Understanding empire

Marco Rubio makes it easy.

It is not possible to understand US history and character without grokking the role of empire; our political essence is imperial. Fortunately, this is not complicated. Marco Rubio has made it easy.

The US started out as 13 settler-colonies largely based on genocide and slavery that banded together to form a nation that continued to expand based on the same model. America was ripe for the taking, with no apologies: “savages” counted for nothing. The creation of the US was essentially tragic.

This was called Manifest Destiny, and by 1890 was a celebrated fact. The frontier was closed. But the same need to project American interests and power continued with foreign wars, conquests and meddling in the affairs of sovereign nations, and which has never ceased. This has resulted in the present compulsion to assert total global hegemony.

Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, just gave a speech at the Munich Security Conference which extolled the European conquest and domination of foreign lands over the past 400 years as the definition of civilization. He called for the reassertion of this colonial domination of the world as the path forward and in response to the growing influence of Russia and China. His remarks received great applause from the Europeans.

But what is Marco Rubio endorsing? He is endorsing the imperial corporate state, not the working man. He is endorsing corporate based oligarchy, not the working class. He is endorsing a new form of predatory capitalism represented by King Baby and his corporate cronies: he is promoting outright fascism.

The great stinking truth about our time is that long-standing predatory capitalism based on extractive colonialism has become fascism. This is why Western European nations are applauding Marco Rubio and King Baby Trump; they can’t imagine a reinvigorated Europe except on the basis of corporate state fascism.

Why is this?

Because the age of colonialism, the age of predatory capitalism represented by great European powers, is over and has been over for decades. It is no longer possible to revive colonialism on the old model of predatory capitalism. For Marco Rubio, King Baby Trump and European powers to actually revive colonial predatory capitalism, they must resort to corporate state fascism: the gratuitous projection of brutal power.

This describes US and NATO policy in Ukraine, in the Middle East continuously for the past 25 years and US policy in Central America presently. If sanctions and tariffs are included, more than half the world is being bullied by fascist policies.

Nothing sums up all of this as cogently as the genocide of Gaza. The major European powers are fully supporting the US and Israel in what is a tremendously violent campaign to murder the rightful citizens of Palestine. And then to profit from their graves. There is not the slightest pretence of diplomacy or decency; King Baby’s envoys are merciless corporate raiders collaborating in genocide.

Colonialism is dead, but corporate state fascism is alive and well. Just ask Jared Kushner and the Europeans; they can fill you in on the details. And don’t forget the slimiest of faux diplomats, arch Mafioso, Marco Rubio who, don’t forget, was approved by a Senate vote of 99 idiots. This is an American project.