The Washington Post’s Max Boot wants to “retire the ‘neocon’ label” because he believes it unfairly tarnishes the hawkish political elite who got America into the Iraq War and who have literally pushed for every war since. Boot claims national security adviser John Bolton doesn’t deserve to be called a neocon. Neither does former Vice President Dick Cheney. Nor does he.

Boot says “Neoconservatism” once had a real meaning — “back in the 1970s” when it was applied to ex-liberals who had drifted right but claims “the label has now become meaningless.”