US Foreign Policy—20 Points

1. Power exists.

2. Power is “the ability to do something or act in a particular way.” It can also mean “a state or country, especially one viewed in terms of its international influence and military strength.”

3. After 1945 (WWII), the United States was the most powerful country in the world.

4. Its moment had arrived, and its expansionist tendencies could now be globalized.

5. Part of being the most powerful country in the world is to make sure other countries cooperate—especially small ones. Lack of cooperation will not be tolerated.

6. The US-Soviet contest, called the Cold War, was largely theater. The Soviet Union was in a distant second place.

7. Most of what you have seen in the movies is categorical nonsense.

8. Now that the United States had its villain, Uncle Sam could blame everything on Moscow and chalk it up to “national security.”

9. As of the 1950s, the Middle East became a place of great interest, largely due to its vast oil reserves. Oil is no longer a huge issue; weapons are the name of the game now.

10. The same intolerance for democracy is currently in place. It is and has been known the people of the Middle East would never like this arrangement. Too bad. Thugs are sponsored as leaders in the region—as they were under British-French colonialism. But the United States is in charge.

11. There is one country in the region that seemed aggressive and willing to do Uncle Sam’s bidding: Israel.

12. Israel is a mostly artificial country (well, they all are, but Israel more so) that up until recent decades was economically unviable. It excels at things like ethnic cleansing and attacking its neighbors, but as a nation state it is small and rather insignificant.

13. Israel’s GDP is just under Michigan’s—around $550 billion.

14. The United States has a GDP of $30 trillion.

15. The United States is the most powerful military power in human history.

16. It takes orders from nobody.

17. “Deterrence” and “credibility” are concepts in US foreign policy, which means Uncle Sam smashes a small country occasionally, merely to keep smaller states in line.

18. The Israel lobby, while influential, is merely pushing in the direction Uncle Sam is headed already. Does a mafia don need to be influenced that crime is the best option? (Does a country the economic size of Michigan push around a country over 50 times its size?)

19. Iran is a case of a country not cooperating (since 1979) and it has always aroused Uncle Sam’s wrath.

20. The trajectory of US foreign policy can be traced back to the country’s beginnings, and what we’re seeing with Iran is wholly unsurprising. The only surprising thing is the population always falls for this and always supports it.

Attacks on Iran

Out of all the articles I have read on the recent US-Israeli operations in Iran, this paragraph from the New York Times I found most interesting:

“Representative Marlin Stutzman, Republican of Indiana, argued [against Trump critics] that Mr. Trump’s attack on Iran would head off a worse threat down the road and pave the way for a new Middle East that would be friendlier to the United States. ‘To those who say, “Well, President Trump said he wasn’t going to take us into any wars,” he’s keeping us out of wars in the long run,’ he said on CNN.”

The paragraph of course echoes what American leaders have been saying for many years: Iran is a terrible threat to Americans and the world. It is not. Iran, except for recent tit-for-tat attacks with Israel, has never attacked a neighbor in the modern period. Its leadership has been judged by US and Israeli intelligence as being “rational actors.” Furthermore, while Iran does enrich uranium at high levels, there is no reported evidence that they are developing a nuclear weapon.

The representative from Indiana then says, ‘“To those who say, ‘Well, President Trump said he wasn’t going to take us into any wars,’ he’s keeping us out of wars in the long run.” In other words: war is peace.

Anyone who has read George Orwell’s novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four, will be familiar with the phrase. Orwell was exposing a contradictory way of messaging employed by political leaders. Representative Stutzman just used it presumably with a straight face.

It is common for US presidents to acquire a taste for deploying military power. Obama racked up a body count with his drone program. Biden conducted attacks in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. Bush II oversaw one of the worst atrocities of the twenty-first century. It goes on and on.

Americans and Israelis share much in common. One of the things they share is they welcome violent men to run their countries.

This violence did not have to happen. It is a war of choice. The current occupant of the White House has acquired the taste. His supporters will defend anything he does; and they will say things like “war is peace.”

Seeing as though his approval rating is down in the upper-30s, it might be nice for the majority to make itself heard in November’s midterm elections.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/28/us/politics/trump-peace-president-war.html

There is No Left (new essay)

The title of this essay you’ve seen before on this blog. The title is “There is No Left.” After I wrote the last one (Feb.13), I wrote another one. This time, I sent it to the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, and the Guardian.

All of them rejected it.

Now, maybe it’s because I’m a nobody. Or, maybe it’s because they’re all guilty of what I am talking about here. (Maybe it’s both.) You decide.

Anyway, the good folks at CounterPunch saw fit to publish it.

I hope you enjoy it. The argument is the same, but I did write it with the New York Times in mind.



THERE IS NO LEFT

[Read time: 3:30]

CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten reported recently, “When we’re talking about 42% of Democrats under the age of 35 identifying as democratic socialists and a third of all Democrats … my goodness gracious.”

Enten then concluded, “The Democrats are moving to the left, the far left is gaining power.”

This is the language Americans have become accustomed to. Talk of the far left prevails in the political discourse. But what is Enten talking about? What is any pundit talking about?

As the essay’s title indicates, there is no left. If we calibrate the center to sync with public opinion, as we should, we find two-thirds of Americans at the liberal center. Yes, you read that correctly: the liberal center.

Understanding that, one finds both major parties, the Democrats and the Republicans, well to the right of the population. In other words, all of Congress, 100 percent of it, is to the right of the mostly liberal population.

There is not one lawmaker on Capitol Hill who is one millimeter to the left of the liberal center. Yes, there are small leftist political parties, but they have meager numbers and basically receive no votes.

In the political discourse we are bombarded by talk of the far left. Included in this fictional category is Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, et al.

None of these politicians are a leftist. Bernie can call himself a socialist all he wants; I can call myself a world-renowned pastry chef, but this does not make it so. He is a 1940s liberal Democrat and nothing more. Same for AOC and the rest of the gang.

It is true; the Democrats are moving to the left, toward the center. The second part is crucial. They are not drifting into some Marxist dreamworld. They are drifting slowly toward what most working Americans want. On the other hand, the Republicans are drifting rightward away from public opinion under the banner of “conservatism.”

What free money for the ultra-wealthy, racism, anti-LGBTQ sentiment, and deficit spending have to do with conservative politics remains a mystery. What is also a mystery is why working Americans who have bills to pay support this socialism for the rich, these bigoted scare tactics, and bad economics.

The detailed public-opinion record meticulously tells us what Americans want. This is not a secret. The data are published in every top-tier paper in the country (including this one). We know well what Americans prefer, need, and reject.

When one attends to the public-opinion record, something quite surprising emerges: the reality that the country is not divided. It might be divided at the election booth; but when the conversation is removed from party politics, a remarkable level of agreement comes into view. The land of 49 percent becomes the land of 67 percent. We are not divided.

If you’ll indulge me, here’s a smattering of the data in no particular order: 70 percent of Americans favor raising the minimum wage; 55 percent desire free public college; 65 percent desire addressing “now” the rich-poor gap; 68 percent seek raising taxes on people earning more than $1 million per year; 58 percent want Medicare-for-all universal healthcare; 55 percent support a US–Iran diplomatic agreement; 85 percent feel a woman has the right to a legal abortion (including “certain circumstances”); 69 percent believe corporations pay too little in taxes; and 66 percent support loan forgiveness for students.

I should point out there does exist a division; there is a conflict that exists between the population and Washington. But when we are repeatedly told that Americans are divided, this is not quite what pundits have in mind.

Simply put, Americans are not getting what they want. For all the promises, speechifying, and ceremonies, the working class, which is most of the United States, does not live in the country it wants. Most people are law-abiding and decent. They desire and deserve a better life. In a country that boasts a $30 trillion GDP, there are plenty of resources to make people’s lives better. Is that leftist of me to point out?

It turns out that liberal Millennials have a strong sense as to the direction this country should be headed. They will be branded as leftists and Marxists, but the opinions of the liberal Millennials are merely centrist. As a cohort, what they want is practically identical to what about two-thirds of Americans want.

But CNN and other news outlets will gasp and express anxiety and horror at the Democrats actually becoming a labor party. Imagine, Capitol Hill tending to the wants and needs of the electorate. Imagine much less poverty and fear. Imagine a healthcare system that covers everyone. Imagine a drastic reduction in gun violence. Imagine an equally drastic reduction of wealth inequality. My goodness gracious.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/02/23/there-is-no-left/

Best Medicine

This series is quite charming. The premise is similar to the Michael J. Fox film Doc Hollywood from 1991; but Best Medicine is based on a book entitled Doc Martin.

The premise in both is a big-city, hotshot doctor goes to a small town. Michael J. Fox’s character just ends up there; in Best Medicine, he deliberately goes there (for reasons that are revealed).

Best Medicine is its own thing. And I throughly enjoyed it. Is it high-art? No. Is it a masterpiece? No. Is it light, charming, and funny? Yep. Also, the cast is a winner; and anytime I get to see Annie Potts in anything, it’s a treat.

Very much worth checking out, if you’re in the mood for light, charming, and funny. And if you’re not … then I don’t know what to tell you.

Ramadan

A blessed Ramadan for my Arab and Muslim readers.

Aliens

I wrote this essay a year ago, and I suspect I will be posting it again in the future. This topic just doesn't seem to die.

https://www.gregoryharms.com/essays-20250228

There is No Left

“Around 58 percent of voters thought the party had become too liberal in 2025….” This is according to a CNN survey. The number was 48 in 2013.

CNN’s senior data analyst had this to say: “The Democrats are moving to the left, the far left is gaining power....”

The first part of that is true: the Democrats are indeed moving to the left—toward the center. The center is where most of the people reading this reside. There is no “far left.” I suppose there is a far left relative to where the Democrats stand politically. They are a right-of-center party, so yes, Sanders and Mamdani are far left—as is the population—from the Democratic vantage point.

CNN’s analyst then shared this penetrating bit of commentary:

“When we’re talking about 42% of Democrats under the age of 35 identifying as democratic socialists and a third of all Democrats, my goodness gracious.”

Yes, my goodness gracious, indeed. Your abysmal reporting is why so many Americans have no idea how politics work in this country. I assume by “my goodness gracious,” he is voicing anxiety that the party is moving toward the center—where most Americans reside. So, CNN is worried that the so-called labor party might actually begin representing the interests of working Americans. My goodness gracious.

I guess I’ll just keep repeating myself: there is no left. It does not exist on Capitol Hill. There are zero members of Congress who are one millimeter to the left of the center. Zero. Yes, there are some small leftist parties, but they basically receive no votes and therefore have no representation in Washington. Past that, the left exists in books and in the minds of people who subscribe to leftist thought—like the author of this blog, though you wouldn’t know it.

The center is the liberal center. To be a liberal is to be a centrist. Bernie can call himself a socialist all he wants. He is not. He is a 1940s liberal Democrat. That is it. Same for AOC and Mamdani and just about everyone in the Progressive Caucus. And many of these people, one could argue, are a skosh right of center.

I am quite glad the Democrats are moving toward the center. This is welcome news. And while the Democrats are moving toward the center, the Republicans are moving to the right under the banner of “conservatism.”

How trafficking in racism, anti-LGBTQ sentiment, shafting the working class, handing free money to the rich, and blowing holes in the deficit is “conservative” is a mystery. How working-class Americans with bills to pay vote for this is also a mystery.

It turns out that liberal Millennials seem to have a grip on where this country should be headed if we want to live in a more civilized, equitable place. My goodness gracious.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/democrats-too-liberal-poll-cnn-b2919693.html