What's dead? War without the everything else

OP-ED: Liquidating the Empire, by Patrick J. Buchanan, Human Events, 10/14/2008

Trenchant piece, as they say.

But Buchanan's take on "empire" is really all that dies here. For those who perceive America's main power in, and primary impact on, this world in military terms, the end of the world is clearly near.

But what really dies here? Unilateralism, go-it-alone-ism, "primacy," and the chimera that a "league of democracies" or the West is a sufficient quorum to rule the world.

Globalization comes with rules, not a ruler. Those rules, while under constant revision, apply to all. Our exceptionalism is path-breaking, not treaty-busting.

So all that really dies here is the neocon dreams and the bankruptcy of this administration's simplistic foreign policy.

Reality is mostly made up of economics in this world of our creating. Some of us just didn't get the memo, but more got the eviction notice.

(Thanks: Elmer Humes)

Comments

[Brian H]

I invite all to search "Cloward-Piven". Or read this:http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/09/barack_obama_and_the_strategy.html .

The Economist has "Capitalism at Bay" for its current headline. At bay, indeed; and not to anonymous forces of human vaguarity.

'... Rudy Giuliani cited Cloward and Piven by name as being responsible for "an effort at economic sabotage." He also credited Cloward-Piven with changing the cultural attitude toward welfare from that of a temporary expedient to a lifetime entitlement, an attitude which in-and-of-itself has caused perhaps the greatest damage of all.

Cloward and Piven looked at this strategy as a gold mine of opportunity. Within the newly organized groups, each offensive would find an ample pool of foot soldier recruits willing to advance its radical agenda at little or no pay, and expand its base of reliable voters, legal or otherwise. The radicals' threatening tactics also would accrue an intimidating reputation, providing a wealth of opportunities for extorting monetary and other concessions from the target organizations. In the meantime, successful offensives would create an ever increasing drag on society. As they gleefully observed:

Moreover, this kind of mass influence is cumulative because benefits are continuous. Once eligibility for basic food and rent grants is established, the drain on local resources persists indefinitely./

'

There is more going on than financial recklessness and malfeasance. There are EXPLICIT political root causes.

[Elmer Humes]

Tom, thanks for these incisive comments which I fully agree with.