Obama's Pragmatism

Warren Strobel takes a look at Barack Obama's foreign policy team and views. The term "pragmatic" comes up a lot, which can mean a lot of things. I think it's important to see that Obama and his inner circle not only have their catch-phrases, but also like to illustrate what they mean by them by referring back to Iraq. When they talk about pragmatism, they see the march to war in Iraq as the reverse; as a deeply ideological movement determined to ignore contrary evidence, plus a Democratic establishment too rigidly wedded to a set of verbal formulae, catch-phrases, and narrowly political thinking to recognize what was happening and respond appropriately.

I'm not really sure pragmatism is sufficient to the challenges we're facing as a country and I think there's more to be said for doctrine-driven thinking than some of this rhetoric implies. Still, pragmatism would be more welcome than the alternatives that seem to be on the table.

Comments

Matt, to me, a combination of pragmatism, intelligence, and common sense sounds pretty good about now.

Posted by Jay | March 10, 2008 11:27 AM

I'm not sure "pragmatism" is sufficient to the challenges we're facing as a country either. I'd go with "mocking the shit out of republicans until they're a laughable disgrace," but that's just me.

Posted by WinSmith | March 10, 2008 11:27 AM

Well, I'm not too happy about Powers telling that European paper that Obama wasn't *really* serious about his alleged promise to withdraw from Iraq if elected.

That's the sort of Democratic Party "pragmatism" I can personally do without...

Posted by RKU | March 10, 2008 11:33 AM

Pragmatism alone can't drive a foreign policy, because you need something else to tell you what you should be trying to achieve in the first place. In that sense, pragmatism is really just about saying no to the ideologues when it looks like their assumptions are unfounded and their hopes are unrealistic. But you still need some ideology to guide your efforts, even with pragmatism operating as a constraint.

Posted by DTM | March 10, 2008 11:39 AM

But you still need some ideology to guide your efforts, even with pragmatism operating as a constraint.

That's right. It's why the Powells etc go rolled over the last 8 years, because they don't have a real agenda and the invade-Iraq nuts down the corridor did.

Posted by otto | March 10, 2008 11:44 AM

RKU,

Powers did not say that Obama was not serious about getting out of Iraq. She just said should facts on the ground change then he cannot get out of Iraq responsibly using his plan 2008. I will admit, however, that she chose her words poorly and that it made Obama look bad.

I also have to say that some of Obama's advisors are not very media savvy. He needs to stick with Kerry and Daschle as his surrogates.

Posted by Micheline | March 10, 2008 11:48 AM

1) I'm not sure it matters. The American voters have pretty well shown that they're too fucking stupid to judge policy results.

2) Look at the fucking idiots in Ohio -- Bill Clinton rammed NAFTA through with the help of the Republicans --and the morons in Ohio were blaming Obama instead of Hillary.

3) Our dollar's becoming worthless --- because we have borrowed huge sums for an unnecessary war -- and we appear to be heading into another Great Depression.

But the stupid cocksuckers in the Democratic Party see no reason to hold Hillary responsible for the malign consequences of her whoring for patrons like Haim Saban and S Daniel Abraham.

Posted by Don Williams | March 10, 2008 11:57 AM

Don't know about pragmatism and policy as they work in today's world. Sometimes I think 4-5 people making phone calls and scribbling decisions on pizza cartons whilst in the throes of a coke & whiskey fueled delerium would work out just as well as the last 7 years have.

Posted by steve duncan | March 10, 2008 11:59 AM

Let's see if his pragmatism can stop the Clintons.

Posted by Naveen | March 10, 2008 12:01 PM

But you still need some ideology to guide your efforts, even with pragmatism operating as a constraint.

I wonder if there isn't a deeper imperative being addressed by the Obama campaign here. Ideology itself is a redoubtable concept here in the 21st century. Obviously, what matters is how you define it. You have to have some sort of principles, lest you be merely technocratic (like Powell). But Ideology can be self-justifying to a ridiculous and dangerous degree, as a little walk through the 20th century would make terribly clear.

Any century will do, though; people being controlled by their own constructs and inventions rather than the other way around is a persistent, and signal human stupidity. In fact, this phrase: '..too rigidly wedded to a set of verbal formulae, catch-phrases..' is a partial definition of this phenom. When the phrases - the words - effectively control the concept they are supposed to describe, you've got problems. The Human penchant for backassery.

Posted by jonnybutter | March 10, 2008 12:03 PM

Samantha Powers said that leaving Iraq was "a best case scenario," which has been enough to make me wonder whether Obama is determined to leave Iraq. Can Obama be trusted? Power was a critically important adviser and insider from the beginning. The statement was disheartening, and calls Obama's honesty on foreign policy to question just as Austan Goolsbee called his policy an honesty on trade to question.

Are these mistakes, or is there an Obama we do not know?

Posted by Jennifer | March 10, 2008 12:04 PM

"I think there's more to be said for doctrine-driven thinking than some of this rhetoric implies"

Idiot.

Matt, I like your blog a lot, read it all the time. But here you're a fucking moron.

Posted by Eric | March 10, 2008 12:08 PM

Re "people being controlled by their own constructs and inventions rather than the other way around is a persistent, and signal human stupidity"
-------------
True. The most signal example being today's announcement from the Vatican that environmental damage is a social sin. http://green.yahoo.com/news/nm/20080310/hl_nm/pope_sins_dc.html

This is coming from the institution which is most responsible for the huge damage the Earth has suffered --because of it's stupid ban on contraception. The result being huge overpopulation and environmental cesspools whereever the Church hold sway.

Posted by Don Williams | March 10, 2008 12:09 PM

Let's see if his pragmatism can stop the Clintons.

Posted by Naveen | March 10, 2008 12:11 PM

Jennifer,

I don't think that the gist of Power's statement is incorrect. Have you ever noticed that Obama never gave a deadline as to when he would withdraw the troops. I'm really nonplussed by those who say they are shocked, shocked, by Powers' statement when they know very well that Iraq is a clusterf--k. Any honest person will realize that anything can change in one year. And if HRC wants to exploit what Power said then someone will bring up her vote for this unecessary war.

Posted by Micheline | March 10, 2008 12:21 PM

I think there's more to be said for doctrine-driven thinking than some of this rhetoric implies.

That sentence is so broad as to be almost entirely meaningless.

Nevertheless, I'd imagine the "best" doctrines were the ones that produced tangible, quantifiable results. Which is to say, the "pragmatic" ones.

Posted by James Gary | March 10, 2008 12:26 PM

The most signal example [of people holding themselves hostage to their own imagination] being today's announcement from the Vatican that environmental damage is a social sin.

No, that would be the opposite. Environmental degradation *is* a social sin. I agree that Christian dogma generally is an example of said phenomenon, but that's no reason to call the church wrong when it's right.

More down to earth, so to speak: 'change' in the Obama campaign might signify a break from the rigid (ie stupid) ideology of the modern GOP, viz: government surplus? Tax cuts! Government deficit? Tax cuts! Continue the Cold War mentality? Yes, at all costs! etc. 'Pragmatic' might mean 'rational'.

Posted by jonnybutter | March 10, 2008 12:35 PM

jonnybutter,

I'm as skeptical as most people, and certainly well-aware of the human capacity for self-delusion, but in the end I think it is also true that sufficiently extreme skepticism and self-doubt leads to paralysis. So, while there may be some use to distinguishing different kinds of worldviews on various structural grounds (what I take you were hinting at by contrasting ideologies with principles), you are going to need some sort of worldview to act in the world.

Posted by DTM | March 10, 2008 12:37 PM

Pragmatism would be so refreshing. The Bush ideologues have proven time and again that they're largely incapable of adapting to new information, changing circumstances or even thinking outside their preconceived notions.

Posted by Paul Maurice Martin | March 10, 2008 12:42 PM

Yes, pragmatism would mean engaging in the Balkans with NATO but not UN sanction. It would also mean NOT going into Iraq without anybody but Tony Poodle. It would also mean not embracing a self-defeating "War on Terror" paradigm fairly unthinkingly built on the template of Cold War moral posturing.

Pragmatism would also mean reserving judgment on what to do in Iraq until almost a year from now: Iraq is a hideous gaping wound that has done us enormous damage. But it is also a humanitarian disaster that rests squarely on our heads and a fluid situation that may get better or worse without substantial warning. Those who are locked into a leave-within-weeks scenario are also working within a profoundly nonpragmatic ideological idee fixe.

Boy, folks are pissed off today. Mindfulness, people. Breathe!

Posted by elle loco | March 10, 2008 12:43 PM

The thing is, pragmatism still relies on some rather normative assumptions about how the world works. If you are pragmatic and one of your basic assumptions is that the strong take what they can and the weak suffer what they must, then, say, overthrowing the government of Venezuela and installing a US-friendly dictatorship is a pragmatic, realistic action. If you have the assumption that the US is just one nation among many, and that we don't have special ass-kicking, Geneva-ignoring privileges, then we get a very different set of actions that are pragmatic. Fortunately, I think most of the Obama camp is closer to the later assumption than the former. And of course, I'm talking more about the pragmatism of everyday usage than the philosophical school.

Posted by urbell | March 10, 2008 12:53 PM

MY, who taught you to abuse semi-colons like this?

When they talk about pragmatism, they see the march to war in Iraq as the reverse; as a deeply ideological movement determined...

Perhaps you intended to use a colon.
Punctuation is supposed to enhanced meaning, not provoke a pointless search for a subject and verb. Please consult a reputable style guide!

Posted by Hypatia | March 10, 2008 12:54 PM

When exactly has doctrinaire approaches worked in American foreign policy? Manifest Destiny?

Arguably our greatest success, WWII, stemmed from a heady (if overlong) aversion to diving into war in the first place, which served us well for most of WWI.

But the large disasters of Yglesias' pet 'doctrine'-fueled policies are Vietnam and Iraq. I mean, how idiotic can you get? Both were generated by figments of the imagination - Domino Theory, PNAC dreams - and fed by gradiose notions of what the world should look like.

I, for one, am not only sick of neocon/con dreams, but fucking sick of liberal chicken hawk warmongering.

Pragmatism, please!

Posted by Eric | March 10, 2008 12:54 PM

The American voters have pretty well shown that they're too fucking stupid to judge policy results.

I'm with Don Williams on this!

Didn't something like 75% of Bush's 2004 reelection vote come from people who believed Saddam had been the one who attacked us on 9/11?...

Posted by RKU | March 10, 2008 1:01 PM

Aides describe him as a multilateralist who believes in American primacy but wants to lead by example rather than hectoring.

To me this seems primary to a "pragmatic" approach, one that understands the place of soft power in our dealings with other states. That has ultimately been the biggest collateral damage of the Iraq excursion - no longer are we seen as a city on a hill among the democracies of the world (and our potential allies in future international actions) but as the wild and unruly example of what not to do with military and economic power. It seems to me that any foreign policy has to be a reversion of this, a disengagement of hard power and a return to a more active interstate diplomacy and public diplomacy.

I find it also interesting that I have found little in Hillary Clinton's foreign policy playbook that doesn't sound like self-conscious unilateralism. Anyone who can point me in the direction of contrary evidence on this would be appreciated.

thedramatist.blogspot.com

Posted by Dramatist | March 10, 2008 1:08 PM

you are going to need some sort of worldview to act in the world.

Yes, DTM, I don't deny this at all. But there is a flaw in the way we devise ideologies. I sometimes think that, simple as it sounds, the fact that we have *called* something an ideology rather than a worldview, makes a difference. Calling something stupid 'ideological' makes it seem grand. How many times have we heard a Republican wave away some absurdity with the line, 'well, we just have an ideological difference here' - speaking of grandiosity, Important Thinker, Public Intellectual, and Historian Newty comes to mind. It's if, like Faith, the question at hand is beyond rational discussion: I believe what I believe because....I just do. Think of all the horrors rationalized by Ideology in the last 100 years. At least religious faith, which is no better in the rationalization-of-horrors sense, is a little more straightforward about it. We need to be more sophisticated about what an ideology is and is for.

Posted by jonnybutter | March 10, 2008 1:09 PM

Micheline, I voted for Obama but I want us out of Iraq and will reject Obama if there is another hint of waivering on leaving.

Posted by Jennifer | March 10, 2008 1:16 PM

jonnybutter,

Assuming I understand your point, I think I agree. I am generally skeptical about reductionist a priori worldviews, and particularly cautious when they are combined with reductionist a priori moral views. I think what you are suggesting is that "ideologies" typically fit into this space, and that the very notion of an "ideology" constitutes a rhetorical defense of such an approach. That strikes me as plausible, so I am tentatively on board with dumping "ideology" and replacing it with the more open-ended "worldview".

Posted by DTM | March 10, 2008 1:52 PM

Ideology played a role in drumming up enthusiasm for the Iraq adventure among the chattering classes, but I don't think it was very decisive factor among politicians and policy-makers. Democratic politicians who supported the war did so for a combination of reasons and assumptions, among them included:

1. There was going to be a war, no matter what Congress said. So the political imperative was just to get on the right side of it.

2. The war was going to be easy and go well. As with all wars that are easy and go well, it would enjoy substantial postwar public approval.

3. Those who supported the war would be able to share in, and take part of the credit for, the glory of victory; those who opposed it would look like timid defeatists, on the wrong side of history.

4. The national security considerations involved - weapons of mass destruction, the need to project military strength from time to time, worries about unreliable, non-aligned Arab strongmen running important parts of oil country and causing trouble for us in the future, etc. - were more or less significant. At least they were significant enough to provide a plausible casus belli.

5. Casualties would be fairly light all around, and most of the casualties would be on the other side anyway. Those people on the other side don't vote and don't count.

6. Foreign grumbling would disappear following a decisive US victory, the quick removal of a bad actor, and the consolidation of decision-making over the Iraqi oil business in the hands of US actors and their proxies.

7. There was going to be an election in the fall of 2006, and it was important for Democrats to get the foreign policy issue - at that time a huge Republican strength - off the table, so the discussion could return to the Democratic strength in domestic issues.

8. The public worries Democrats are pussies when it comes to throwing annoying, foreign shit hole countries up against the wall from time to time. Erring on the side of hawkishness is better political strategy than erring on the side of doveishness. [Possible key piece of ex post facto evidence for this calculation: vast numbers of Democrats have no intention of holding Hillary Clinton accountable for this error.]

There is nothing markedly ideological in the above list of considerations. That's not the problem. A prson can be motivated by all sorts of very practical, worldly - even cynical - motives. But if he doesn't do sufficient homework, even the cynic can miscalculate in the fitting of cold, practical, cynical means to cold, practical, cynical ends. The key factor in creating the political support for the Iraq disaster was the lack of reliable and informed assessments of conditions in and around Iraq, and of the likely consequences of a US invasion. To the extent that such assessments were available, they were overwhelmed in the national debate by other assessments. As a result, most of the Washington players failed spectacularly in predicting the outcome of the invasion.

One of the key documents in the lead-up to the Iraq war is, in my opinion, Ken Pollock's book. Pollock's was not an ideological argument cut from the same cloth as Hitchens, Powers or Ignatieff. It was a national security argument presented in dispassionate, analytical terms. It is actually a fairly well-constructed argument, disposing of several bad pro-war arguments before settling on a better one. The argument turns out on examination, however, to have some very mistaken premises about the nature of the Iraqi regime, its motives and its military programs. It also includes some very mistaken premises about the political aspirations of the Iraqi people, the nature of the organized political opposition in Iraq such as it existed, and the psychological impact of a US invasion on Iraqis. This isn't bad ideology; it's bad intelligence and bad historical and sociological scholarship.

I don't think we have learned many lessons from Iraq about the appropriate place of ideology vs. "pragmatic" considerations in foreign policy decision-making. Both parties are still internally divided in numerous ways among factions who assign different values to different ideological considerations. Those same internal arguments will take place again, with just as little hope for ultimate resolution, whenever the next crisis is debated.

The problem isn't really ideology. It's that we still have a political and media system that is not very good at generating high quality debate about complex causal factors and their bearing on means and ends, or at subduing irrational passions. Thus our debates tend to be fairly crude and oversimplified, and the whole thing is highly susceptible to the whims of demagogues and special interests pursuing private agendas.

So no ideological lessons. Perhaps, though, people will be in a somewhat more cautious mood for a while, and err on the side of restraint until some other insult to national pride, or offense to moral sensibility, comes along to re-kindle the old enthusiasms. If there are lessons to be learned, they may just be these: Do more homework. And try to avoid getting the public fired up with war enthusiasm that can't easily be turned off if it is leading in a stupid direction. And there is perhaps a lesson to be learned in the area of moral and intellectual virtue: don't be guilty of the ultimate cowardice of failing to voice important reservations and objections because you are more interested in appearing strong than being strong, and more interested in serving your political career than serving the truth and the public interest.

Posted by Dan Kervick | March 10, 2008 1:57 PM

Who cares about Obama's alleged pragmatism: We are building a religion!. Obamatons, tell me that link doesn't pump you up. Yes you CAN, motherf*ckers!

Posted by Fred | March 10, 2008 2:09 PM

Dan Kervick,

I don't have time right now to read your whole opus, but I think your first point is incorrect:

"There was going to be a war, no matter what Congress said. So the political imperative was just to get on the right side of it."

Although Congress hasn't insisted on declarations of war to fight wars since WWII, and Presidents have been allowed to start small wars on their own (e.g., Grenada, Panama) a clear de facto precedent was set by George H.W. Bush before the Gulf War: Presidents need Congressional approval in some fashion before launching wars which involve large-scale invasions. It's possible George W. Bush might have launched some air strikes against Iraq without advance Congressional approval (as Clinton did), but it's inconceivable that he would have invaded the country with 100k+ troops absent Congressional authorization.

Posted by Juan | March 10, 2008 2:19 PM

RE Dan Kervick's comment "One of the key documents in the lead-up to the Iraq war is, in my opinion, Ken Pollock's book. Pollock's was not an ideological argument cut from the same cloth as Hitchens, Powers or Ignatieff. It was a national security argument presented in dispassionate, analytical terms. It is actually a fairly well-constructed argument, disposing of several bad pro-war arguments before settling on a better one. The argument turns out on examination, however, to have some very mistaken premises about the nature of the Iraqi regime, its motives and its military programs. It also includes some very mistaken premises about the political aspirations of the Iraqi people, the nature of the organized political opposition in Iraq such as it existed, and the psychological impact of a US invasion on Iraqis. This isn't bad ideology; it's bad intelligence and bad historical and sociological scholarship."
--------------

In my opinion, it's very naive to think that Kenneth Pollack's 2002 book "The Threatening Storm" was an error.

Pollack was employed at at Think Tank set up by ISRAELI BILLIONAIRE Haim Saban. Saban has always been very clear where his loyalties lie: with Israel. The Israel being attacked in 2002 by suicide bombers whose families were receiving pensions from Saddam Hussein.

In my opinion, Kenneth Pollack deliberately lied to the American people in order to justify use of the US military to take out a threat to Israel --not a threat to the USA. As I've noted here, Pollack was being supported as well by lies from Ariel Sharon's spokeman and by his envoy, Bibi Nathanyahu.

Hillary and Bill are a pack of hicks from Arkansas who never would have gone anywhere if they had not shown a willingness to bury their noses 3 feet up the rectum of the Israel Lobby. As a result, 4000 US soldiers have died in a needless war, thousands more are crippled for life, and $3 Trillion has been stolen out of Social Security/Medicare.

And that corrupt whore Hillary blandly lies through her fucking teeth and suggests our sleeping children will be safe with her as Commander in Chief. She claims this just after sending thousands of our children to their deaths --an act done just so that Hillary could suck Haim Saban's dick.

Posted by Don Williams | March 10, 2008 2:21 PM

Very good comment by Dan K. The only sense in which I would disagree is this: the reasons for the Iraq war, from the POV of the neoconservatives, were quite 'ideological'. Dan says the analysis by people who *do* things like analysis was unideological, which is true. But, as he says, there was going to be a war no matter what, because of an ideology - on the part of the people who actually made the decision. Democrats and others were just being calculating. Republicans have had ideological reasons for doing all kinds of unworkable things in recent years. The failure of the opposition party (and people who analyze things dispassionately) is something else. Obama's target is less HRC than W Bush, I would think.

Surely the Obama campaign is not using 'pragmatism' in the jargon sense of the word. They're talking about the very difficult to define 'common sense'.

Posted by jonnybutter | March 10, 2008 2:31 PM

There is a bit of a false dichotomy between the concepts of ideology and pragmatism. It's easy to let yourself believe that you simply see the world as it it. Foreign policy realists have been among the worst at this. Kissinger thought he was simply master of the universe who knew all (after all, he only got one grade below an A while at Harvard) and didn't have to think about silly things like consequences, human lives, etc. You also end up with dumb ideas like Mearsheimer rallying to arm Germany with nukes after the fall of the Soviet Union because realism said that Europe will fall into war and realism is simply how the world works. Now he telling us it is inevitable we will be at war with China and need to focus on fighting that war on our own terms. The neocons thought invading Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Iran and possibly (depending on who you're talking about) Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Libya, North Korea and even France was a pragmatic way to deal with a bunch of thugs that like an actual state apparatus to keep up a long war and pose an existential threat or to have nuclear or biological weapons research capabilities. This so-called pragmatism, of course, was based on a reconstructed version of Trotskyism fused with libertarianism, which was of course insanely ideological.

Nobody is completely devoid of ideology and only pragmatic because no one is a non-subjective being. At this point in history, "pragmatic" just means "not fucking retarded." The Obama team seems to realize that rejecting ideas like meeting with leaders we don't like, public diplomacy, soft power, meaningless wars, etc. aren't exactly pragmatic when it comes to not pissing away American power and legitimacy in the world. It always seem ironic that so often the people in a country most obsessed with power, such as Bush, show the least understanding of what it is and how to use it.

Posted by Reality Man | March 10, 2008 2:36 PM

I'd also say that while the idea that the US should be about 'throwing annoying, foreign shit hole countries up against the wall from time to time', an idea that HRC seems to buy into - and is saying that not buying into it is 'naive' - might better be called 'nationalist' than ideological, you would surely get some long-winded, ideology-larded arguments to justify it (ie the only path to happiness for the entire world is the precise US version of republican government, and the exact same rationalist/adversarial approach to culture). Ideologies, as opposed to principles, have tended to be for people who don't like to think and make judgments, people who would rather just plug any problem into the ol' Ideology Mainframe and see what answer comes out. The problem with an ideology isn't that it's 'wrong', it's that it is given a function it wasn't really designed for - it's taken too seriously, in other words. An ideology has been an *attempt* at explaining the world. It's a model, a useful device.

Posted by jonnybutter | March 10, 2008 3:11 PM

sorry to be a bandwidth hog here, but, to finish my thought:

You could say that HRC does represent an adherence to a failed ideology: the Cold War one ('throwing shit countries up against the wall now and then'). Since the Cold War is over, and since the question of how we deal with our relative decline in the world compared to 1948 is the big question at hand, I'd say Obama (and Samantha Power) have a serious point to make here.

Posted by jonnybutter | March 10, 2008 3:19 PM

No more doctrine driven thinking; please, please, please.

Posted by charles kang | March 10, 2008 4:55 PM

That which is pragmatic for some can be suicidal for others. For the US Israel Lobby, invading Iraq, fomenting civil wars within Israel's enemies, threatening Iran, etc., may well be pragmatic considering the fact that Israel's goal is to keep as much stolen Palestinian land as possible. However, for Americans, getting mired in an unnecessary three trillion dollar war is suicidal.

Posted by J.E.Dundee | March 10, 2008 8:22 PM

I can't speak for Matt, but it sounded to me like he was trying to say you need to have some overall principles and overall strategy in your foreign policy, rather than just being "pragmatic".

Calling such principles and strategy "ideology" may be incorrect, but the concept is correct.

George Washington laid down those principles two hundred years ago - no foreign entanglements, and deal fairly in commerce.

The US started violating both of those principles almost immediately after.

All that said, it's woefully inadequate NOW for Matt to say this. Because the situation is far worse than just having a bunch of "pragmatists" running for office. The problem now is systemic, and has been so since the 1950's. The problem since then is the deliberate decision, as Chalmers Johnson documents, to turn the US into a military-industrial-security state. This has to be reversed.

Of course, it can't be, so that statement was a waste of time.

Only thing left now is to enjoy the fireworks as the United States empire is eventually brought down by the usual suspects: hubris and arrogance.

As Dorian Gray said in "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen", "I've lived long enough to see the future become history, Professor. Empires crumble. There are no exceptions."

The United States is doomed. Of course, it's rare that "doom" means everybody gets it in the neck. The smart ones always survive.

Matt however is doomed.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | March 10, 2008 10:34 PM

Four times out of five, `pragmatism' is the name that someone unconscious of his axioms will give to their implementation. Foreign-policy realists believe they are pragmatists; so do liberal internationalists; so do isolationists; so do mercantilists, for that matter.

Posted by Heathcliff | March 10, 2008 10:35 PM