Tactical differences exist, but what are exactly the interests of the multinational empire in the Middle East?
> You're not suggesting, are you, that the Bush administration would be better
> advised, from the standpoint of US imperialism, to revert to unilateralism
> and reliance on its high-tech armed forces - the (ideological) view which
> governed its first three years in office?
We can only evaluate means in relation to ends. We may imagine that, say, if _we_ were running the empire, we'd have these interests, these long-term, medium-term, and short-term goals, and these means would work better for those goals than the White House's means. But the White House must have different goals, based on its own conception of the empire's interests, than what we think should be the empire's goals. We can't rule out that the means the White House has chosen aren't the best possible ones under the circumstances to further their goals (though not our conception of what is in the interest of the empire).
It's like that joke from Yes, Prime Minister:
Jim Hacker: "I know exactly who reads the papers: The Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country; The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country; The Times is read by people who actually do run the country; The Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country; The Financial Times is read by people who own the country; The Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country; and The Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is." Sir Humphrey: "Prime Minister, what about the people who read The Sun?" Bernard Woolley: "Sun readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big tits."
I'm afraid most Western leftists think like the Guardian readers. :->
In the USA, it gets even more confusing, because the New York Times and the Washington Post are read by both people who actually do run the country _and_ people who think they ought to run the country.
We need to keep in mind: people who own the empire, people who actually run the empire, and people who think they ought to run the empire (because they think they are smarter and more competent than the ones who are running it, but who can never hope to take power in their lifetimes) have radically different conceptions of the empire's interests and what goals it should aim for. -- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>