Shadee Elmasry – Is Trumps America First A Radical Ideology- The Thinking Muslim
AI: Summary ©
The speakers discuss China's history of adopting a policy of expanding the scope of the United States into other countries, creating a "monster" culture, and the philosophy behind the golden era theory. They both acknowledge that the philosophy of American is not going to go to war with China or North Korea, as both look and feel the same. The speakers also discuss the philosophy of American and the liberal world order, which is not going to go to war with Britain or France because they look and feel the same.
AI: Summary ©
And America first is, as you say, an
ideology, but I would also say that, is
it such a radical one?
Isn't it a common sense ideology for every
nation, if we were to even just accept
the status quo of the nation states that
we have, wouldn't every country care about itself
first?
Well, exactly.
And that is the case for normal states.
But in the in the words of Robert
Kagan, who wrote a really good book, and
Robert Kagan is the neocon that turned liberal,
but he wrote a really good book, The
World America Made.
It's a slim volume.
And I would advise your viewers to read
it because I think it's a really good
read.
He talked about America's liberal world order being
in its enlightened self interest.
And so of course, by expanding your military
and economic weight around the world and projecting
your power in all corners of the world,
the idea really is that you bring the
coffers home, you bring like the British Empire
vote, where the gold and the riches of
India came back to Britain, America will reap
those sorts of rewards.
So ultimately, his argument was and is that
America's global empire is there to serve its
own self interest.
At the end of the day, America's become
rich on the back of, you know, exploitation
of other countries around the world and the
back of the dollar dominance and on the
back of the manner in which America is
able to is able to interfere in every
affair in every place in the world.
Right.
Now, Donald Trump's point is, well, fine, maybe
just maybe we were successful for a while
using that strategy.
But for a long time, that's failed us
because that's failed America in general.
I mean, Donald Trump made a very interesting
point.
And again, I hate to say Donald Trump
is, you know, is a is a clever
guy here, but he made a very interesting
point, which I actually believe I think is
true.
He said something about China.
He said that in the 2000s, we allow
China to become a member of the World
Trade Organization.
Right.
And Bill Clinton at the time did so.
It was the end of the 1990s, early
2000s, I think just about when he was
leaving presidency.
But he paved the way and it was
George Bush Jr. who finally consolidated that.
So it was a consensus between the two
parties.
They lowered the standards to allow China to
be part of the World Trade Organization.
Now, if you're part of the WTO, that
gives you preferential trading rights with every other
member of the of the WTO.
Right.
It was a really radical move.
But Clinton and Bush at the time had
in their mind this sort of real, really
ridiculous idea that if China trades like a
capitalist country, China is going to become a
democracy like us and China will soon become
a liberal minded democracy like us.
Right.
And so the the gateway into becoming, you
know, a cappuccino drinking New Yorker, if you
live in Beijing, is to first become a
capitalist country and we're going to make them
capitalist and rich and then they're going to
become like us.
Actually, what happened was completely the opposite.
China has become a stronger authoritarian state and
it's using its riches now to build its
military.
And China now, at least regionally, if not
in many corners of the of the world,
can compete with America on a military basis
and a light by light military basis.
Right.
And so if I can interrupt one second,
why would the Americans care about the Chinese
people becoming more liberal?
Because there is this philosophy and it goes
that goes back right to Immanuel Kant.
There is this philosophy that when countries become
liberal and become democracies, they're not going to
go to war with one another is what
Francis Fukuyama said.
When you have two countries that are democracies,
Britain and France are not going to go
to war one another because they look and
feel the same.
They're both liberal countries.
Right.
You know, America is not going to go
to war with Canada because these are liberal
countries, whereas America could go to war with
China or North Korea because one is a
is a dictatorship and one is a liberal
democracy.
So they've got this philosophy and it's a
crazy philosophy, by the way, it makes very
little sense in reality.
But a philosophy, I mean, it was it
was Thomas Friedman, the the even more ridiculous
writer for The New York Times, who wrote
in 1991, I think it was, he developed
this theory called the golden artist theory of
world peace.
And the argument was that if a country
has a McDonald's in it, that country is
never going to go to war with another
country that has a McDonald's in it, because
McDonald's represents capitalism, a free market capitalism.
But it also represents a type of liberal
economy and a liberal society because it's young
urban elites that go to McDonald's and, you
know, hang out there and whatever.
And so it represents a type of attitude.
And that attitude would mean that you never
go to war with one another.
Right.
And so if you can convert and it
is it's a conversion.
I mean, it's a religious conversion.
If you can convert lots of Chinese people
into it to become good capitalists and good
liberals, then you make them like us, but
also you make them less threatening to us.
Right.
So in effect, what they wanted to do
is make China into another Japan or Germany.
If you remember, Germany and Japan after the
Second World War were completely reoriented into into
these liberal democracies they are today.
And that's what they wanted for China.
And by the way, that's what George W.
Bush wanted for the Muslim world when he
when he went to war in Iraq and
Afghanistan.
OK, so, yeah, I mean, I guess I
get the idea that if people all become
liberal democracies, they won't fight each other.
But I mean, if we just take it
to its logical extension real quick, if the
entire world became liberal democracies, it's not fathomable
that there is going to be a world
without war.
Right.
So but I do get the idea.
Well, they would say, I mean, they would
say, for example, the European Union.
So the European Union is the sort of
like premium liberal institution.
And these are 27 countries that come together.
And by the way, to become a member
of the liberal EU, you've got to be
a liberal democracy in a capitalist country.
Right.
You've got to adopt these.
These is what they're called a Copenhagen criteria.
You've got to adopt these sort of thick
values.
And so, you know, historically, Poland and France
did not see eye to eye because Poland
was a communist country and France was a
capitalist country.
But today, you know, you can't foresee a
war between Poland and France.
At least that's what they argue.
And so you've now got this happy union
of Europeans who live in this family of
states.
And if they have disputes, the disputes are
very low level and not high level.
That's the argument.
That's the liberal dream that Immanuel Kant imagined,
you know, back in the 18th century.
Yeah.
And it's essentially any group of people that
basically is saying that any group of people
who agree won't go to war.
Yeah.
That's like boil it down to a six
year old level.
Right.
If we like each other, we won't go
to war.
If we agree on stuff, right, that's the
basic summary of it.
And now when it comes to America First,
I look at two things.