POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN BY CLIVE CROOK IN THE FINANCIAL TIMES
"President Obama's great promise has been utterly wasted in policy-setting."
Absolutely, and I have to believe he represented the last great hope of changing America's course, Mr. Murray.
The entire planet breathed a sigh when Bush left office and this bright, charming young man entered.
But I cannot think of one area now where Obama has not disappointed, often greatly disappointed.
It does really seem that elections do not matter in the United States.
The pointless Afghan War goes on and on.
America is killing hundreds of civilians in Pakistan.
Iraq remains the mess America has made of it, millions reduced to hopeless lives for a generation.
America's client, Israel, continues its brutal, bloody policies, never once making a genuine effort at peace, never once even acknowledging the inhumanity of its actions.
Internally, American politics are the same dog-fight they ever were. The Culture of Complaint prevails in everything, the Tea Party being just the latest change of costume for the same old play. No sense is heard anywhere on the national scene, at least from anyone of influence or even potential influence.
Sinking into old age as I am, it is exceedingly melancholy to consider the way virtually nothing in America has changed for the better since I was an angry young man over the horrors of Vietnam. American political rhetoric remains as utterly meaningless as 45 years ago.
The slaughter of innocents continues all over the globe, indeed, now is becoming computerized so that buzz-cut young men in secret rooms can play games at computer consoles, pumping their fists after sending a Hellfire missile into a home full of people.
I think it likely the only force now which will precipitate real change in America is its relative decline in the world, an unavoidable reality, which will cause many changes in attitudes and beliefs as it truly takes hold.
