Love and being the United States of America means never having to say you're sorry (at least not yet). It also means being pompously and ludicrously self-righteous – a bit like someone with a toilet seat around their neck offering you advice on etiquette.
The latest clanger in this line was dropped by Chuck Hagel, the US defence (sic) secretary at a recent three-day summit held in Singapore, where he accused China of being a "destabilizing force" in the South China Sea. Yes, perhaps in that little patch of brine, but what kind of authority does America have to accuse any country of destabilizing anywhere? After all, this is a country that is currently supporting factions – or simply stirring the shit – in on-going bloodbaths in Egypt, Syria, and the Ukraine.
While he was at it, Hagel also urged Thailand's coup leaders to restore "democracy," although democracy – or the US-approved version of it – seems to be the problem, fuelling a state of semi-anarchy in a country of otherwise placid Buddhists.
What made Hagel's statement all the more striking was the way it coincided with the latest news out of Libya, Obama's masterpiece of destabilization in recent years. Here the chaos created by US intervention has effectively turned the country into a basket case and a massive conduit for criminal people-smuggling gangs, attempting to flood Europe with the psychologically scarred outpourings of dysfunctional Third World countries and other experiments in US political stabilization.
While Europe's voters are turning to the so-called right-wing and anti-immivasion parties, Frontex, the EU border agency just reported a sharp rise in the number of people attempting the dangerous sea crossing from North Africa to Italy, creating a scenario reminiscent of the ironically-titled The Camp of the Saints, the famous novel by Jean Raspail, which describes Europe’s destruction at the hands of a refugee horde.
From January to April, 42,000 migrants were detected on these routes, with most of them crossing from Libya. The influx is now said to be higher than at the height of the Arab Spring, with another 300,000 reportedly in Libya, waiting to cross or be rescued by Europe's soft-touch maritime patrols. This situation is largely the result of the mess the US has created in Libya.
Not only has America destabilized Libya beyond repair, but the consequences of this is that it is also destabilizing its supposed European allies, as well as the EU in general, by facilitating mass Third World immigration. With this going on, Hagel has the effrontery to complain about China causing a bit of turbulence around a few shoals and uninhabited reefs on its oceanic doorstep.
America is waning in power and influence, and Hagel is part of this, drawing criticism from psychopaths like John McCain and the Israeli lobby for a more detached and limp-wristed foreign policy. His China jibe may simply stem from the desire of the impotent to substitute words for actions, but as the chaos in Libya and elsewhere shows, America still has the ability to cause great evil in the World.
Just as America once needed a political doctrine to exclude European interference in its continent, perhaps what the rest of the world now needs is a kind of "Anti-Monroe Doctrine," one that seeks to confine America's cack-handed geopolitics and glaring hypocrisies to its own New World backyard.
The latest clanger in this line was dropped by Chuck Hagel, the US defence (sic) secretary at a recent three-day summit held in Singapore, where he accused China of being a "destabilizing force" in the South China Sea. Yes, perhaps in that little patch of brine, but what kind of authority does America have to accuse any country of destabilizing anywhere? After all, this is a country that is currently supporting factions – or simply stirring the shit – in on-going bloodbaths in Egypt, Syria, and the Ukraine.
While he was at it, Hagel also urged Thailand's coup leaders to restore "democracy," although democracy – or the US-approved version of it – seems to be the problem, fuelling a state of semi-anarchy in a country of otherwise placid Buddhists.
What made Hagel's statement all the more striking was the way it coincided with the latest news out of Libya, Obama's masterpiece of destabilization in recent years. Here the chaos created by US intervention has effectively turned the country into a basket case and a massive conduit for criminal people-smuggling gangs, attempting to flood Europe with the psychologically scarred outpourings of dysfunctional Third World countries and other experiments in US political stabilization.
While Europe's voters are turning to the so-called right-wing and anti-immivasion parties, Frontex, the EU border agency just reported a sharp rise in the number of people attempting the dangerous sea crossing from North Africa to Italy, creating a scenario reminiscent of the ironically-titled The Camp of the Saints, the famous novel by Jean Raspail, which describes Europe’s destruction at the hands of a refugee horde.
From January to April, 42,000 migrants were detected on these routes, with most of them crossing from Libya. The influx is now said to be higher than at the height of the Arab Spring, with another 300,000 reportedly in Libya, waiting to cross or be rescued by Europe's soft-touch maritime patrols. This situation is largely the result of the mess the US has created in Libya.
Not only has America destabilized Libya beyond repair, but the consequences of this is that it is also destabilizing its supposed European allies, as well as the EU in general, by facilitating mass Third World immigration. With this going on, Hagel has the effrontery to complain about China causing a bit of turbulence around a few shoals and uninhabited reefs on its oceanic doorstep.
America is waning in power and influence, and Hagel is part of this, drawing criticism from psychopaths like John McCain and the Israeli lobby for a more detached and limp-wristed foreign policy. His China jibe may simply stem from the desire of the impotent to substitute words for actions, but as the chaos in Libya and elsewhere shows, America still has the ability to cause great evil in the World.
Just as America once needed a political doctrine to exclude European interference in its continent, perhaps what the rest of the world now needs is a kind of "Anti-Monroe Doctrine," one that seeks to confine America's cack-handed geopolitics and glaring hypocrisies to its own New World backyard.
