The US gives Israel no aid. The money euphemistically called aid is anything but that. There are three types of aid: hesed (given of pure goodwill, not owed), tzedakah (owed for moral reasons), and mishpat (owed for legal reasons). None of those categories apply to Israeli-American relations. America possesses neither selfless goodwill, nor moral or legal obligations toward Israel. The annual subsidies are bribes at worst, payments at best.

America pays Israel for the influence in the Middle East. Controlling the Middle Eastern bully is America’s greatest regional asset. America receives immense leverage in its dealings with Muslims by the fact of controlling their major enemy. That achievement did not come easy: America failed at replicating it with Pakistan, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Germany, Japan, and several other countries. America has two contradictory policies: isolation and the world outreach. Aligning itself with regional hegemons is the only way to resolve that political dichotomy. Tried in many countries, the US policy of regional alignment succeeded only with Israel. Only the Jews were ready to sell sovereignty.

The aid to Israel is an extremely efficient investment. America spent more than $300 billion for the second Iraqi invasion, but the debacle discredited it: Iran ignores the American threats and Muslim countries continue jacking up the oil price. Israel is given 1% of that amount in annual installments, and in return greatly reinforces the US stance in the Middle East: Arabs can always appeal to America against Israel, and America generally listens to them.

The American aid is insulting. In Jewish law, it is an obligation of every individual to avoid being a burden to society at any cost; charity is the last measure for those who cannot support themselves. It is outrageous for the Jewish nation to plead for aid with Gentiles. Israelis are not that poor, and the aid is not that huge. Ending the huge subsidies to Israeli Arabs and non-working Jews, reducing socialist pensions and job benefits in the Histadrut trade union, and firing a large number of useless bureaucrats would more than offset the lost aid. Sensible free market economic policy rather than the post-socialist regulatory abomination would propel the Israeli economy. The IDF can be reduced, long-term conscription abandoned, and a lot of money saved if Israel officially relies on nuclear deterrent in any large-scale war.

The amount of US aid, about $3 billion, remains steady in nominal dollars since 1979 while the CPI increased more by than three times during that period. The cost of weapons increases much faster than the CPI, and the amount which was substantial in 1979 is now negligible. The aid comprises 0.02% of the US GDP and 0.5% of its military budget. For Israel, the figures are, respectively, 1.5% and 17%. Though even the 17% can be realistically offset by streamlining the Israeli army, the situation is actually much simpler: Israel spends 77% of the American aid for American weapons. R&D is a major part of advance weapons costing, and Israeli purchases help amortizing it. In effect, Israel receives the US subsidies in order to pass them to the US military contractors. The comparable Russian weapons – not exactly of the same edge but still very good and sufficient for fighting the Arabs – cost 4-7 times less. In terms of purchasing power parity with Russia, US military aid to Israel amounts to about half a billion dollars annually and close to 3% of Israel’s military budget. Some of the weapons Israel procures in America are virtually useless, untested, hyper-expensive military toys superfluous in the real combat. Addicted to US weapons, Israeli army came to resemble its American counterpart in terms of inefficiency, skyrocketing costs, and the lack of training and daring spirit.

Large-scale procurement of American weapons made Israel dependent on America for any military operations and highly susceptible to the threats of American embargo on arms deliveries. Israel currently places tens of thousands of small, less than $100,000 orders with the US defense contractors, which suggests across-the-border dependence on American suppliers for spare parts and minor items. That creates immense political dependence on the US.

The general purpose American aid to Israel is now being phased out, and for good, as it was spent in the most corrupt manner and hardly benefited common Israelis. The extraordinary aid packages were always detrimental to Israel as they were tied to sweeping political concessions such as evacuating Gaza, a move which created power vacuum where Hamas quickly established itself.

The amount of US aid to Israel is comparable to private Jewish contributions, about $1 billion through charities and $500 million in Israeli bonds. Israel could reasonably double those contributions by a stronger Diaspora outreach program.
The balance of aid benefits the enemies of Israel. Egypt gets $1.3 billion in military aid annually, even though its only target and potential enemy is Israel. America knowingly and willingly funds an anti-Israeli army. Egypt also receives $500 million of general purpose aid, which frees the equal amount of its own resources for military programs. American aid is much more critical to impoverished Egypt than to Israel, and so the cessation of foreign aid to all parties benefits Israel.

America also aids Palestine – though the money nominally bypassed the PLO, it paid the salaries of PLO functionaries and employees. Now America directly funds Fatah, which even pays Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades and Hamas employees in Gaza with that money. In Palestine, America directly finances anti-Israeli terrorist infrastructure.

Not only the US aid, but also arms sales are doubtfully helpful to Israel. America traditionally offsets arms sales to Israel with deliveries to Arab states. Arab procurement of US weapons greatly exceeds Israel’s. Joint US-Russian arms embargo on the Middle East would benefit Israel: she is able to manufacture most weapons while Arabs cannot, and Israel has an edge over Arabs in arms smuggling and grey market procurement.

Arabs recognize the dubious value of US support. For example, Jordan, the Arab country closest to the US, supported Saddam in the Iraq-Kuwait war. Jordan was afraid of Saddam and did not count on the US help.

The campaign to end US foreign aid should also include ending the goodwill military campaigns, such as liberating the petty emirate of Kuwait. Israel would benefit from a still wider policy, namely America’s return to its traditional isolation. Taking the US bases out of the Gulf countries would leave Israel as America’s only juggernaut in the Middle East, and actually increase the US establishment’s dependence on Israel.

It is easy to be pessimistic about American economy. The hard part is timing the downturn. The problem is well known from shorting on stock market: many companies are obviously overvalued, but can still rise up enough to wipe out the bear.

American economy was always, in a sense, a vampire. It attracted huge foreign investments and then defaulted cyclically. Americans have Las Vegas casinos, while the world has its own casino - America. The foreigners played on American stock market, railroads, junk bonds, currency, dotcoms - you name it. To call it "investment," even "speculative investment," is a misnomer: we're talking about high-stakes gambling. The money doesn't even fund the companies in IPOs, but mostly applies to the secondary - purely speculative - market. In the end, foreigners always lost their investments. The boom cycle seems to be about 30-40 years, and the last major crisis took place in the early 1970s, reverberating into the S&L crisis and the 1987 stock market crash.

Obviously, the three times increase in stock market indices since 1994 and up to five times increase in real estate valuations reflect a market boom. Such increases are unsustainable. The looming social security crisis when the baby boomers retire also assures an economic downturn.

The government attempts to cut down on taxes and welfare proved unsuccessful. America, as any democracy, continuously increases the allowances for its voters until the economic dead end. The government expenses rise continuously, almost always faster than GDP, and are resilient: the expenditures keep rising when GDP slows down.

The US dollar is overvalued as any brand-name item. For decades, it was the currency of choice for foreign governments, companies, and commoners. The US, accordingly, was able to issue staggering amounts of currency without the fear of being inundated by it: foreigners kept dollars as reserves and savings, and did not threaten the run on the American market. That situation is changing rapidly since late 1980s as US brokers appeal to previously passive investors. Foreign pension funds and governments seek higher profits by investing in America rather than simply maintaining cash reserves in US dollars. Japanese and the oil Arabs, untouched as yet by American economic crises (their riches accumulated after the 1970s US default), are especially active investors. Chinese government can always unload its massive dollar reserves onto the US market. The euro undermined the dollar as the major reserve currency. American financial sanctions against Iran also suggested the Muslims to switch to euro and Swiss francs. The dollar inflation is huge, about 390% from 1972.

Though the American dominance in the high-tech is unrivaled, it is actually not American. Only a relatively small educated class prospers from the high-tech. Another small number of denizens profits hugely from the Casino America, offering financial services to foreigners and hapless locals, both of whom lose consistently. The majority of Americans are employed in the industries which cannot compete with the foreign ones. That's why the American economy is disproportionally service-oriented: its industries went bankrupt. Scores of Mexican immigrants with no competitive skills weigh the American economy down. The similarity with Ancient Rome is striking. There, too, a small part of the economy was highly competitive while most citizens lived on the government handouts.

Though the US economy is relatively free from regulation, its most important aspect - wage - is heavily regulated. The minimum wage in America drives industrialists out of business. If the least skilled worker receives $8 per hour, then a much more skilled industrial worker expects three times as much, and entrepreneurs have to move their factories to China.

Outsourcing the high-tech jobs to places such as Israel and India presents little problem to America so far. No other country managed to develop the high-tech clusters: many companies working in the same area, venture capital, excellent universities, and attractiveness to highly qualified foreign workers. The problem comes from counterfeiting and reverse engineering the US products. Another critical factor is the demand for high-tech gadgets: recently, Microsoft encountered relatively sluggish sales of its Vista platform to existing Windows customers, as they are satisfied with their current OS and don't want to invest in switching. Manufacturers of hard goods are already familiar with this problem: Volvo is so reliable that many owners of old cars refuse to upgrade, and mobile phone users don't rush to replace their handsets with the newest devices. The market for high-tech improvements can be saturated.

The US "financial" (gambling) industry can be struck hard by the foreigners and small domestic investors becoming temporarily wary of speculative investment.

American economy is overleveraged: from sub-prime mortgages to resurging junk bonds. Many stock corporations have liquidity far below the market price of even the IPO valuations, and their investors are latent losers. The US economy is highly vulnerable to even small downturns. The government has long recognized that problem, and fights it with interventions, essentially absorbing the losers' debts and embezzlers' profits with taxpayers' money. From the New Deal semi-socialist programs which converted a short-term recovery into prolonged recession, to the giant S&L bailout, to the government-propped buyouts, such as the recent Bear Stern's, the government hides the losses from the public view to retain credibility and avoid its nightmare, the run on the US dollar. That's sort of what Enron officials were charged with.

The American economic ripples are a part of the worldwide crisis which has recently broke out in Japan, Malaysia, Great Britain, and other countries. The governments grew bigger, tax more, spend more, and regulate more. For decades, booming economy and the technological revolution provided a sufficient pace for worldwide GDP growth despite the opposing trend of growing governments. Still, the US disposable income grew by merely 1% a year for the last 35 years.

The current international income disparity is abnormal. In the late eighteenth century, English farmers lived not much better than freehold Chinese farmers. So the situation will slowly return to the historical norm. Abnormal profits are only made in monopolies: either regulatory or based on some other advantage. Now the US economy enjoys monopolistic advantage in the high-tech. The income trickles from the top earners down through the American society, but also the know-how and jobs trickle to other countries. America will prosper in absolute terms, but decline compared to other nations which develop faster. They are still unlikely to reach the American income, GDP, and budget figures for considerable time, but the gap is closing. Some countries can form the blocs which collectively exceed the US GDP.

The US Army is heading into a major trouble. It staked everything on the cutting-edge weapons but their costs increase faster than GDP, squeezing the budget. All other high-tech goodies become cheaper, but it's different with weapons where good is never enough, and the army always looks for the best. The law of marginal utility kicks in, and the costs of slightly better weapons skyrocket. The US Army, therefore, might not be so terrifying soon. Or, a major war might shake the excessive gadgets off, and the army would settle on good rather than hyper-advanced weapons.

For all its booms and busts, America will remain a wealthy and important country at least for decades, but its relative importance in international affairs will decline from the unsustainably high post-WWII level.

The American debate on comprehensive health coverage is instructive both because it illustrates the extremes of welfare society such as also Israel’s and because it shows how socialists take some very questionable propositions for granted.

The American health problem is the overregulation of medical profession which led to spiraling costs and cartelized prices. Tooth filling costs upward of $200 in America, but as little as $10 in Russia; the quality is comparable. Absurdly long medical education drastically increases doctors’ wage requirements. Plenty of medical operations can be performed proficiently enough by less skilled personnel; it doesn’t take a registered nurse’ training to administer a shot. Relatively low out-of-pocket expenses of insured medical treatment leave patients little incentive to control the costs. The medical lobby demands ever higher standards which increase costs exponentially. Medical professionals use licensing to create both a cartel and a trade union, making health provision the ultimate monopoly. Like every trade union, the medical one increases its profits by milking consumers rather than investors who simply don’t receive enough profit to be milked. The solution is to break the monopoly: anyone should be able to practice medicine, and patients should be able to choose between various types of providers, such as those licensed by a semi-official association, less pompous licensees, even Mexican and Indian medical graduates. Medical liability should be legally limited to a sensible amount; that would allow limiting the number of expensive tests when patients cannot afford them. The government must stop dictating to insurance companies their policies; there is a huge demand for medical insurance that only covers low-quality treatment by non-AMA doctors.

Stories of working single mothers being unable to buy medical insurance for their kids are nonsense. What kind of mother doesn’t buy her child a $50 health insurance? That’s not a critical amount even for minimum wage earners. No doubt, she manages to pay $30 per month for the cable TV. In order to arrange health insurance for almost all children from poor families, slap a few hundred such mothers with long jail terms for gross negligence and endangering the lives of their children; just look at the mother’s bank statement and if she purchases anything non-essential before buying health coverage – send her to jail. Publicize such cases. Many such mothers are paid cash and expenses don’t show on their bank accounts; search their homes to obtain incriminating evidence. Send their ex-husbands who evade child support payments to jail, too. Universal health coverage legalizes parental negligence. That’s sort of the government compensating victims of robbery and abandoning prosecution of robbers.

Poverty has nothing to do with absence of health insurance. Jews in the tsarist Russia were so poor that inner-city Blacks cannot imagine. American Blacks and Mexicans are not poor in any meaningful sense, but filthy rich compared to 90% of the world’s population. If the white society really wants to integrate the Blacks, it should make them responsible. Universal health coverage enshrines personal irresponsibility. A mother who routinely feeds her children with hamburgers is guilty of manslaughter.

Universal health insurance encourages negligence. People who don’t brush their teeth properly are assured of the taxpayers-funded dental coverage. Those who sit the entire evenings in front of stupid TV shows get ophthalmologist’s help at public expense. Instead, one has to prove due diligence when applying for public funds: prove that he exercises regularly, adhere to a reasonable diet, and overall leads a healthy lifestyle; McDonald’s customers should not be eligible. The Torah establishes the right to charity only for the people who positively cannot provide for themselves: widows and orphans in the ancient economy. Following the biblical logic, modern states may offer charity only to people who accidentally lost the ability to work through no fault of their own. Such definition makes old people generally ineligible for public funding: they should have accumulated enough money during their working life to provide for retirement and also raise enough children to care about them. Drunkards, drug addicts, homosexuals with AIDS, and similarly degraded elements are also ineligible for public help: not only have they inflicted harm on themselves, but the costs of maintaining them are staggering; the money can be more efficiently spent elsewhere. Health coverage, as any paid activity, is subject to limited resources: societies may spend infinite amounts on health care, but can actually spend only so much. Instead of wasting $50,000 – 150,000 annually on treating drunkards in emergency rooms, the society can just accept a simple fact that every system produces waste, including human one, and not all waste can be recycled. “If I’m not for myself, who would be for me?”

The government formally submits to criminals when extending free health coverage to illegal immigrants, including children. The case is often misrepresented as “illegals and their children.” No, the children are also illegals. A society has zero moral obligation to those who join it illegally: a duckling among swans must not be treated as a swan. The children might not be contentious criminals like their parents who entered the US illegally, but are not members of American society, either. Sponsors of legal immigrants to the US are required to prove their ability to pay for the new immigrants’ medical coverage; how much more the illegal immigrants must care for themselves instead of relying on the public purse? The American defeatism towards illegal immigrants is akin to the Israeli defeatism about the swelling numbers of Israeli Arabs. The question, What can we do about them? is absurd. The US keeps millions of its citizens in jails; surely it can deport the millions of illegal immigrants. They would go by themselves if the government cracks down on their employers.

Universal health coverage creates ethical impasse. The society needs healthy twenty-year-olds, but spends mostly on economically worthless eighty-year-olds and drunkards. A rational welfare society would pay for dental care and gym for poor youngsters rather than spend a million plus dollars keeping Alzheimer patients alive in the vegetative state. State-sponsored health coverage forces state officials to solve insolvable ethical problems, such as whether spend more on dental care for the young or Alzheimer treatment for the old; both can consume virtually unlimited budgets. In an ethical society, each person accumulates funds for his own medical treatment and then chooses how to spend them; families and charities can likewise make private choices as to funding this or that treatment. Universal health insurance socializes ethics and puts officials in charge of moral issues.

The relatively wide acceptance of the universal health coverage among the American population demonstrates the extent of taxpayers’ alienation from the government. Even among the hardcore liberals, few would willingly part with money in their bank accounts to benefit the illegal migrants and irresponsible Blacks. Americans, however, have no problem with the government spending the tax funds it has already confiscated. Americans submit to the fact that government confiscate their money, and welcome a spending with even the remotest benefit as opposed to pork barrel spending in Iraq, military procurement, and elsewhere.

Except in the very narrow, biblical terms there’s no right to charity, but only a liberty to work. There’s no right to medical care, but a liberty to contract it. Charity is an ad hoc affair which shouldn’t be made into a universal policy. All recipients of charity must be investigated before being granted it; charity is an exception to the established order whereas every man provides for himself and his family. Universal health coverage is another step by the government to usurp responsibility for the people’s lives, and rule over infantile subjects.

America has no business aiding Israel. The attempts to achieve for Israel closer ties with the US are a disservice to Jewish people. America will never-ever pursue Jewish interests as they are irrelevant to US voters and establishment alike. America embargoed weapons shipments to Israel during the Independence War, threatened intervention on Egypt’s behalf in the 1956 war, had operational plans for landing its troops in Sinai to defend Egypt in 1967, barred Israel from preemption in 1973 - and only shipped Israel weapons after we won the war - forced Israel to abandon Sinai, and now pushes us into the suicidal peace process. America gives more aid to Egypt and Palestine than Israel, fought for Kuwait but never for Israel, and spent more in Iraq than the total aid to Israel since inception.

That is only natural, as we cannot expect America to care about the Jewish state. Why would the WASP establishment care, if Jews don’t? Polls indicate that American Jews overwhelmingly support the peace process and oppose the war with Iran. No one hates Israel like many American Jews: they want to prove to their Gentile friends that they are not too Jewish, and so they side with Arabs. They are trying to show that Jews are exactly like others; but the Jewish state is not like other states. And so most American Jews support "democratic" Israel where Arabs enjoy equal rights with Jews: that is, the right to breed and vote the Jewish state out of existence.

The support Israel now enjoys from America is a self-delusion. The US vetoed many UN resolutions which condemned Israel. But the very likelihood of such vetoes allows other UNSC members to behave more radically: they vote pro-Left and pro-Arab, knowing that the resolution won’t pass. The US vetoes keep Israel in the UN while a stream of empty anti-Israeli resolutions would have forced Israel out of that barbarian conference, and end Israeli adherence to the UN-sponsored nonsense such as the 1956 borders. The UN fails to enforce sanctions against Iran, an international pariah; the chance of effective sanctions against Israel is infinitesimal. If Israel doesn’t follow South Africa’s path of decades-long oppression of aborigines, but ends the Arab demographic problem swiftly and ruthlessly, in a few years there would be no prospect of sanctions.

From 1948 to 1972, Israel survived while having no official sponsor. We played with France, Germany, America, even the Soviet forefront Romania, and survived. Arab loyalty is non-existent and allegiance – prohibitively expensive; many countries would find it cheaper to buy regional influence by aiding Israel than the Arabs. America aids Israel to control her, and to brandish that control before Arabs extracting concessions from them. The control over Israel gives America great leverage in relations with every Arab country; aid to Israel is an excellent investment. Not only the US, but other countries, too, realize that and would ally themselves with Israel. In the show of absurd loyalty, Israel sticks to America, but America sells her at every corner – for oil.

Russia cannot give Israel much aid, but can supply advanced weapons much cheaper than America, and provide excellent support in the UN. Russia’s military credibility among Arabs is much higher than America’s; Arabs don’t hesitate terrorizing the American pawn, but would shrink from attacking Russia’s client state.

There is also France, boiling with imperial ambitions but unable to vie the Arab states away from America. Through an alliance with France, Israel can extract diplomatic support and considerable aid from the EU.

And there are China and India.

Israel pays with real concessions for the fictional American support. The US needs to show the Arab clients its power over Israel, and kicks her around just for the fun of it: witness the squabble over a few dozen hamlets frightfully dubbed “illegal outposts.” As if the Arab attacks on Israel from 1929 onwards have anything to do with those hamlets erected as a protest against the Oslo capitulation. American politicians sell Israel to placate Arabs, such as by boosting the peace process after the Iraqi debacle. The Carter-Rice ilk uses Israel to vindicate their silly theories, and Clinton pushed for the peace process to cover his deviatory conduct. If not for US pressure, Israeli governments wouldn’t even think of giving the Arabs Judea and Samaria and partitioning Jerusalem.

Incidentally, our tactical goals partially agree with a major aim of American anti-Semites: divestment from Israel. For utterly different reasons we, too believe that Israel must abandon the US aid and live on her own. Financial responsibility would signify the return to Israel’s fundamental political doctrine: Only the IDF is responsible for Israel’s safety. Israel doesn’t need Star Wars weapons to extinguish Palestinian terrorism; good old napalm would do. Israel need not cutting-edge weapons against regular Arab armies: nuclear bombs are good enough.

Rough, self-reliant, arrogant Israel has a good chance for a lasting armistice with neighboring Arabs. Israel the American client has no chance for lasting peace.

We have already tried relying on Assyria.

As the successive US Administrations employ the Old Europe’s cynical and corrupt approach to politics, their policies are twofold: pro-Israeli and anti-Jewish. US Administrations need Israel the bully to push Muslims into cooperation with America. But since the US politics lost the last shreds of morality, it works against everything that is Jewish in Israel. Thus the US demands destruction of Jewish villages, accepting Arab occupation of Judea and Samaria, and abandoning Jerusalem to Palestinians.

It is very different with American people. Public support for Israel in America is very high. Common Americans accept the Jewish right to Jerusalem and Judea, and agree to the overwhelming use of Israel’s force against the Arabs. Jews and Americans have much in common, though not the absurdities trumpeted by Jewish Diaspora barons.

Democracy is not central to Jews and Americans alike. Both nations are values-oriented. Americans fought a civil war in large part over the issue of slavery instead of democratically allowing the South to continue with it. America commonly took leadership in international affairs rather than seeking democratic solutions through the UN. In Judaism, too, democracy takes the second place to values: “You shall not follow the majority to evil.” Ancient Athenians could theoretically pass any decision democratically; Jews and Americans have doctrinal safeguards against such voting. Neither is tolerance a shared Jewish and American value. In fact, our nations are fairly intolerant. Europeans tolerated the Nazis until Germany swallowed them, but the US proceeded to fight the evil as a matter of principle. After the four decades of leftist brainwashing, majority of Americans still oppose homosexual families. Americans are religious, if superficially. So are the adherents to Judaism.

Anti-Semitism exists in America as in every Christian country. Polls indicate anti-Semitism among Caucasian Americans lower than in Europe. The real difference, however, is institutional. Americans lack the history of restricting the Jews. Americans are inbred with the idea of institutional equality. Anyone may dislike Jews, but almost everyone treats us as equals.

Jews and Americans share messianism. Both nations believe in their unique role as the beacon to mankind. Both nations act on this belief consistently. Americans see themselves as an example of liberty; Jews – of morality. Our roles are compatible. The British-American liberty was formulated on the Sinai; American liberty inherits the Torah values. That is not libertarianism, but a rigid system of moral values. Morals are regulated; in everything else, the people are free. Jews and Americans consciously developed their doctrines and made them the reason for national existence.

Israelis and Americans share the history. Both our nations encountered the lands settled by hostile aborigines. Both offered them coexistence, beneficial for the aborigines. Both were forced to kill and repress the aborigines, and eventually took over their land. The most enterprising Europeans left the Old World for America. The most zealous Jews left Europe to settle Palestine. Both countries, after they succeeded initially, were deluged by ideologically neutral immigrants who lack the settlers’ pioneer mentality. Israel admitted Arabs and Slavs, America accepted Mexicans; both countries shrunk from proudly pronouncing themselves different and refusing the newcomers of alien mentality.

Israel and America are both strangers: in the Middle East and the world, respectively. Arabs are zealous and ill-wishing of Israel, Europeans – of America. Both dominate and face perpetual military conflicts. Terrorism threatens both Israel and America, albeit unimportant statistically.

We just need to get rid of our governments.

Our American friends are not only ours. America is also the friend of Wahhabite Saudi Arabia, totalitarian Egypt, the Al Jazeera state of Qatar, Bedouin Jordan, Islamist Kuwait, terrorist Iraq, and just about every other enemy of Israel. Even Russia would be a more reliable and attractive imperial master for Israel than is the US. Our American friends sell immense quantities of advanced weapons to Saudi Arabia, provide $1.4 billion annual aid to Egypt, fought for Kuwait, and spent more in Iraq in the four years than given to Israel in forty years. The US plays it nice: vetoes the UN's empty proclamations against Israel, scorns Ahmadinejad for genuine anti-Israeli feelings of all Muslims, and pats amenable Israeli leaders on the shoulder.

America used Israel as a bulwark against the Soviet Union's expansion in the Middle East. In the late 1960s, America enjoyed wooing Israel away from France. But the best thing for America about Israel is that she creates a controllable threat. Arabs perceive Israel as a dangerous dog and the US – as her master. The dog must be well armed to bark loudly and increase the master's importance. The American establishment needs Israel conflicting with Muslim states. The states threatened by Israel appeal to the US for protection and arbitration. Such policy doesn't require the absence of peace treaties between Israel and Muslims. America has it both ways in the case of Egypt: the peacemaker's laurels of pressing Israel and Egypt into the peace agreement, and afterwards – of the power broker who arms both Israel and Egypt and oversees their hostile relations. Dog barks when feels insecure; Israel in the 8-mile-wide Road Map borders will be permanently insecure, thus hysterical. The peace agreement with Arabs would make Israel so narrow that she would not be able to afford war. Israel was very relaxed after 1967, enjoying a great depth of defense in Sinai. Ludicrously narrow Israel, surrounded by the Hezbollah-dominated Lebanon, Hamas-run Palestine, saturated with Russian missiles Syria, and Iraqi-controlled Jordan – such Israel will brandish her weapons to steer the enemies away. The enemies will be afraid and spiral the arms race and lean to America. It is soothing to believe that the US foreign policy establishment is stupid; no, it is devilish.

Only the stupid Jews imagine that the US Administration seeks Israeli benefit in the peace process.

Idealists push into the White House. Media loves unusual things, and trumpet insignificant curiosities. One is Barack Obama. For all the hype about equal rights, sensible Americans won’t elect a black President. A third position, like Rice’s, is fine – but white Americans won’t elect a Black person to rule over them. At least, not now, not until the political correctness erodes the common sense. Even female rights are not that deeply entrenched in public mentality. Making Nancy Pelosi the Democrats’ leader harmed their ratings a lot. Voters subconsciously attributed the Democrats’ non-performance in the Congress to the female Speaker. People voted for Democratic Party, but ended up with female leader. Gender prejudices are alive and well.

Obama personifies many common traits of native Blacks – not their American variety grown arrogant on the incessant concessions and affirmative action. Obama is nice and soft, dislikes conflicts, all for peace. He would rather suffer than make others suffering. Critically, Obama shares a prominent feature of people from underdeveloped nations: he tries to ingratiate himself with white, advanced Americans; yes, a servant syndrome. Various “experts” proclaim that the third-world people hate America. On the contrary, they admire America and mask their admiration and jealousy with superficial expression of hatred; that hatred evaporates after a half-hour discussion.

Obama feels out-of-place in politics similarly to Jimmy Carter. Both approached the real – cruel – world with moral standards developed for mutually respectful and compassionate communities. Both are equally dangerous champions of the left who try to mould the world into being nice. Carter twisted Menachem Begin’s arms into Sinai capitulation: Israel won the wars of 1948, 1956, 1967, and 1973 against Egypt but relinquished a huge buffer zone of Sinai for unreliable Egyptian promises of peace. Barack Obama revealed the conference of Jewish American politicians that Israel needs a just solution with the Palestinian Arabs rather than seek controlling them through fear; the Jewish anti-Semites applauded him.

The Democrat’s another presidential choice, Hillary Clinton, is equally lame. A woman is naturally anti-war – but in the real world peace comes through war. Clinton’s Methodist family background predisposes her to rational, peaceful means; they do not work in foreign relations. Clinton is fussy. Unable to formulate realistic policy suggestions, she travels to Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria to imitate political activity. Hillary Clinton reminds of her husband who forced mildly suicidal Wye River memorandum on Israel just to show himself active on the international arena. Hillary Clinton recalls Golda Meir: leftist, female, indecisive, willful, vindictive, cruel. Clinton, however, lacks Golda’s common sense and charisma: a Jewish grandma leading the world’s oddest nation with one of the world’s strongest armies. Clinton would rather push the client states like Israel or Iraq into the mold of her political preconceptions than admit her political failures. So far, Hillary Clinton did not come up with coherent or sensible foreign policy proposals, but only criticizes the war in Iraq and calls for talks with hostile regimes. She is ready to apply harsh measures against those who refuse her urging: Clinton accepts bombing Iran, but could equally decide to punish Israel, if it is not sufficiently forthcoming.

Both Obama and Clinton proclaim goodwill toward Israel – but only to a very particular Israel: obedient, suffering, and peaceful. To Israel that suicidally dances the American line of the peace process with the committed Arab enemies. A good part is that neither a female nor a black president would be strong enough to push Israel to the national suicide of the peace process.

Since its earliest days, America has supported ugly regimes for a variety of reasons: reputable European realpolitik, the dictators’ openness to foreign investment, and simply because other options were still worse. Idealism has slowly poisoned American foreign politics. The United States entered the world wars against Germany for no reason of national significance, but rather to establish America, a newcomer to world politics, as a global hegemon. Might bred pride. The danger and costs restricted idealism and pride initially, but the changes in power after WWII propelled the United States to superpower status. America could bring light and build ambitions safely and at relatively moderate cost. Thus came the dubious wars in Korea and Vietnam, and the non-feasible but image-building protection of Western Europe against Russia. America behaved like an ambitious, unchecked giant. Each stratum got a piece of the pie: idealists defended the free world against communism, while imperialists extended American influence into the Asian jungles.

America’s political expansion into the Middle East didn’t serve commercial interests. The US oil corporations did business in the Arabian Peninsula before the state’s involvement. The US-supported Arab regimes generally denied foreign companies from developing local oilfields. Arabs never intend to stop the oil supply, nor could they survive without oil revenues. America involved itself heavily in the Middle East to counter Soviet expansion, but why? In the worst-case scenario, if the Soviets stopped oil shipments, America could comfortably supply itself from its domestic oil fields, and from Canada, Mexico, and Venezuela. The quest for influence was entirely driven by imperial ambitions.

Unwilling to replay the Vietnam scenario and install quisling regimes in Arab countries, the only option America was left with was buying influence. When the United States refused to pay for the Aswan dam, Nasser switched sides and took Russian aid, instead. America virtually begged the Arabs to accept its authority. The US accepted wicked, corrupt, fundamentalist, openly hostile regimes, such as the Saudis, and fought for Kuwait without asking for a price. Measuring influence in square miles rather than military force, America sided with the Arabs to pressure Israel for concessions instead of rationally standing firm behind its strong and reliable ally. Now both Arabs and Israelis are contemptuous of America.

The United States doesn’t need an empire. Military might didn’t help it in its many trade conflicts with the Arabs, Japan, and Europe. No country significantly threatens America. The country doesn’t profit from its protectorates, but spends handsomely to maintain their condescending loyalty.

People welcome incidental help but resist long-term patronage or intervention. Protracted wars, such as in Iraq, bring the empire no benefits. America can achieve popular goodwill abroad with education programs, ideological expansion, and by the pinpoint killings of evil rulers, the Saudis included.

Recent shooting in American university proved a boon to anti-gun campaigners. Availability of guns surely adds to criminal situation: absent of firearm, the shooter would unlikely have devised another mode of mass murder. Oklahoma bombing shows that unlikely things happen. Gun ownership in Canada, Switzerland, and Norway approaches the US, but their homicide rates are 3-6 times lower. Total (firearm and otherwise) homicide rate in America is only twice that of Canada, Finland, or Scotland - ostensibly safe countries. Homicides in America are spread unevenly, concentrated in several notorious inner cities. Other than in those small, degraded enclaves violent crime is very low – and decreasing.

Americans possess hundreds of millions of handguns and rifles. If gun ownership is restricted, criminals won’t surrender their weapons. They can also re-supply from Mexico. Students have no trouble buying drugs now, and would buy illegal firearms with similar ease.

Leftists and idealists cooperate to bring down the institute of gun ownership. Leftists instinctively dislike popular resistance to their rule while idealists imagine people will cease killing if guns are not sold legally. For obvious security reasons, Israel could not significantly restrict gun ownership, but leftist courts consistently sentence the Jews, even soldiers who shoot Arabs in self-defense, and thus effectively rendered guns useless. That is, useless for Jews.

Aliens are different, not completely comprehensible, thus unpredictable, thus non-trustable and dangerous. Predictability of behavior cements societies; people know a likely response, act safely and enter into agreements. Arabs are notoriously adaptive, like any primitive people who lack strong culture of their own. In US, Arabs mimicry American lifestyle, in Europe – French, German or any other; no wonder that narcissist Europeans patronize Arab countries. Israeli Arabs learn Hebrew and often pass for Jews. Jews, however, aggravate our inherent difference from other peoples, thus unpredictability and distrustfulness with political swings that drive friends and foes mad. Israelis pronounce high moralistic values and bomb Lebanese civilians (bombing is right, moralism – wrong), offer Palestinians a state and then refuse it over border rectifications, build strong army and sue for peace. Foreigners recognize clinical case of political madness and treat Israel as a warden patient: ignore her interests and kick her around.