The greatest victory of the Blob is its effective banishment from Washington of those who forcefully reject its basic premises. The effect is to make critics look like fringe lunatics. John Birchers or the Flat Earth Society. 1/
They are not fringe lunatics. According to the three smartest academics who defend the broad strokes of US strategy, “most scholars who write on the future of US grand strategy [think] the time [has] finally come for retrenchment.” 2/ scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/…
If you had been only following the output of Washington think tanks—or if you were a Congressman, say—this would come as a big surprise. The effect of the groupthink has not so much been gaining acceptance as fostering ignorance. There is no Other Way. 3/
The blob has offered the appearance of debate and the appearance of choice. The game is played between the 10 yard line and the end zone of one end of the field. 4/
So if @QuincyInst can serve as a one-stop shop for those who, against all the social, financial, and opportunity-cost pressures would like to hear about alternatives, it should be judged as a major success. /end
/coda If you have greater interest in this analysis, @BH_Friedman and I wrote an article on these themes in the mid-aughts that I think was very prescient. cato.org/sites/cato.org…
