Thank you
Robin

Lester Ness
Kunming
China

Your discussion about the left/right political construct was right on the money. Its turned into a really useful idealogical tool, to keep everyone fixated on the “other tribe” as the source of all problems, obscuring the fact that the dominant societal elite have largely plundered the nation’s wealth.

I have to say though, I think your guest went a bit astray of the mark in his assessment of the president-elect. The idea that Obama could do something along the lines of, say, attacking Iran is pretty misguided. Even Bush was forced to reject the idea, ultimately, because it’s an insane proposition. Obama wouldn’t dare, even if he didn’t owe his election to the anti-war movement (as pliant as it may be).

Just as many of Obama’s more enraptured supporters irrationally project onto him all their deepest desires, I think many folks (including many of my own basic intellectual persuasion) are also far too eager to irrationally project onto him their darkest fears. What Ive seen and heard recently suggests that Obama does intend to follow through on a (at least somewhat) meaningful withdrawal from Iraq, and I have begun to see a fracturing of the supposed “consensus” regarding a surge in Afghanistan. Theres no question that Obama has been forced to subordinate himself to the national security establishment, and you can never underestimate the poisonous effects of the enormous wealth that seeks to influence the president’s decision making, yet at the same time you cant so easily dismiss the fact that Obama developed in a background that was opposed to many of those same forces. At one time he protested against apartheid in south africa, heard sermons denouncing american foreign policy, befriended the very good palestinian scholar Rashid Khalidi, etc. In my opinion it is not in our interests to disown Obama before he has even taken his first official action. Especially when at the moment he is basically trying to engage all views in a conversation about how our policy should be headed. Obviously I don’t expect he will make a 180 degree change in our foreign policy, which is practically impossible, but I do expect he will make a change for the better, and how much better will depend on just how successfully we exert our pressure.

Ultimately I think a return to Clinton-era policies is not possible. America is a superpower in decline, economically and thus strategically. Financially we are nearly broken. There is an extent to which the political/media establishment realizes the unsustainability of the current course, and will accept the leader’s decision to terminate certain misguided policies. But again, just how much depends on us. We may be right, but we are also a minority position. So we’ve got to be loud. And we should only denounce Obama according to what he does, not what we speculate he might do.