Obama's Choice

In 1821, John Quincy Adams warned:

"…[America] goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own. She will commend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example. She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force.... She might become the dictatress of the world…"

Everything that Adams warned of has come to pass. The "dictatress of the world" has governed not with the force of argument, but with the argument of force. That means, however, that once the world stops fearing America, and once American power is shown not to be absolute, the Empire won't have a leg to stand on. Far from being an example to the world, the U.S. is now a shining beacon of warning: this is what happens when good ideas go terribly wrong.

There is a strong pragmatic argument that perpetuating an Empire of bases and satrapies around the world is choking the life out of the American economy. But the Empire does a lot more. Every act of violence abroad, every resort to tyranny and abuse in the name of expediency and national interest translates into a blow against liberty at home, to the point where this country has become something its founders would have only envisioned in their worst nightmares.

It is becoming increasingly obvious that to save America, the American Empire will have to go. Otherwise, neither has much of a future. Understanding this will be the biggest challenge facing President Obama – that, and the realization that if he is to help save America, he will have to give up being Emperor. If he is capable of doing this, he may yet be deserving of the masses' adulation and near-religious belief.

Text partially taken from Obama's Choice True Change Means Abolishing Empire.