America’s State of Denial

In his last speech, shortly before his assassination, Robert Kennedy contended that avoiding current problems, instead of solving them, would leave behind a difficult legacy for future generations. The truth is that President Obama’s administration, on top of its weakness, bears the difficult legacy of the problems and crises that George Bush Jr. left as a result of his erroneous policies and rash decisions.

The established fact is that the U.S. lost a lot, financially and militarily, in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the volume of these losses deprives it of the power to maintain its control and hegemony over the world as part of the “New World Order.” These crises are what have weakened President Obama’s administration and prevented it from implementing his "change" and reform program, which he adopted during his electoral campaign and announced in his speech when he became president.

Similarly, the opposing forces in the U.S. have not ceased sabotaging. The neoconservatives among the high-ups of the Republican Party have continued their activities, and they tried to push President Obama toward the edge of the abyss when they encouraged him to direct a military strike against Syria and launch an attack on Iran thereafter, despite the economic problems that would entail.

But President Putin succeeded in defusing the impending explosion in the region when he threw President Obama a life jacket and pulled him out of a difficult position. He did that through the Russian-American accord that smothered the regional fire in the Middle East before it could flare up. This followed communications between Washington and Tehran, which occurred in the United Nations and consolidated a calm phase in the region.

What is noteworthy is that this does not please Israel, which was clearly evident in the speech Netanyahu gave to the United Nations, full of incitement and calls for mobilization and inclined toward war. He said that even if Israel is left standing alone, it will prevent Iran from developing its nuclear powers. Likewise, he called for a continuation of the intensification of sanctions against Syria and Iran. While repeating these phrases and threats, he was relying on the support of the Zionist lobby and hard-line conservatives in the United States.

In reality, it is impossible to defend Obama’s stance, his weak administration or U.S. foreign policy, as all these are biased toward Israel, its security and interests. They all cast justice aside in matters connected to Israel’s interests. They all exist in a state of denial: Some people in the U.S. do not want to understand or realize that the world is going through a metamorphosis and that a new world is now being formed.

This group of hard-liners in the U.S. is not pleased by the American-Russian accord, American-Iranian communications or cancellation or postponement of the American attack on Syria that had been planned. This joint accord in the foreign arena, which eased tension regionally and internationally, irritated the hard-line contingent in the U.S. and Israel. Thus, a domestic front has emerged against the Obama administration within America. This front has taken shape in Congress’ rejection of the budget, the crisis that closed the doors of the U.S. government and halted work and spending until further notice, thereby inflicting paralysis on the administration.

These crises prove that the U.S. finds itself in a situation that disqualifies it from leading the world on its own. They prove that it cannot face states that are rising politically and economically, which have come to constitute a second pole and have imposed an equilibrium of military and economic power in a new, changing world, where oppressed peoples look forward to some amount of justice.