Joe Biden’s Muddled Middle East Policy
On this episode of The Time of Monsters, David Klion on a president’s mix of hawkish policy and moderate rhetoric.
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On this episode of The Time of Monsters, David Klion joins Jeet Heer to discuss the President’s mix of hawkish policy and moderate rhetoric.
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Joe Biden has often been described as among the most pro-Israel politicians in America, a characterization that has a large element of truth but misses some important nuances. As David Klion argues in a deeply researched essay for The Nation, Biden’s support for Israel has long been accompanied by rhetorical gestures indicating opposition to aspects of Israel’s policies, particularly the building of settlements. How do we make sense of this disjunction between action and rhetoric? Is Biden simply trying to placate his liberal base with cheap words? Or does his thinking on the topic indicate a fundamental incoherence in his worldview?
David joins the podcast to talk about Biden’s Israel policy, which leads into a wide-ranging discussion of the internal contradictions of Cold War liberalism and Biden’s larger policy thinking.In addition to David’s piece, we talk about topics that address this by Jonathan Guyer in The American Prospect and Noah Landar in Mother Jones.
Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.
On this episode of The Time of Monsters, Jeet Heer is joined by Matt Duss to discuss Trump's anti-war pitch.
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