And in the latest issue of Harper’s I was engrossed by Jackson Lears' polemical essay against American imperialism. Parts of the piece are far too one-sided—implying that an opposing view is groundless or unthinkably stupid or irrational—but the whole thing is worth reading. Here is one of many money lines:

The Founders feared that an empire committed to endless war would create scarcity amid plenty; centuries later, that fear has been vindicated.

Lears' argument about America’s imperial past and present is worth pairing with this recent ISI debate between Curt Mills and Phillip Blond on the same question.