THE ROBERT W. WHITAKER ARCHIVE

A CRY OF FRUSTRATION | 2003-03-29

WhitakerOnline talks about the power of the Israeli Lobby, but we also offer an alternative. Israel and Europe and foreign aid recipients are able to use America because our own citizens simply will not demand that we pursue THEIR interests.

I keep saying that we need to go to a consistent policy of "We the People". We need to stop dedicating ourselves to "Iraqi Freedom" or providing Europe with military welfare or chasing after "Middle East Peace".

I cannot get the slightest bit of attention to this concept. Everybody tells me how good France is or how bad France is. I get endless e-mailings about how Israel is what God is all about and from others who denounce the Israeli Lobby.

None of this addresses the real problem American policy has had for the last sixty years. When you talk about Israel or France or the poor little Iraqis, you are still in the same old groove: You are asking "What about THEM?"

We should be obsessed with our own interests. We should be every bit as obsessed with cheap oil for ourselves as leftists say we are and conservatives say we're not.

We are in a war so somebody has to worry about OUR soldiers. Please see "American Self-Interest Would Avoid a Battle of Baghdad."

Everybody wants to debate whether we should have gotten into this war or not. We're there. What matters now is our interests, our soldiers' lives.

Could somebody please send me just one note about American self-interest so I can feel like somebody is interested in something besides the moral condition of France or what we should have done a year ago?