Trump Playing At Hamlet

I’ve done a partial transcript of Judge Nap with Prof John Mearsheimer this afternoon. It captures the degradation of America in service to the savagery of Jewish Nationalists. The worst part, perhaps, is the way Trump seems to revel in this national disgrace. To start with, earlier today I wrote this brief comment that sets the tone for what follows:

Listening to the news briefly (CBS), it sounds like Americans are waiting for Trump to come to some sort of personal decision on War and Peace--latest word is, sometime in the next two weeks--as if he personally will speak for the country. Almost as if the timing will be a matter of personal Trumpian style. Nobody in Congress that I'm aware of has tried to bring up any kind of debate, despite the vast amounts of money being spent. What does this have in common with our constitutional order as historically intended?

OK, now for the Judge and the Prof:

Judge: Professor Mearsheimer, shouldn't there be a great debate in America about the nature and extent of our involvement in a war that could be as disastrous as is happening? Why should a person who changes his mind every 10 minutes meet in a windowless room with five people telling him what he wants to hear make this decision rather than great debates on the floor of the House and the floor of the Senate about the role of America in the world and we really want to kill Iranians.

Prof: Oh, it's very simple. You can't have a great debate on any issue involving Israel. It's just impermissible--The Lobby won't allow it. And all The Lobby's cutouts--you see them in the Senate, you see them in the House, you see them in the media--these cutouts working with The Lobby will not allow us to have a debate. And the reason they won't allow us to have a debate is it won't come out in Israel's favor. You want to understand that the main reason that we have an Israel Lobby that goes to enormous lengths to shut down discourse about Israel and to smear anyone who is critical of Israel--to ruin their career--is because if you had an open discourse Israel would come out on the losing side.

[The Judge plays a video montage of Netanyahu, Dubya, and Colin Powell lying their asses off to get Congress to vote for war on Iraq.]

Prof: I was one of the principal public opponents of the Iraq War before it happened, on March 19th, 2003. I wrote op-eds in the New York Times and the Chicago Tribune, I helped pay for an ad on the op-ed page of the [interrupted]. I can tell you, it is the same story all over again. You're up against The Lobby. The Lobby works behind the scenes to put enormous pressure on media figures and on politicians and on policy makers to support these crazy wars, and people who have facts and logic on their side can barely get a hearing. It was easier to get something of a hearing back then than it is now. The situation has only deteriorated over time, in large part because The Lobby has gotten more powerful.

Judge plays a video of Tony Benn speaking in Parliament against the Iraq War:

Judge: Hard to imagine that Thomas Massie, or Rand Paul, or even Bernie Sanders would be permitted to make arguments like that on the floor of the House or the Senate.

Prof: Well, they probably would be permitted, but they would be assaulted--verbally assaulted--afterwards, and everybody would go after them hammer and tong, as is so often the case. I would also note, just to add to what Mr Benn said, that after World War II it was not only the scourge of war that we were trying to eliminate, it was the scourge of genocide--and we don't want to lose sight of the fact that while this war between Iran and Israel is being waged a genocide is taking place in Gaza on a daily basis.

Judge: And we're continuing to fund Ukraine on a daily basis. Let's not lose sight of that. So the president of peace is funding genocide in Gaza and a losing effort in Ukraine, and is acting like Hamlet --or wants us to think he's acting like Hamlet--with respect to Iran.