Clashing Generations

I ’ve written before about the worrisome gap between the American people and foreign policy elites (see e.g.here andhere). Whereas most Americans believe that the U.S. military exists chiefly to defend the United States andits economic and security interests, the intelligentsia is committed to a broader set of objectives, including defending the security of others, shaping the international system, and advancing the cause of democracy and human rights. These slightly differing impulses often worked hand in hand. A large and active U.S. military that was focused mostly on U.S. security and prosperity typically helped others.But that wasn ’t always the case. And military interventions initiated with lukewarm public support (e.g. Somalia 1993), or sold on phony pretenses (e.g. Iraq 2003), eventually subjected the men and women responsible for these debacles to closer scrutiny. As I explain overat The National Interest:Trump exploited the gap between the elites and the public at large with ruthless efficiency on his path to the GOP nomination, and then in his general election win over Hillary Clinton. As president, his rhetoric has continued to shine the light on the public vs. elite divide, though his actions have largely conformed withthe primacist consensus.  Increasingly, however, we see not merely a disconnect between the public and elites, but also among different age groups within the American electorate. And the age cohort most skeptical of American global leadership...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs