The January/February issue of Foreign Affairs will carry a review essay by Mahmood Mamdani, a professor at Columbia, detailing “key parallels between neoconservatives and jihadists.” The two groups share “global ambitions,” “a deep faith in the efficacy of politically motivated violence,” and “cadres … tainted by early stints in the Trotskyist or the Maoist left.” This is old-hat conspiracy-mongering: It could be a Maureen Dowd column, if she were funny. What makes it piquant is its appearance in Foreign Affairs. For eons, the Council on Foreign Relations, which publishes Foreign Affairs, was thought to be the master spinner of a web of sinister influences, liberal/defeatist or New York/financial. “Linked” was the classic verb in anti-CFR exorcisms, though “tainted” is an excellent modern substitute. Is Foreign Affairs now publishing such stuff out of relief that it is no longer the target?
