“We must choose a side, and it should never be the side of dictators.” It’s a simple enough statement, but when you examine the background of the person who has just said it you have to wonder if wilful blindness is becoming a contagion among America’s political elite.
Either that or they must think that ordinary Americans are barn-door thick with the memory of a goldfish. However, gone are the days when acerbic journalists had the savvy to hold politicians, presidents and prime ministers to account. Many journalists today are enabling politicians who have turned lying and misleading the public into a political art form, and an acceptable one at that.
This particular 14-word statement was constructed by Nikki Haley, a candidate in the 2024 Republican Party presidential primaries and a former US Ambassador to the UN during Donald Trump’s first term in office. And, yes, before you ask, she is yet another proud recipient of AIPAC funding, pro-Israel through and through.
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Haley made a name for herself at the UN for her advocacy of the Zionist State. It was under her watch that the US withdrew from the UN Human Rights Council because it was allegedly anti-Israel. Little wonder then, that her latest tweet on X prompted a strong response.
“America has always been a pillar of freedom and democracy,” wrote Haley. “We have to have the moral clarity to know the difference between good and evil and right and wrong. We can’t blur those lines. We must choose a side, and it should never be the side of dictators.”
There’s so much wrong with that statement that it is hard to know where to begin.
However, the ideal rebuttal barrelled through Twitterland in the shape of an article written for Counterpunch in 2021 by Matthew Hoh, the Associate Director of the Eisenhower Media Network.
“The US supports nearly 75 per cent of the world’s dictators, autocracies, monarchies, military regimes, etc., with weapons, military training and money,” wrote Hoh at the time. “Please remember this the next time someone tells you the US should do X or Y because such and such a nation is bad…”
The list of dodgy states was provided by Freedom House, which produces reliable data annually that is used widely by policymakers, researchers, students, international organisations and investors. Hoh compared that list with the 2020 US overseas weapons sales, military training and financial aid list and discovered that 42 of the 57 nations considered undemocratic in 2021 benefitted from America’s military aid. He also established that 74 per cent of the non-democratic nations of the world are supported militarily by America. Interestingly, the remaining 15 nations are nearly all on US sanctions lists. Hoh concluded that the world’s countries were divided into those who buy/receive weapons from the US and those who are punished by sanctions.
The point of this is to illustrate just how morally bereft high-flying American politicians like Haley are.
She campaigned directly against Trump for two months and became the first female Republican presidential candidate to win a presidential primary after a shock victory in Washington DC. As the last candidate standing bar Trump, she finally quit last March after losing all but one — hang your head in shame, Vermont — of the so-called Super Tuesday primaries.
However, it is clear that she still has ambitions to become the first female US president. American voters will be asked to choose again when — and if — Trump eventually leaves office. If she continues to peddle such nonsense she shouldn’t stand a chance but… America just sent Trump back to the White House. Surely not.
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The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.