Daydream Deceivers

There is an ancient wax like thingy from way back in the last millenium called a 'Long Play Record' or LP in the ancient tongue. Kinda round and frisbee like - they have a tiny tiny hole in the center.

They were packaged in 'Album Covers' and on the back of it they featured 'liner notes'. Ancient PR - way before the net, blogs, satellite radio and MTV, MTV1, MTV2,VH1 and videos in general.

During this Nick at Night TV Land era, before Rock and Roll was transformed into Rock, bands of Brit Cats 'invaded' the states with a wild, new sound that wiped clean and drew again the face of pop music.

Hot on the heels of the Moptops (who were alledgedly bigger than Baby Jesus) were a gang of 5 that are still around in name today - The Rolling Stones.

On one of their first 'records' the liner notes featured a crazy, cool rant by their manager - Andrew Loog Oldham. Appealing to the inherent 'hooliganism' of baby booming kids in the Great Satan these notes commanded the kids

"If you haven't the money for this record, then knock a blind beggar on the head
and steal his money"

In a way, this could be applied (in jest y'all - that means teasing - harmless joshing) to the latest pub by Dr Fred Kaplan.

"Daydream Believers: How A Few Grand Ideas Wrecked American Power"

Don't spend cash on it (or gift cards) - and don't try to steal it either - just hang at Barnes and Nobles on a Sunday Afta and check it out. May wanna lay off the venti tripple expresso mocha latte Chocco grande though.

To be fair the writing is flat out great, hey, it dang well better be - this cat is a Pulitzer Prizer.

"American power seemed not merely undiminished but nearly absolute. It was a new era, time to devise new ways of seeing and dealing with the world—new strategies
that would take full advantage of what they saw as their unbridled supremacy.
The traditional paths to influence were waved off as the figments of ''old
thinking.''

Multinational diplomacy was unnecessary; the United States could go
it alone. Fine if allies wanted to come along; even better—less constraining—if
they didn't.

Nor were massive armies any longer a prerequisite to dominance. New
American-made technologies made possible lightning victories on the battlefield
with far fewer troops and much lighter armaments.

The mere demonstration of these weapons, of how quickly they can crush an enemy's army and destroy its regime, would compel other foes to change their ways and fall into our orbit or else face the same doom. "

Sweet! Sounds about right. And like Me Maw (bless her heart) who used to forget that she'd done sugared the tea once (or twice) Dr K gets sweeter.

"America would go to war against this new kind of foe; the intellectuals had a
strategy for a new kind of war. The old rostrums of stability, deterrence, and
containment were deemed irrelevant (after all, they hadn't prevented 9/11); the
new strategists called for regime change, preemption, and victory.

And their concept of victory was expansive, to include not only defeating an enemy in battle or ''making the world safe for democracy'' but—in an ambitious twist on
that age-old ideal—remaking the world into a democracy. "

And that's about where the sucking starts.

According to Dr. Globestomping , Great Satan has actually totally suicided herself in 8 years. This boring, inappropiate handwringing is weak and lacks vision - unless gleefully listing every error and mistake (many of which can hardly be attributed to Great Satan alone) since 911.

Essentially, 911 was a fluke, an anomoly - even worse - Great Satan's faux righteousness really really hurt the feelings of veto powered ho's at the UN.

Dissed so bad they would rather sit on their hands (or Saddam's) than to honor realpolitik era alliances or jump in and plot with the revolutionary, crazy, skoal chomping upstart Ray Banned culture spewing Americans that were breath takingly arrogant to daydream that lottie dottie everybody wanted to be free.

"There is no Universal Man marching inexorably down a common path to freedom.
Real human history is molded, not fated. . . . It is not only naïve but reckless to believe that blowing off a tyrant's lid will unleash the geyser of liberty.
It will unleash only whatever social forces have been teeming or festering underneath."

YAWN.

Only at the end does Dr Kaplan realize how retarded the entire book is - that it goes nowhere, suggests nothing, and is as hopelessly stuck in a time traveling loop as are all Iraq war arguments.

Dr Kaplan's conclusion is null and void.

Neo's overreached and Victory like isolationism is impossible (take that Michael Desch), immoral and illogical, and his precious realpolitik is still as incinerated as the nearly 3k innocents who made it into work that late summer day.

So how can the Great Satan act out in the new millenium? Shall she be truly Unbound like Ivo Daalder suggests? Or Michael Mandlebaum's "Case For Goliath" ?

Shall America tolerate intolerant, illegitmate regimes (many with pitiful literacy rates, no free media and an amazing ability to torment their own people, their neighbors and spawn militias that tend to sprout up in civilian heavy areas attacking any democracies in weapons range)?

Another Neo bashing book - wheeee! Throw it on the pile. Cali Poli Sci Dr. Douglas teaches that

"Otherwise esteemed analysts and pundits make the same mistakes over and
over again in recent journalistic histories of neoconservatives in the top ranks of power."

This book by Dr Kaplan may best be interpeted as a risible chronicle of his inner ethical wrestling match slide from Cold War Realpolitik's amoral, corrupt cult of stability to a new millenium amoral, corrupt cult of stability.

A tough sell - like Daydream Believers. Wait til Late spring when you can get it online for a buck.

Or less.

Original manipulated, doctored, edited and make believe cover by GsGf