Clinton Is the Most Dangerous Person Alive - An Interview with Edward S. Herman

AG: What do you think of Clinton’s statement that she would make removing Bashar Al-Assad her top priority? And Trump’s statement that he would not, because that would recklessly risk confrontation with Russia?

ESH: Hillary Clinton has essentially promised to escalate war in Syria and is therefore promising to go to war with Russia as well. Diana Johnstone has made the case that Hillary Clinton plans to try to bring about “regime change” in Russia (cite). This is of course incredibly dangerous and would have aroused a really democratic media, but the existing media are part of the war system, hence Hillary Clinton’s commitment to wars is essentially suppressed. Trump has made a number of statements along the lines of reducing US interventions and commitments abroad and trying to deal with Russia in a less confrontational manner, but he has sometimes contradicted himself by urging expanded arms, use of nuclear weapons, etc. But Hillary Clinton has said nothing that would offset her war-mongering. This difference from Trump may help explain the intensity of media hostility to Trump.

AG: Jill Stein has said that “wars for oil are blowing back at us wth a vengeance” and that she would cut the military budget by half, close most of the foreign bases, and redirect resources into a Green New Deal that would fully employ Americans building sustainable energy and agricultural infrastructure. I can’t imagine you disagree, but do you think it’s important for the Greens to articulate such a vision at the national and international level, instead of focussing solely on local races that they might win? 

ESH: The Greens don’t have the resources to compete in many local elections. So she is wise to focus on the big national and international issues. Furthermore, the real gap in the political system is the lack of opposition to national neoliberal and militaristic policies. It is said that she can’t make a bigger mark given the hegemony of the duopoly, but even Ralph Nader couldn’t get 5 percent of the vote. The system still works well, for the 1%.

AG: Michael Moore has made a movie called “Trumpland” and warned that Trump’s election would be the end of the United States, assuming that would be a bad thing. David Swanson, author of “War Is a Lie,” has imagined the same but argued, in “Secession, Trump, and the Avoidability of Civil War,” that the break-up of the United States is not the worst possibility on the horizon. Do you have any thoughts on this? 

ESH: Michael Moore is completely oblivious to the fact that the enlarging war that is likely to follow Hillary Clinton’s election threatens not only a nuclear exchange, but also attacks on civil liberties and the march toward fascism. In its own way, the election of Hillary Clinton might threaten a democratic order as much as a Trump victory. The anti-Trump hysteria has tended to block out consideration of the Hillary Clinton menace.

AG: Is there anything else you’d like to say about why you’re voting for Jill Stein and Ajamu Baraka? 

ESH: I’ve always believed in the moral rule laid down in the categorical imperative: “Do that which you would wish generalized.”