Manifest Self-Delusion

All the Friedmanesque nonsense about American exceptionalism makes me want to lose my lunch. Wilsonian internationalism, liberal or neoconservative, has always had a santimonious missionary tone about American superiority that automatically makes it suspect in my eyes — particularly when it has so often been hypocritically employed to excuse our worst impulses.

Should we stop genocide and ethnic cleansing? Yes. Should we not support authoritarian dictators on behalf of greedy American busnessmen? Yes. Should we work within international institutions to create global consensus on civilized behavior? Of course. Should we lead by example? If only we would.

Should we invade foreign countries and forcefully impose American style democratic capitalism because it is the best of all possible worlds and nothing could be finer?

Emphatically, no.

Here’s a bit from Tristero, who says it much more eloquently:

American values never had, and never will have, an “exceptional” role in the history of the world, any more than Islamic values did during the great conquests that constructed the Caliphate, any more than Roman values did under Caesar, Augustus, and the others, and so on. America’s dominance of the world is a contingency of history, not proof of the rightness of our ideals. Sure, democracy is a lot better style of governance than a theocracy or a Roman Empire. But the US didn’t invent democracy and was only one of several countries and cultures that helped spread it. And today, it is inarguable that other democratic countries have fairer election systems and that other democratic countries treat both their individual citizens and their businesses in many ways that even the most gung-ho America lover would envy. And it is arguable – indeed it is a very common argument – that American economic rule is any better than any other country’s for the citizens of a third world country whose economy we dominate. The number of monstrous dictators this country has accommodated, and still does, is shocking.

Manifest Destiny and other ideas helped justify American expansionism. Today, it has resurfaced in debates about America’s “exceptionalism” and as part of the “mission” of the neo cons. As I’ll show in other posts, about Woodrow Wilson and others, it is also highly influential in one strain of American political liberalism. To say the least, in a world which has overwhelmingly rejected Bush’s overt attempts to impose an American empire through military force -and which will certainly continue to resist such attempts in many different ways- America will need to drive a stake through its narcissistic fantasy that it is “special” and its values are, or should be, everyone’s. Aside from the fact that it is patently ridiculous to believe America is exceptional, there lie monsters (example: the embarassing absence of the important nations of Europe from the Coalition of the Willing).

To recognize that the US is simply one more country that is sometimes great, sometimes mediocre, and sometimes horrible shouldn’t diminish anyone’s love of country. In my case, if anything, it increased it. Suddenly, the phony impression I had of a bromide, perfect America was replaced by wonderment at the sheer scale of this country’s achievement, both for good and ill. Suddenly, America became real. Because “destiny” is bogus teleology. But America’s interactions with its world and the challenges of doing that well while honoring America’s boundaries are profoundly exciting.

Exactly. We Americans benefit hugely from the great riches and opportunity that this (mostly stolen) land gave a bunch of immigrants cast off from all over the planet, and there is much to be proud of in what we managed to achieve. But, it is completely absurd to look at this country and not be able to see that we are a long, long way from perfection and that there is much we can learn from others, from history and ourselves. We aren’t exceptional and we don’t have to be.

The line between good and evil is within each human being, they are not characteristics of nationality or tribe. We don’t have a monopoly on either one and neither does anyone else.