Screaming about the historic horror of Trump's Syria "withdrawal" is destructive for several reasons. Not only does it whitewash previous examples of horrific US policy, it wrongly implies that the Syria mission was always virtuous and well-founded, and Trump just screwed it up
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) October 24, 2019
Bret Stephens has a good opinion piece in The New York Times this morning about how liberals and progressives have been driven by Trump Derangement Syndrome into embracing American imperialism in both trade policy and foreign policy.
“Donald Trump’s abrupt withdrawal of U.S. forces from Syria has drawn widespread scorn from Republicans and Democrats alike, and with good reason: The U.S. has betrayed an ally and ceded influence to a gallery of rogues — Bashar al-Assad, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Vladimir Putin and Qassim Suleimani, to name a few — in exchange for a hollow talking point about ending endless wars.
But give Trump this: He’s turning a remarkable number of foreign policy liberals and progressives into born-again neoconservatives.
That’s a thought worth pondering as the president pursues a foreign policy that, had it been undertaken by a Democratic administration, would likely have been met with considerable approval on the left …”
Obviously, Blompf isn’t perfect, but he has withdrawn troops from Syria to the horror of the Republican foreign policy establishment. He hasn’t started a new war yet with Iran either much to the crushing disappointment of neocons and the Pentagon. Most of them have found a new home at CNN and The Washington Post and within the Democratic Party.
A few years ago, the Democrats sounded more like Tulsi Gabbard than Hillary Clinton, but since Hillary lost the 2016 election by decisively losing the Midwest to Trump the party has embraced her positions on globalism. It isn’t clear which of the two parties is more opposed to new imperialist adventures now. Generally speaking, the Republican Party has gotten better on the issue while the Democratic Party has gotten worse although there are still loud champions of endless wars and free trade within the Republican Party like Sen. Lindsey Graham.
Donald Trump’s foreign policy is reminiscent of Obama’s foreign policy in that he makes gestures to the majority sentiment about winding down all of these wars and “bringing the troops home” while actually presiding over a military buildup and an overall increase in America’s military footprint in the CENTCOM region. The Democratic candidates sound more like John McCain and Mitt Romney in their wailing over the betrayal of “Muh Kurdish Allies.” Didn’t Barack Obama withdraw troops from Afghanistan and Iraq? What about those allies?
I agree with Bret that it has been a remarkable turnaround. I think it is great that the “progressive stool” has added a neocon leg to the neoliberal leg and the social liberalism leg. Overall, this is certain to make it more repulsive to moderate White voters in the Heartland.
Democrats loved Obama’s imperialist interventions, and Clinton’s. They’ve always been neocons when a Republican isn’t president, it’s just that this time they are becoming neocons even though a Republican is president.
Essentially Democrats are more anti-Russia, anti-Serbia and sometimes anti-China though that can change depending on where the GOP president stands, Republicans are more Zionist and anti-Iran though that is relative. Both hate Assad, hated Saddam, and hated Gaddafi.
What is really disgusting though is how the “radical left” including anarchist, Trots and even some supposed communists have acted as cheerleaders for post-cold war humanitarian imperialism, which is really just the same old cold war imperialism. Milosevic, Saddam, Assad, Gaddafi are all SOCIALISTS as well as anti Zionist patriots and that is why the US waged war against them. It was part of ZOG’s continuing global war against the real (patriotic) Left. But (((Noam Chomsky))) and the rest of the “extreme left of capital” are all whining about MUH KURDS and their US and Israel sponsored “revolution” that the US needs to keep protecting from the scary anti-imperialist “fascists”. As if any movement sponsored by the fucking US could be an actual revolution.
Both Democrats and Republicans have always favored more war, only their public stances have differed depending upon who was in office. The Democrats got a free pass heckling the hapless, incompetent GWB II over Iraq War II but they mostly voted for it. The few Democrats who voted against Iraq War II such as Bernie Sanders did it to burnish their Left Wing credentials. Had Iraq War II depended upon Bernie’s vote he would have voted for the war, it was for the benefit of Bernie’s countrymen, “our greatest ally”. There were enough pro war votes without Bernie so he got to be a hypocrite. Again.
The same pattern holds for all the wars/interventions since 1945, public stances are contradicted by votes in Congress. The geniuses thumping for war on C-SPAN from various so called “think tanks” eg. The Rand Corporation, Foundation for Defense of Democracies etc. rarely have military, especially combat experience. Retired officers are hired as window dressing for the Benjamins but the “support our troops” crowd supports the troops from 7,000 miles away, not 50 yards away, that’s too dangerous. The “elite” and theirs are too busy with college, making money, travelling etc. to risk their fat asses or their sons’ either. They are the worst scum, completely lacking in moral courage, hypocrites who have risen to the top of society at the expense of others and ultimately, our country.
https://web.viu.ca/davies/H323Vietnam/Draft_inequities.1969.htm
Rush, DJT, GWB II, Dick Cheney, John Bolton, Bill Clinton and a cast of millions made sure that their bitter cup passed them by, the proles weren’t so lucky.
Anarchists are in favor of imperialism, you said? Then they’re not anarchists. Anarchists want a stateless society. Did you mean some other kind of Marxist group? Those turds all want expansion of state power, which is anathema to anarchists.
The difference between neo-liberalism and neo-conservatism is like the difference between….I don’t know, fags and homos?
The Jews hate Trump because he won’t kill for them, which is pretty much all they want.
I never realized how wise my Irish-Catholic grandmother was until she died at 103. She frequently remarked about “The Wandering Jew” and that Jews had had no home. When I told her the Jews had Israel, she pooh-poohed the assertion. Neo-Cons truly are “Wandering Jews” they have no real home. Too many White Goys on The Right and POCs on The Left are no longer responding to cries of (((The Shoah))). Neo-Cons will find themselves as unwelcome guests among the POCs taking over the Democrat Party. POCs do not view Jews as a victim minority group, but rather as high status whites with a different religion.
It’s not going to last once the crosstalk starts to separate and the democrats themselves hash the debate out: “Was the movement of troops from Syria to western Iraq strategically wrong or morally wrong.”
Right now it seems like one big massive voice but it won’t be
They’ll be one group that says we need to fight it to the end and another that says get out, just get out smarter and don’t relocate resources to area next door.
Funny how the liberals, especially jews, suddenly become (chicken) hawks whenever it’s time to send US troops into the middle east to fight for Muh Greatest Ally.