America’s Benevolent Imperium

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John Hannah, late of Dick Cheney’s office, thinks that Barack Obama is a wuss:

[In the Middle East] concerns run deep over the administration’s lack of strategic vision, its instinct for retreat and its complicity in the unraveling of a benevolent imperium that has for decades underwritten the region’s security.

….No good can come from the perception of the United States in retreat, a willing accomplice in the dismantling of a regional order — Pax Americana — that has been the linchpin of Mideast security for decades. It’s a dangerously corrosive narrative, one that left unchecked will breed uncertainty, instability and even war. Disabusing friend and foe alike of its accuracy should be a top priority for Obama.

I don’t have a ton to say about this. Hannah is mostly upset that (a) we apparently don’t plan to bomb Iran back into the Stone Age, and (b) we’ve been reluctant to do….something….to protect the interests of various Mideast thugs who happen to have been allied with America from time to time. Overall, in fact, his bill of particulars against Obama is surprisingly weak, just a couple of barely on-point quotes plus the fact that Obama is withdrawing from Iraq (a George Bush policy, though he doesn’t mention this), he hasn’t solved the Israel-Palestine problem yet (what a shocker), and he’s failed to bomb Iran (another George Bush policy, which Hannah has been upset about for years). All that’s missing is a tossed-off reference to the Obama Apology Tour™. Yawn.

No, the only interesting part of the whole piece is Hannah’s obvious comfort with the idea of a “benevolent imperium” and a “Pax Americana.” Plainly he doesn’t think he needs to hide his preferences behind euphemisms and shilly-shallying. America ought to be the puppet master that pulls the strings in the Middle East, and that’s the end of it. Anyone got a problem with that?

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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