Feb 07
5
Chalmers Johnson – New Book – Nemesis
I am looking forward to reading Chalmers Johnson's new book. Here are some excerpts from an essay he wrote introducing the book at Working for Change.
“History
tells us that one of the most unstable political combinations is a
country — like the United States today — that tries to be a domestic
democracy and a foreign imperialist. Why this is so can be a
very abstract subject. Perhaps the best way to offer my thoughts on
this is to say a few words about my new book, Nemesis, and explain why I gave it the subtitle, “The Last Days of the American Republic.” Nemesis
is the third book to have grown out of my research over the past eight
years. I never set out to write a trilogy on our increasingly
endangered democracy, but as I kept stumbling on ever more evidence of
the legacy of the imperialist pressures we put on many other countries
as well as the nature and size of our military empire, one book led to
another.”
———————-
“As our
occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq turned into major fiascoes,
discrediting our military leadership, ruining our public finances, and
bringing death and destruction to hundreds of thousands of civilians in
those countries, I continued to ponder the issue of empire. In these
years, it became ever clearer that George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and
their supporters were claiming, and actively assuming, powers
specifically denied to a president by our Constitution. It became no
less clear that Congress had almost completely abdicated its
responsibilities to balance the power of the executive branch. Despite
the Democratic sweep in the 2006 election, it remains to be seen
whether these tendencies can, in the long run, be controlled, let alone
reversed.”
———————-
“The
American political system failed to prevent this combination from
developing — and may now be incapable of correcting it. The evidence
strongly suggests that the legislative and judicial branches of our
government have become so servile in the presence of the imperial
Presidency that they have largely lost the ability to respond in a
principled and independent manner. Even in the present moment of
congressional stirring, there seems to be a deep sense of helplessness.
Various members of Congress have already attempted to explain how the
one clear power they retain — to cut off funds for a disastrous
program — is not one they are currently prepared to use.”
———————-
“It is
possible that, at some future moment, the U.S. military could actually
take over the government and declare a dictatorship (though its
commanders would undoubtedly find a gentler, more user-friendly name
for it). That is, after all, how the Roman republic ended — by being
turned over to a populist general, Julius Caesar, who had just been
declared dictator for life. After his assassination and a short
interregnum, it was his grandnephew Octavian who succeeded him and
became the first Roman emperor, Augustus Caesar. The American military
is unlikely to go that route. But one cannot ignore the fact that
professional military officers seem to have played a considerable role
in getting rid of their civilian overlord, Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld. The new directors of the CIA, its main internal branches, the
National Security Agency, and many other key organs of the “defense
establishment” are now military (or ex-military) officers, strongly
suggesting that the military does not need to take over the government
in order to control it. Meanwhile, the all-volunteer army has emerged
as an ever more separate institution in our society, its profile less
and less like that of the general populace.”
———————-
2006, the Bush administration submitted to Congress a $439 billion
defense appropriation budget for fiscal year 2007. As the country
enters 2007, the administration is about to present a nearly $100
billion supplementary request to Congress just for the Iraq and Afghan
wars. At the same time, the deficit in the country's current account –
the imbalance in the trading of goods and services as well as the
shortfall in all other cross-border payments from interest income and
rents to dividends and profits on direct investments — underwent its
fastest ever quarterly deterioration. For 2005, the current account
deficit was $805 billion, 6.4% of national income. In 2005, the U.S.
trade deficit, the largest component of the current account deficit,
soared to an all-time high of $725.8 billion, the fourth consecutive
year that America's trade debts set records. The trade deficit with
China alone rose to $201.6 billion, the highest imbalance ever recorded
with any country. Meanwhile, since mid-2000, the country has lost
nearly three million manufacturing jobs.”