I’ve seen several diarists and commenters here refer to prominent state Republicans as “neoconservatives.” In fact, there is no reason whatsoever to append that title to Matt Blunt, Rex Sinquefeld, or any other top conservative politician or activist in Missouri. Just plain old “conservative” will do.
Neoconservativism refers to a specific strain of conservatism actually derived originally from the far left fringe. Michael Harrington (a St. Louis native) coined the term in the 1970s when dismissing ex-Trotskyists who backed aggressive US military action in their anti-Soviet zeal. Almost all of the leading neoconservatives today were either intellectually descended from ex-Trotskyists, i.e. Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Elliot Abrams, or literally descended, such as Bill Kristol and John Podhoretz. Most of them are rather moderate on domestic issues compared to traditional conservatives.
But today’s conservatives in Missouri don’t have that lineage, intellectual or otherwise. They stand for traditional conservative values like privatizing government, regressive taxation, and defunding public services like education and social insurance. I don’t really see the need to add a new name – neocon – when the old one – con – fits nicely.
While everything you say is absolutely correct, the term Neo-Con has come to refer to those Republicans whose primary loyalties are to the wealthy and the largest corporations, as opposed to the traditional conservatives who are more associated with working class fundamentalist Christians. The Neo-Cons support wars of empire while Conservatives are more isolationist.
In calling Blunt & Co “Neo-Cons” there is an attempt to demonstrate (or promote) a wedge within the Republican Party by portraying the upper reaches of the Missouri Republican Party as supporting the rich rather than their socially conservative base. Note that Jim Talent may have lost some internal support as he was portrayed as becoming less conservative and more neo-con when he went to Washington and was seen as being affected by corporate cash.
Similarly, the Republican Party is everywhere feeling the split between its working class base and its corporate funders on the issue of illegal immigration, since the rich prosper mightily from cheap illegal labor while poor whites (not to mention poor Blacks) are the ones losing the jobs to illegal immigrants and suffering loss of wages as all working class wages in the jobs hiring illegals drops down to match the wages the illegals are willing to take.
And the Democrats are going to feel the same split between its union and working class base versus its neo-liberal corporate lobbyist funders.