[Peace-discuss] What if the NPR liberals don't matter to US foreign policy any more?

[Robert Naiman]

Many of us have become habituated over decades to a love-hate relationship
with NPR liberals over questions of US foreign policy.



What if these historic tensions don't matter any more? What if the NPR
liberals don't matter any more on questions of US foreign policy?



I was eleven years old when Jimmy Carter was elected President, promising
to make human rights "the soul of U.S. foreign policy."



Since then, every U.S. president has pretended to care about human rights
in U.S. foreign policy. All of my adult life, U.S. presidents have
pretended to care about human rights in U.S. foreign policy.



What would it be like if the U.S. president didn't pretend to care about
human rights in U.S. foreign policy? How would we know? We've never lived
in that country before.



Some people made a great show of being offended when they found out that
Hillary Clinton thought that a politician should have a public view and a
private view.



Everybody in Washington knows that this is the way that most people in
Washington of all purported political persuasions think, most of the time.
Not just most politicians, but most people who work with politicians, and
most people who work with people who work with politicians.



And this is certainly true of discussions of U.S. foreign policy. There's
one conversation for DC insiders, and another conversation for the unwashed
masses outside of DC. In the inside conversation, people talk about "US
interests," like making money for U.S. companies by selling weapons. In the
outside conversation, people talk about "promoting U.S. values," like
"human rights."



What would happen if that distinction were abolished? What if from now on
there were just one discussion of U.S. foreign policy? What if the outside
discussion dropped all the pretenses that the inside discussion drops?



What if "we are all realists now"?



How would we know what that would be like? We've never lived in that
country before.



===

Robert Naiman
Policy Director
Just Foreign Policy
www.justforeignpolicy.org
naiman at justforeignpolicy.org
(202) 448-2898 x1
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