comment on Zionism discussion

[Brad DeLong]

>On Sat, 14 Jul 2001, Brad DeLong wrote:
>
>>  But what does the U.S. get from this $3 billion a year, besides a
>>  more difficult and prickly relationship with the Gulf states where
>>  the oil is?
>
>That's a post-Cold War question, but we're talking about the history of
>the Cold War era. Capitalist empires don't "get" things from their proxies
>the way the Romans plundered their provinces.

Then why have an empire?


>There's a different
>rationality at work, namely classic good-cop, bad-cop strategy: the minor
>powers serve as the attack dogs, gendarmes, and errand-runners, so that
>the hegemon can relax and watch NFL football

Simply not true. An enormous amount of the hegemon's time and energy 
is spent trying to make the minor powers behave...


>
>Put more sharply still, you'd have to explain why the US *didn't* invest
>those billions in R&D, or energy conservation. The answer isn't stupidity
>or some evil conspiracy of brain-eating aliens, but objective history: a
>decrepit, enfeebled 18th century system of governance and the narrow and
>self-destructive class interest of the ruling elites of the US.
>
>-- Dennis

Ah. So now we get to the point. You agree with me. It makes no sense 
at all--at least not from a flint-eyed State Department realist 
perspective...

Brad DeLong