The American left, which is afraid to touch "class politics" has gotten lost in issues of race and gender.The real problems of the United States are not about race or sex it is about class.

These are issues that cloud the vision and divide working people form their common problems. This is part of the "genius" of the American system, its talent for endlessly dividing, co-opting and distracting dissent.

Being poor is what marks Americans for failure and desperate lives, not sex of gender. American women of color like Michelle Obama or Oprah Winfrey are firmly entrenched in the upper-middle class despite being "victims" of both racism and sexism.

The real victims of the American system are the poor (especially the children) of all colors and sexual orientations. Unlike most other developed countries, in the USA it is almost impossible for them to escape from that condition.

The following analysis of the Obama-Hillary bloodletting  by über-neocon, Charles Krauthammer* is very insightful. I am not a fan of his, I would consider him what the English used to call, "a nasty piece of work", but he is very intelligent. Read it.

Krauthammer*: Adventures In Identity Politics - Washington Post
Elections can be about policy, personality or identity. The race between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton is surely not about policy. The differences between the two are microscopic. It did not start out that way. Last year, when Hillary was headed toward a coronation, she deliberately ran to the center. (...) When she began taking heat for those positions from the other candidates and the Democratic Party's activist core, and as her early lead began to erode, she quickly tacked left and found herself inhabiting precisely the same ideological space as Obama. With no substantive policy differences left, the Obama-Clinton campaign was reduced to personality and identity. Not advantageous ground for Hillary. In a personality contest with the charismatic young phenom, she loses in a landslide.(....) If you cannot successfully pretty yourself, dirty the other guy. Hence the relentless attacks designed to redefine Obama and take him down to the level of ordinary mortals, i.e., Hillary's. Thus the contrived shock on the part of the Clinton campaign that an Obama economic adviser would tell the Canadians not to pay too much attention to Obama's anti-NAFTA populism or that Samantha Power would tell the BBC not to pay too much attention to Obama's current withdrawal plans for Iraq. The attack line writes itself: Says one thing and means another. So much for the man of new politics. Just an ordinary politician -- like Hillary. Power, the maladroit Obama foreign policy adviser, is caught calling Hillary a "monster." A resignation demand nicely calls attention to the fact that the Obama campaign -- surprise! -- hurls invective. And a strategic mention of Tony Rezko, the Chicago fixer who was once Obama's patron, nicely attaches to Obama a whiff of corruption by association. These attacks have a cumulative effect. Obama mania is be What to do? First, adjust your own persona.(...) Did Bill Clinton deliberately encourage racial polarization by saying before South Carolina that one expects women to vote for Hillary and blacks for Obama? Or, after the primary, by dismissing Obama's victory with: "Jesse Jackson won South Carolina twice"? With Bill Clinton, you never know. And there is no proving cause and effect, but the chronology is striking. Two weeks before the South Carolina primary, Obama was leading Hillary among blacks by only 53 percent to 30 percent. Ten days later, Obama was ahead 59 to 25. On voting day, he got 78 percent of the black vote. By the time the campaign trail reached Mississippi on Tuesday, Obama was getting 92 percent of the black vote. And only 26 percent of the white vote. The pillars of American liberalism -- the Democratic Party, the universities and the mass media -- are obsessed with biological markers, most particularly race and gender. They have insisted, moreover, that pedagogy and culture and politics be just as seized with the primacy of these distinctions and with the resulting "privileging" that allegedly haunts every aspect of our social relations. They have gotten their wish. This primary campaign represents the full flowering of identity politics. It's not a pretty picture.(...) The optimist will say that when this is over, we will look back on the Clinton-Obama contest, and its looming ugly endgame, as the low point of identity politics and the beginning of a turning away. The pessimist will just vote Republican. READ IT ALL

* In German, "Krauthammer" means "Cabbage Hammer"
http://seaton-newslinks.blogspot.com/

  Asked whether the United States could repair the damage it has suffered to its reputation during the Bush presidency and especially since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, Kouchner replied, "It will never be as it was before." "I think the magic is over," he continued, in what amounted to a sober assessment from one of the strongest supporters in France of the United States. Bernard Kouchner, French Foreign Minister

I've been living abroad for many years and have had a good opportunity to evaluate America's image in the world. I think it is important to note that, although Bush has aggravated the situation and hastened the deterioration of America's image, he was not a primary cause, only another symptom.

Symptom of what?

In one word, "decadence".

The general view is that the United States is a power in decline. Some are happy at this decline, while others are saddened by it, and still others, like the Israelis, are terrified by it, but all are in agreement that the USA is decadent.

What Bush has done is to cause a significant number of people to evaluate the USA in a Chomsky like manner. It could be said that Noam Chomsky's critique of American power is now mainstream. We owe that to Bush's clumsiness. A majority of people in the world (if we are to believe the polls) see America as the "problem", not the "solution". It's desire to project its power by any means is considered the prime destabilizing factor in the world.

To compare the foreign policies of Clinton to Bush II, would be like comparing two magicians: Clinton would be David Copperfield, brilliant, perfect execution, but only smoke and mirors in the end and Bush would be like a children's birthday magician that reaches in his top hat and instead of a rabbit, come up with only a handful of rabbit poop. Both are fakes, but one is a pro and the other is incompetent.

It would behoove the United States to not think about ordering and cleaning up other people's messes, but to engage with all its resources in cleaning up its own mess: health, education, infrastructure, governance, corruption, etcetera. It would be good if it reduced its military spending and reconstructed its manufacturing sector. The list is endless. In the meanwhile America's foreign policy should be minimalist, realist, and not engaged in Wilsonian tilting at windmills.

If Bernard Kouchner, who is one of the world's most enthusiastic "liberal interventionist", thinks the "magic" is gone, believe me that the magic is gone: gone to where, to use a Spanish expression, "the wind turns around to come back."
http://seaton-newslinks.blogspot.com/

"A fateful debate is now taking place at the Pentagon that will determine the pace of U.S. military withdrawals for what remains of President Bush's term. Senior Pentagon officials -- including, we hear, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Joint Chiefs Chairman Mike Mullen, Army Chief of Staff George Casey and Admiral Fallon -- have been urging deeper troop cuts in Iraq beyond the five "surge" combat brigades already scheduled for redeployment this summer.(...) their rationale for troop withdrawals seems to have less to do with conditions in Iraq and more with fear that the war is putting a strain on the military as an institution." Wall Street Journal

 'You are going to be the proud owner of 25 million people,' Colin Powell told the president. 'You will own all their hopes, aspirations, and problems. You'll own it all.' Pottery Barn Rule

"In War, victory should be swift, if victory is slow, men tire, morale sags. Sieges exhaust strength; protracted campaigns strain the public treasury. If men are tired, moral low, strength exhausted, treasure spent; then the feudal lords will exploit the disarray and attack. This even the wisest will be powerless to mend.(...) No nation has ever benefited from a protracted war.(...) The skillful warrior never conscripts troops a second time " Sun Tzu, 500 BC

"It’s probably Fallon’s good sense that made it impossible for him to work for this administration." Cato Institute

Admiral Fallon's revelations in Esquire, nearly constitute what in 19th century Spain and Latin America was called a "pronunciamiento". In a sense, so was the intelligence report that Iran had dropped its nuclear program. This is probably as close to a coup d'etat as you can get in the United States today. The military and intelligence establishments are defying the President. Fallon has taken early "retirement" in order to publicize his views and throw a monkey wrench into the neocon/Israeli juggernaut to have the United States attack Iran before there is a changing of the guard in the White House.

I have very little to add to the many articles and columns being written about the Fallon affair. I would only underline the concern that I detect among the professional soldiers for the deteriorating state of the armed forces as an institution. This concern goes back before Bush. The Clinton administration was very impatient with the Powell Doctrine, "What’s the point of having this superb military you’re always talking about, if we can’t use it?" asked Madeline Albright. And although Barack Obama wants to "change the mindset that got us into the war", his recently canned adviser, Samantha Power wants to send the US armed forces all over the world to prevent genocide and stabilize failed states and bring democracy to the benighted heathen. Über-neocon Robert Kagan has this to say about Obama's military philosophy:

Obama wants to increase defense spending. He wants to add 65,000 troops to the Army and recruit 27,000 more Marines. Why? To fight terrorism. He wants the American military to "stay on the offense, from Djibouti to Kandahar," and he believes that "the ability to put boots on the ground will be critical in eliminating the shadowy terrorist networks we now face."

This endless patrolling of the world's sewers is something that the US armed forces desperately don't want to do. I think that it is forgotten that in many ways the armed forces are a community of families, deeply rooted in American life, with a continuity over generations. The recent film "In the Valley of Elah" gives some of the flavor of that.

Probably the only reason I am skeptical that John McCain is eager to follow the Bush/neocon/liberal-interventionist doctrine of endless tilting at windmills all over the globe is that his father and grandfather were US Navy admirals. The Republican candidate spent his entire life until entering politics in the US Navy: it is his home town, his youthful reality and dreams. Politics was a second choice career for him when he saw that his "lost" years as a prisoner of war were a detour from the chain of command that made it practically impossible for him to be an admiral like his father and grandfather.

I just can't imagine anyone with that background using up the lives and families of the men and women he grew up with in fool's errands, which may in fact not even be in America's greater interest. Not even Colin Powell himself could have such deep emotional ties to the military community that McCain must have. I can just imagine the hell he would catch from his Navy wife of a mother.

Nobody campaigning for the presidency is going to say a word that would trouble or concern AIPAC, so I discount all the words that all of them pronounce. I am only looking at their lives and trying to see their deepest motivations. It may be innocent on my part, but I feel that McCain's threats to bomb Iran follow the teachings of the timeless master of strategists, Sun Tzu:

 "Strong words combined with an aggressive advance are a sign of impending retreat."

This is the context within which I see Admiral Fallon's "pronunciamiento".

http://seaton-newslinks.blogspot.com/

Why do I think at this point that McCain would be a better foreign policy choice than either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama? Basically because I think that on foreign policy, deep down, he is in the line of traditional, Eisenhower Republicanism. It is George W. Bush and Cheney that are way outside the party traditions, up to their necks in Wilsonism.

Frankly I think McCain wants to actually do what Dubya said he wanted to do in 2000. That would be a G.H.W. Bush "restoration". Baker, Scowcroft, Powell doctrine stuff. Even Rice was supposed to be in that line. The surprise was when, after 9-11 Bush-II threw in his lot with the former Trotskista neocons. Even Yassir Arafat, who was pretty sharp, thought that Dubya was going to be like his father... they say the disappointment broke the old fellow's heart (sniff).

Although unfortunately phrased, Baker correctly defined the basic relationship between the oilmen Republicans and the Jewish community. I don't think that underlying logic has really changed. I suspect (hope?, pray?) that McCain is a closet Mearsheimer-Walt devotee.

The surprise was Dubya, who went against his entire culture and background to avoid antagonizing the people his father thought had cost him his reelection. I don't imagine that McCain has the same oedipal problems with Bush-I that Bush-II does, nor to share in his evangelical, last-days devotion to maximalist Zionism. In short, I'm hoping that he is an old fashioned, country club Republican.

As to McCain's professions of undying support for Israel, as Master Sun said, "war is deception": you don't telegraph your intentions. Keep AIPAC neutral. Talk about a hyperbolic, "hundred years in Iraq". Talk about, "bomb, bomb, bomb: bomb, bomb Iran". Neither a hundred years in Iraq nor bombing Iran appear doable: America is maxed out.

The fact is that if the USA could go to war with Iran it would have already happened; Cheney would have done it long ago if he could have. However, the United States' military is overextended and weary, and the country is on the brink of financial collapse. Setting the Middle East on fire would only push it over the edge.

Getting out of Iraq with some dignity is the number one foreign policy priority of the USA and the only existent plan for getting out of Iraq is the Baker Iraq Study Group's and negotiating with Iran is the key to its success. That is why the Israelis still hate Baker.

My feeling is that domestic policy (health care, education   , etc.)  should be in the hands of the Democrats and foreign policy should be in the hands of the "realists" and that US foreign policy should be deliberately minimalist, not the sort of Quixotic, Wilsonian brew that Obama is offering up or the Madeline Albright redux that Hillary is flogging.

None of this is at all sure, but frankly I cannot see any other successful alternative.
http://seaton-newslinks.blogspot.com/

Because of the time difference between the EU and the USA, just when things heat up here, I have to go to bed. So I thought I'd put a link to a post I made that I don't want anybody who read my stuff to miss. By the time many TPM readers wake up it has been pushed off to TPM purgatory.

It also can be found at
http://seaton-newslinks.blogspot.com

Quite a few people who read my posts have written to me saying, "David, it is all very well to criticize, but do you have any constructive suggestions to make? What do you suggest we do besides sitting around making cynical remarks like you do?" In fact some have used even harsher language than that. (sniff)

I gladly accept the challenge. This is a very fair question and deserves to be answered in some detail. Like the man said, "What is to be done?"

First I think it is important to look into the problems that the political class are being called upon to solve. What are the problems, and can they be solved by politicians? If so, which politicians are best suited to solve which problems?

As complex as the United States is, and as entwined and tangled as its problems are, I think they can be broken down roughly into two groups: domestic policy and foreign policy.

On the domestic front, the major issues, in my opinion, are establishing universal health care and protection of the working poor during what looks like turning into a severe recession or worse. The economic situation has many experts totally puzzled, that in itself bodes ill. Next on the list of priorities is repairing America's aging infrastructure. If we consider public education of quality part of infrastructure, then this is quite a shopping list. If we add guaranteeing the pensions of the soon to be retiring boomers to it, it is obvious that economies will have to be made in other areas... The military budget springs to mind.

This takes us closer to foreign policy.

Probably no one has a clearer grasp of where America's foreign policy and its domestic needs overlap than Chalmers Johnson. Here is how he defines the problem:

"We are spending insane amounts of money on "defense" projects that bear no relationship to the national security of the United States. Simultaneously, we are keeping the income tax burdens on the richest segments of the American population at strikingly low levels.(...) in our devotion to militarism (despite our limited resources), we are failing to invest in our social infrastructure and other requirements for the long-term health of our country. These are what economists call "opportunity costs," things not done because we spent our money on something else. Our public education system has deteriorated alarmingly. We have failed to provide health care to all our citizens and neglected our responsibilities as the world's number one polluter. Most important, we have lost our competitiveness as a manufacturer for civilian needs -- an infinitely more efficient use of scarce resources than arms manufacturing."

At this point the most glaring waste of resources is the miscarried war in Iraq. Professor Andrew Bacevich of Boston University author of "The New American Militarism", is one of the clearest thinking political analysts working in the United States. He described the situation in an article in the Los Angeles Times:

"The truth is that next to nothing can be done to salvage Iraq. It no longer lies within the capacity of the United States to determine the outcome of events there. Iraqis will decide their own fate. We are spectators, witnesses, bystanders caught in a conflagration that we ourselves, in an act of monumental folly, touched off."

So obviously the war in Iraq has to be ended and America's military budget has to be cut back and resources reassigned in order to attend to the needs of the American people themselves.

Up till now the only detailed and credible blue print for getting out of Iraq with some shred of dignity is James Baker's, "Iraq Study Group" report, called "dead on arrival" by such neocon luminaries as Robert Kagan and William Kristol. Daniel Pipes at the extreme right of ultra-zionist, neo-connerie, denounced the Baker report in the following terms:

"Of course, small minds assert that problems in Iraq are "inextricably linked" to the Arab-Israeli conflict – thereby repeating the precise mistake that lead co-chairman James A. Baker, III, made in 1991. He then led the effort to abandon the Persian Gulf and turn to the Palestinians, leaving Saddam Hussein in power for another dozen years and contributing directly to the present mess. In the new report, Mr. Baker and his colleagues call for a Palestinian state and even demand that a final settlement address the Palestinian "right of return" – code for dismantling the Jewish state. They peremptorily declare that "the Israelis should return the Golan Heights," in return for a U.S. security guarantee."

The right wing Israeli newspaper, The Jerusalem Post, described the report in these terms,

"How embarrassing. Senior figures from both major American parties have, in broad daylight, betrayed such staggering naivete that their report might not have passed muster with a reasonably discerning high school teacher, let alone offered a serious basis for US foreign policy."

And in the left leaning Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Shmuel Rosner wrote of how Governor Bill Richardson lost Jewish support by mentioning the "B word".

"Israel, he said, should be a bi-partisan issue he said charitably. And with this sense of bi-partisanship in mind pulled out of his hat the first name he could think of: Former Secretary of State James Baker. Baker was a member of an administration "widely viewed as the most hostile ever to Israel." Saying you might appoint him as your envoy (John McCain also did it in the past) is like telling people a "more balanced policy" is needed. It seems just fine to the untrained eye, but is actually a code-word which has only one meaning: I'm prepared to pressure Israel."

James Baker must be doing something right. Pressuring Israel is truly the belling of the cat. There is no solution in the Middle East short of Word War III that doesn't pass through settling the Palestinian conflict. The only one, except Jimmy Carter, that has ever really tried to bell the cat is James Baker.

Baker is supporting McCain:

 "I am proud today to endorse John McCain for President of the United States. Senator McCain is a great American leader, a true hero, a thoughtful and a dedicated Republican, and a person whom I greatly admire."

And McCain is supporting Baker:

 "Secretary Baker has a distinguished record of service to our country and our party. I look forward to his counsel and am honored to have his support."

The Forward, America's foremost Jewish newspaper commented at length on the endorsement:

Along the way to winning the presidential nomination of the Republican Party this week, Senator John McCain picked up the endorsement of James Baker, a former secretary of state with a long history of rocky ties with the American Jewish establishment. In the weeks since the February 28 endorsement, little protest has been heard from pro-Israel circles, and Jewish activists say Baker’s support is unlikely to become a campaign issue. Democratic frontrunner Barack Obama, meanwhile, has been heavily scrutinized for accepting the support of Zbigniew Brzezinski and Robert Malley, like Baker former administration officials who have riled the American Jewish community with their views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Jewish Republicans are quick to point out that the communal shrug toward Baker’s endorsement could turn antagonistic should the Arizona senator name the former secretary of state as an adviser, a role Brzezinski plays in the Obama campaign. At least one Jewish Democratic activist, however, is already crying foul, claiming that the American Jewish community is giving McCain an undeserved free pass. “There is a very, very disturbing double standard,” said Matt Dorf, a Jewish Democratic consultant who also works on Jewish communal issues with the Democratic National Committee. “I cannot think of any other figure in the Republican Party who raises more concerns than Jim ‘F**k the Jews’ Baker.”

There has been something moving on the right for some time now, among "realists" like James Baker, Brent Scowcroft, or Meersheimer and Walt; among libertarians like Ron Paul and the Cato Institute; or paleoconservitives like Pat Buchanan. All of them are pushing for a reevaluation of America's policy of foreign intervention. On the Democratic side, can anyone seriously imagine Hillary Clinton, Senator from New York, pressuring Israel. Frankly I can imagine McCain going up against anybody except his mom.

As to Barack Obama, the aforementioned neocon, Robert Kagan is enthusiastic about "Obama the Interventionist".

America must "lead the world in battling immediate evils and promoting the ultimate good." With those words, Barack Obama put an end to the idea that the alleged overexuberant idealism and America-centric hubris of the past six years is about to give way to a new realism, a more limited and modest view of American interests, capabilities and responsibilities.(...)To Obama, everything and everyone everywhere is of strategic concern to the United States. "We cannot hope to shape a world where opportunity outweighs danger unless we ensure that every child, everywhere, is taught to build and not to destroy." The "security of the American people is inextricably linked to the security of all people." Realists, call your doctors. Okay, you say, but at least Obama is proposing all this Peace Corps-like activity as a substitute for military power. Surely he intends to cut or at least cap a defense budget soaring over $500 billion a year. Surely he understands there is no military answer to terrorism. Actually, Obama wants to increase defense spending. He wants to add 65,000 troops to the Army and recruit 27,000 more Marines. Why? To fight terrorism. He wants the American military to "stay on the offense, from Djibouti to Kandahar," and he believes that "the ability to put boots on the ground will be critical in eliminating the shadowy terrorist networks we now face." He wants to ensure that we continue to have "the strongest, best-equipped military in the world." Obama never once says that military force should be used only as a last resort. Rather, he insists that "no president should ever hesitate to use force -- unilaterally if necessary," not only "to protect ourselves . . . when we are attacked," but also to protect "our vital interests" when they are "imminently threatened." That's known as preemptive military action. It won't reassure those around the world who worry about letting an American president decide what a "vital interest" is and when it is "imminently threatened." Nor will they be comforted to hear that "when we use force in situations other than self-defense, we should make every effort to garner the clear support and participation of others." Make every effort? Conspicuously absent from Obama's discussion of the use of force are four words: United Nations Security Council.

Do you see anything here that would liberate enough funds to attend properly to America's domestic agenda? I don't.

America cannot continue to intervene all over the world for a simple reason, Americans as we saw in the video featured in the previous post, know next to nothing of the world and care less. The people in the video are not morons, they are able to earn a living and, to coin a phrase, "put food on their families". They just don't care. What this means is that America's foreign policy can never be democratic.This means that it will be always prey to those who are focused on a single issue, like the Israel or Cuban lobbies. In my opinion that means that it should be minimalist in the line of Ron Paul. But Ron Paul is against universal health care and so is McCain, no?

What is the answer to all of this? How can we square this circle? How should Americans vote in November?

First lets run through the possibilities, as I see them:

Will the Democrats ever achieve universal health care. Maybe, probably not.

Will the Republicans ever vote for universal health care. Never.

Will the Democrats ever pressure Israel enough to pacify the Middle East? Never.

Will the Republicans ever pressure Israel enough to pacify the Middle East? Maybe, probably not.

Not very promising is it?

Taking all of this into account, I recommend that Americans vote massively for Democratic candidates in local, congressional and senate races. The Democrats should have majorities in both houses to comfortably override any presidential veto. This might bring about universal health care and keep the Republican from sending more taliban to the Supreme Court. And for president... vote for John McCain. I don't think either Hillary or Obama are ready for prime time and I think both of them would continue with "liberal interventionist" adventures, which make any improvement in domestic policy impossible.

Is this really a solution? No, not really.