Militarism, Empire & the Decline of Democracy
In ruling circles and in the media, it’s all fine and dandy to talk about Rome and British, French and Soviet empires, but it’s impolite to talk about the United States as an empire. If you do, you’ll be ridiculed and labeled a loony Marxist. But it’s there with its hubris and arrogance and colossal military bases straddling the globe, and its wars and interventions. Simply stated, imperialism erodes democracy. The signs of U.S. decline are everywhere to be seen and felt. Why? Because the Pentagon’s military-industrial complex and its vast sums of money have greatly weakened the proverbial guardrails that protect democracy.
Speaker
Chalmers Johnson
Chalmers Johnson, a distinguished political scientist, was professor emeritus at the University of California, San Diego. He was the author of Blowback, Sorrows of Empire, Nemesis and Dismantling the Empire. He warned, “A nation can be one or the other, a democracy or an imperialist, but it can’t be both. If it sticks to imperialism, it will, like the old Roman Republic on which so much of our system was modeled, lose its democracy to a domestic dictatorship.” He died in 2010.
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