Predatory Hegemony

In the March/April issue of Foreign Affairs, Stephen M. Walt, a professor of international affairs at the the Harvard Kennedy School, says the U.S.foreign policy can best be described as “predatory hegemony.”  Foreign policy is no longer treated as a “plus-sum” game in which two sides can benefit.  Instead, Trump sees it as a “zero-sum” game.  The U.S. gains will be at the expense of the losses of other countries, both former allies and opponents.

Here is how Walt sums up current policy:

A predatory hegemon is a dominant great power that tries to structure its transactions with others in a purely zero-sum fashion so that the benefits are always distributed in its favor.  A predatory hegemon’s primary goal is not to build stable and mutually beneficial relations that leave all parties better off but to ensure that it gains more from every interaction than others do.  An arrangement that leaves the hegemon better off and its partners worse off is preferable to an arrangement in which both sides gain but the partner gains more even if the latter case yields large absolute benefits for both parties.  A predatory hegemon always wants the lion’s share.

Walt points out that predatory hegemony often has short term gains but tends to ignore the long-term negative consequences.  The U.S. will become poorer, less secure, and less influential than it has been for last 100 years.  

Don't say you weren't warned

During my high school and college years I read a pile of science fiction.  That was a golden era of cheap paperback books and of really good science fiction writers like William Tenn, Isaac Asimov, Theodore Sturgeon, Judith Merril, Clifford Simak, Phillip K. Dick, and Poul Anderson.  

I got rid of most of those books years ago, but I still have a copy of Selections from Science-Fiction Thinking Machines edited by Groff Conklin.  This  paragraph is from the frontispiece of the Bantam edition of 1964:

Robots...Androids...Electronic Brains...

The mechanical men are waiting, biding their time.  Imitation flesh and blood–soulless, but not mindless–they were invented by man to do the world’s hard work.  But how long will they let us be masters?

What an A-hole

I wonder how many times I’ve uttered that phrase after hearing our President on some topic.  Must be hundreds.  

The latest was tonight when the news was showing him in front of a crowd at some political event bragging about how great the name “Epic Fury” sounded.

The fact that this war is costing billions, has killed American soldiers and about 130 Iranian school girls–not mentioned.  It’s like a game to him.  He has no idea what war is like.  

But wow, it has a neat name.  

What an A-hole.

Rep. Andy Ogles: "Muslims don't belong in American society"

 Rep. Andy Ogles

151 Cannon House Office Building

Washington D.C. 20515

Dear Rep. Ogles:

I know that you would never say that “Muslims don’t belong in American society.”  I know that someone is trolling you in order to discredit you and make you look like a bigot.  You need to come out with a firm denial that you said that.  

I think it is really nasty when people use the Internet or social media to discredit our Republican politicians.  I have friends and relatives in Tennessee, and I know that people in that great state are fine and reasonable people who would never insult millions of their fellow Americans.  Speak out and explain that you are a victim of a terrible smear.

Sincerely,

Roy Christman

Goliath's Curse

That’s a book by Luke Kemp, published last year by Alfred A. Knopf.  The subtitle is The History and Future of Societal Collapse..  I asked the Palmerton Library to order a copy, and I am almost finished with it.  (It’s 445 pages long with another 100 pages of end notes and the index.).  

If you read one book this year, read it.  On the other hand, if you want to continue whistling a happy tune, betting on football games, and thinking life is good, run from this book.  It will made you very afraid. 

Should President Bonespurs salute a soldier

In a word, no.  Although the President is Commander-in-Chief, the President is in civilian clothes.  According to armed forces regulations, the President is not required to salute.  In the past, generals who became Presidents, like Washington and Eisenhower, did not use the hand salute when meeting soldiers.  

The first President to salute troops was President Reagan, who during World War II made propaganda movies.

I will say this.  When the President is wearing a baseball cap and dead soldiers are being unloaded from the plane and passing in front of him, it might just be appropriate for him to take off his cap.  

 

Just to remind you how a real leader speaks

     We shall not flag nor fail.  We shall go on to the end.  We shall fight in France and on the seas and oceans; we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air.

     We shall defend our island whatever the cost may be; we shall fight on beaches, landing grounds, in fields, in streets and on the hills.  We shall never surrender and even if, which I do not for the moment believe, this island or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British Fleet, will carry on the struggle until in God’s good time the New World, with all its power and might, sets forth to the liberation and rescue of the Old.

Winston Churchill June 4. 1940

And then there is this:

“And sadly, there will be more [deaths] before it ends.  That’s the way it is.”

Donald Trump, earlier this week