
Cloning
In a 1998 issue of Time magazine, Charles Krauthammer warned of the potential medical future of head transplanting with cloning:
“ At the University of Texas and at the University of Bath. During the past four years, one group created headless mice; the other, headless tadpoles. Why then create them?...Take the mouse-frog technology, apply it to humans, combine it with cloning, and you are become a god: with a single cell taken from, say, your finger, you produce a headless replica of yourself, a mutant twin, arguably lifeless, that becomes your own personal, precisely tissue-matched organ farm...Congress should ban human cloning now. Totally. And regarding one particular form, it should be draconian: the deliberate creation of headless humans must be made a crime, indeed a capital crime."
External links
- Krauthammer's Weekly Column in The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
- Krauthammer Archives at Jewish World Review
Jewish World Review is a free, online magazine updated Monday through Friday , which seeks to appeal to "people of faith and those interested in learning more about contemporary Judaism from Jews who take their religion seriously."It carries informational articles related to Judaism, dozens of...
- Krauthammer's biography at The Washington Post Writers Group
The Washington Post Writers Group is a press syndication service composed of opinion journalists, editorial cartoonists, comic strips and columnists. The service is operated by the Washington Post.-Writers:...
website