retreat
There is no easy victory in Iran, or any of Israel’s wars.
The three options are:
- Send in U.S. troops for long wars of attrition that bankrupt the U.S. taxpayer and unnecessarily kill stupendous numbers of people. (Going that route in Afghanistan wasted over $3 trillion, took 20 years, and ended up failing. Iran is much stronger militarily than Afghanistan.)
- Retreat and give up on having a U.S.-Israeli empire in the Middle East, and put that money into American well-being instead.
- Detonate a nuclear bomb and quite possibly end life on Earth.
Retreating, and thus giving up on imperialism and colonialism, is not just the only viable answer. It’s the only moral answer. That’s not because I’m a fringe lefty. This is mainstream opinion.
Israel’s attempt to colonize the Middle East and create “Greater Israel” is not a personal quirk of Netanyahu. It’s a longstanding, publicly stated military objective of even his “liberal opposition.” The only thing keeping this deranged fantasy alive is the U.S. taxpayer. Once the U.S. taxpayer decides they don’t owe Israel any more money, the wars grind instantly to a halt.
Why does the "Israel has a right to exist" line never apply to Iran, to Lebanon, to Greenland, to any other country that Israel or the U.S. is trying to conquer? Because our duopoly is bought by AIPAC, arms traders, big tech and oil billionaires who are making a fortune right now. You will almost never hear the “retreat” option even mentioned by a Democrat or Republican.
I distinctly remember in 2008 bands getting popular off of appropriating African music and saying in mainstream interviews that it was OK to do that now that we’re in a post-colonial period. This isn’t a criticism of any band or music, which I often loved. But since then people have woken up to the fact that we are not in a post-colonial period. We’re in the climax of the colonial period. Rubio just stated as much. We’re in a period in which the U.S. has the largest and most lethal military ever constructed, and even genocides are considered moderate.
In politics as in everything else, actions are always louder than words. Democratic opposition has been nothing but words. The past several years have proven that it’s not enough to support politicians who “say” they’re against genocide, or “say” they hate Trump or Netanyahu, but whose party still manage to enable their worst policies again and again.
We tolerate those worst policies - wars, genocides, militarized police, concentration camps, massive inflation, media censorship, mass surveillance, corporate bailouts, crackdowns on free speech, suspension of civil liberties - because they are sold as “emergency” measures. But if we make exceptions for their every “emergency,” then they will simply keep creating more “emergencies.”
The Ayatollah was assassinated and strategically it made no difference. Something similar would be true in the U.S. or Israel. Trump and Netanyahu are replaceable. Focusing all your energy on one or two human beings legitimizes the political careers of those one or two human beings, while enabling the system they epitomize to thrive while you’re distracted. Trump getting impeached, assassinated, or reaching the end of his term will not dismantle the American war machine.
At this point, just saying you hate Trump or Netanyahu is another imperial luxury we can't afford. It does nothing to dismantle the system they epitomize, and is strategically completely worthless. People like Trump and Netanyahu feed off of your hate. They monetize your hate. For them there is no such thing as bad publicity. What we need is a plan to get out of these wars. What we need is to support those trying to create that plan.
What we need now is lawmakers who do not take $1 from AIPAC, arms dealers or oil billionaires. If they are a Democrat, great. If they aren’t a Democrat, even better. We’re on the brink of WW3 between states with nuclear weapons. We’re out of time to dream about slowly persuading Democratic politicians, already being successfully bribed and blackmailed to commit the worst crimes humanity has ever invented, that they will somehow give up their fortune by being nice to them.
At this point, suggesting that the Green Party, Working Families Party, Socialist Party, or any other 3rd party is "unserious," or only exists to promote Trump, is an imperial luxury we can no longer afford. It is a mistake on many levels:
- If every single 3rd party voter in the last presidential election had voted instead for Harris, she would still have lost every single swing state by a large margin. Democrats are simply not popular.
- 3rd party candidates, not bought by AIPAC, weapons manufacturers, big tech or oil billionaires, are allowed to have policies that voters want. Democrats, overwhelmingly bought by AIPAC, weapons manufacturers, big tech and oil billionaires, are overwhelmingly not allowed.
- 3rd party candidates repeatedly show that they have a much better grasp of political reality than sitting politicians.
- The reply guy habit of saying that 3rd party candidates are not “serious” is a weak, defeatist, non-substantive attempt to sabotage 3rd party candidates so that voters give up on ever being represented in government.
- The fantasy that the Democratic Party is on the verge of magically reversing their business model and becoming a viable opposition to Netanyahu so far has absolutely zero evidence of being true.
- 3rd parties are unpopular until they become popular, as we see with the sudden rise of the Green Party in the UK in the past month.