Michael Mann's incoherent critique of Empire.
Michael Mann's critique of the Bush administration's brand of imperialism, Incoherent Empire, couldn't have been released at a better time. The Iraq occupation has officially exploded like a brown paper sack full of dog shit or M-80s left on the White House front porch.
Ding-Dong!
"Dubya, I think thar's another group a' grateful liberated Eye-raqis comin' over to sing us Christmas carols. You git the door, I'm busy pumpin' Jenna's stomach again."
"Oh, awright, Laury-Laur. You know I ain't got nuthin' 'gainst these liberated Eye-raqis, jus' that they smell like our old sheepdog, what-his-name, the one I named Jenna after? [Opens door] Golly, a bag postmarked from Baghdad! Must be some kinda steaks these liberated Eye-raqis gave me for Thanksgiv?"
POP-POP!?glllurp? glllurp?glllurp?
"Dubya?! Yew awright?!"
"Laury-Laur, I jus' figured sumthin' out."
"You did? Oh Dubya, I confess! I been havin' an affair with Colin!"
"Huh? No, not..."
"Awright! It's true, I been sleepin' with Condi too! The three of us been doin' the ice cream sand'ich!"
"Laury-Laur, listen to me. I'm all covered in doggie-poo! Head to toe!"
"Well I'll be. Who'd do such a thang?"
"Laury-Laur, I realize sumthin'. I don't want Eye-raq no more. Them folks isn't nice like you and me."
Now's the time to ruthlessly counterattack the Bush gargoyles and all of their Vichy mandarins in the media/think-tank ranks who made the Iraq war plan seem rational and centrist?cut them down while they're in disarray and retreat, before they have a chance to regroup.
Mann's book promised to be one of the swords piercing the backs of the retreating Bushites, but that promise turns laughably sour on the first page.
"Since I am a scholar and not an activist, this book does not denounce [America and Britain] with high moral rhetoric. Instead, I analyze and pick apart their 'new imperialism,' armed with my general comparative knowledge of power and empires, militaries and clerics, and fanatics of all stripes."
The first problem, besides the caricatured pomposity, is that Mann does go on to denounce America throughout the book (though strangely not Britain or any other imperial power in history besides Germany) with high moral rhetoric. Which is fine with me?but why pretend he doesn't? Any sane person should denounce Bush with high rhetoric, low rhetoric, and every rhetoric in between. But Mann is a pompous academic, and he wants us to know that he wears tweed, not hemp.
This would also explain the clunky title, Incoherent Empire. To a pompous academic, the greatest sin is to be "incoherent." Mann thinks he's scored a real zinger against the Bushites by accusing them of running not an Insane or Doomed empire, but rather an incoherent one. Mann has given Bush's imperialists a "C." That'll show 'em.
The second problem is how feeble his "army" of comparative knowledge performs on the field: "I hope to convince them?or at least you, the citizens and voters of various countries?that the United States has greatly exaggerated its powers, that it could found only a militaristic Empire, not a benevolent one [?]."
Say what? A "benevolent" empire? I guess that term has been thrown around by some of the more loony neo-con goons, but no one could have possibly taken the "benevolent empire" argument seriously. Anyone that gullible can only be cured with electroshock therapy and sterilization, not scholarly books.
Mann takes the "benevolent" empire argument seriously throughout the book, grapples with it, and manages to wrestle it to the ground and defeat it. Some people make a living wrestling bears or crocodiles; Mann makes his living wrestling goldfish.
One of his key arguments to support his position against the benevolent empire theory boils down to an old poster some hippie I knew in college had up on his wall: "War is bad for children and other living things." Which ties in to his overall argument as to why Bush's alleged imperialism will supposedly fail: Things go wrong.
"Things go wrong," and "It's nice to be nice." That's the argument this book makes against Bush's imperialism. And every chapter is a list of all the things that go wrong, and all the areas, big and small, where American power isn't as effective or benevolent as the imperialists (with punchline names like Charles Krauthammer or Robert Kagan?does any real "scholar" take these idiots seriously?) might believe. In other words, because things go wrong and people die, imperialism will fail. Good thing no one told the Romans or Brits that!
Mann is a sociology professor at UCLA, so that might explain the shocking simplicity of his argument. From what I remember in college, sociology was what athletes and sorority girls majored in, so it's not like Mann has faced much intellectual scrutiny or resistance over the years.
The first four chapters of this book are so full of lefty bathos (he even drags out a poor Guatemalan garment factory slave named Sofia, some poster girl for the anti-globalization movement, to remind us that American imperialism isn't nice), cliched anti-American quips and Mann's infuriating literary personality?a mix of breezy confidence, affected eccentricity and mediocrity, the Jiminy Glick of the left?that I found myself suddenly siding with the idea of Imperial America. Not Bush's half-assed, feel-good brand of imperialism, but all-out, Roman/British imperialism. Giant Middle American footprints in all of our conquered territories. Huge shopping malls done in the Southwest style, in every Shiite suburb from Sadr City to Basra, stucco beige, with glorious food courts featuring greasy imitations of all our favorite international cuisines?stressed-out Shiites showing up to the office on casual Friday for another 14-hour shift in the cubicle?force-fed Everybody Loves Raymond and The King of Queens?and best of all, American colonials wading through the crowds with pith helmets and rods, swatting the locals away as they make to seize another prime plot of land, which is their imperial right.
The problem with Bush's brand of imperialism isn't that it's not benevolent or that things can go wrong; the problem is that there's nothing in it for the common American except for the promise of a warm feeling or a smile, assuming that they really can turn Iraq into Spielberg America. I mean, that's what Bush offered, isn't it? Those tv shots of happy Iraqis in April yelling "Thank you, America!" whistling and dancing: That was it, the Big Payoff for Imperial America.
Whoop-tee-frickin-doo.
That's a pretty cheap reward to offer your average American who spends his days and evenings in office slavery, falls off one trendy diet after the next, returns home to his wife's and daughter's bipolar disorders, drowns under increasing debt. For all that, for all the work and tax and debt, for all he does as part of Imperial America's backbone, he gets an Iraqi whistling, "Thank you." No wonder Middle America is so cravenly turning against the very war they eagerly supported just a few months ago.
If Bush were genuinely imperialistic, he'd have offered Middle America what real empires offer their miserable male citizenry: a way out of your shitty life. Middle America might not tuck tail and flee at the first little truck bomb if there were something in it for them, such as the two "-y" suffixes: "Glor-y" and "boot-y." This is what true empires offer their citizens. Stolen riches. Forced sex. And massacres by the thousands to let off a little steam. Each colonial a little king. What every male office slave secretly dreams of in between evaluations, traffic jams and overtime.
An uprising in the Sunni Triangle? A real Imperial Power would bisect that triangle, surround the left half, shell it, slaughter every last citizen and their livestock, raze it and salt the earth so that nothing could ever grow there again. After that, the right half of that Sunni Triangle would be singing "God Bless America," waving twin U.S.-Israeli flags, for the next 1000 years.
Wait a minute?what am I saying? I've been against this stupid, filthy war, and now I'm calling for this? What happened to me?
Oh yeah. I've been reading Michael Mann's Incoherent Empire.