• bad_news@lemmy.billiam.net
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    16 days ago

    If you think the tail cannot wag the dog, I’d suggest you look into our history in Vietnam, where our installed dictator led us around by the nose, exploiting our domestic politics (and democrats’ weird compensatory masculinity BS around needing to be bigger warmongers than the Republicans). The domestic, Christian Zionist movement is 100% republican. I don’t see any of those “deplorables” coming anywhere near influence in a DNC White House. And what you’re saying about Saudi Arabia is 100% on point, but, I would just ask, who actually benefits? Strikes me as shades of Diem. The idiots in DC may THINK they’re running an empire, but the empire is running them to their own ends, on our dime, yielding nothing but a sea of blood and destruction.

    • TheOubliette@lemmy.ml
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      16 days ago

      The US invasion and heavy bombing campaign in Vietnam and Cambodia was not the tail wagging the dog. It was an anticommunist, pro-colonial effort done in perceived US interests and with the expectation of victory via their scorched earth tactics. It replayed much of the US invasion of Korea, which happened along virtually identical lines for the same rationale. The greatest difference was the scale of US ground troops’ involvement, and just like the brigadier generals of the IDF, imperialists could not handle their task, they began to fall apart domestically due to having to pay literally any cost whatsoever for their crimes - even just PTSD.

      The Domestic Christian Zionist movement is not 100% Republican. Not at all. There is bipartisan consensus among the haute bourgeoisie and their facilitators in the political class and academia. The upper echelons are not wholly partisan, either, that is something taught to the masses they attempt to manipulate. The richest donate widely to Dems and GOPers depending on the issue and timing. Yass is a libertarian that donates to both GOPers and Dems as well as several Zionist and islamophobic orgs, for example.

      The global, US-based haute bourgeoisie benefit from the petrodollar and US dominance. They make their money from super-profits generated by these arrangements and fiscal manipulation via the dollar.

      The political class serves bourgeois interests and the deep state is the most aware of this. Not the InfoWars absurd idea of the deep state, just your run-of-the-mill careerists in the Pentagon, FBI, CIA, US State Department, the Fed, and so on. They are tied together through their knowledge and advocacy for US supremacy as the global seat of capital. They don’t all need to fully understand it, they only need to hear from “industry” and “finance” about how badly things will go if X country takes independent action. But they do, along with the largest monopolies, hire experts in the hopes of answering questions like, “what do US economic interests depend on?” And they get answers like, “dollar dependency, debts and surpluses denominated in dollars, and egficient ‘market access’ for US companies to buy up peripheral assets”. Those experts are also largely credentialed through a well-maintaining imperial system, they come from think tanks and academia funded by the same people that run The Atlantic Council and so on.

      The political class and the state bureaucracy are of course subordinate to capital, but they are truly on the same team. You don’t gain or stay in those positions if you oppose the interests of US-dominated capital. You are filtered out. You lose your election with a lack of donors and party support, with “your” party supporting your “opposition” party candidate! You lose your job for not being a “team player”, quietly losing promotions for unknown reasons, losing security clearance, and simply not being kept on when parties bring on their own people. The political class and bureaucrats learn this early in their careers and they, accordingly, exude smarmy careerism. They lash out dramatically if you threaten their ascendancy, too. They are vehemently reactionary towards sentiments for liberation movements because they care more about their own run for city council than any number of dead Palestinian kids.