American Exceptionalism and American Innocence: A People's History of Fake News―From the Revolutionary War to the War on Terror

by Roberto Sirvent, Danny Haiphong, Ajamu Baraka (Foreward)

Did the U.S. really “save the world” in World War II? Should black athletes stop protesting and show more gratitude for what America has done for them? Are wars fought to spread freedom and democracy? Or is this all fake news?

Fake News of U.S. Empire: American Exceptionalism and American Innocence examines the stories we’re told that lead us to think that the U.S. is a force for good in the world, regardless of slavery, the genocide of indigenous people, and the more than a century’s worth of imperialist war that the U.S. has wrought on the planet.

Sirvent and Haiphong detail just what Captain America’s shield tells us about the pretensions of U.S. foreign policy, how Angelina Jolie and Bill Gates engage in humanitarian imperialism, and why the Broadway musical Hamilton is a monument to white supremacy.

Genres: Politics, History, Nonfiction, The United States Of America, United States, American History, Sociology

256 pages, Hardcover

Published April 2, 2019

Reviews

[The Conspiracy is Capitalism · Rating 4 out of 5]

How American Liberals perpetuate systemic violence abroad and at home…

Preamble:
--While this book does not explicitly set out to critique "liberals"/the Democratic Party, a major theme is how it takes both US political parties to define and re-enforce the boundaries of debate (paraphrasing Chomsky; also see: Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies).
--Both parties weaponize "identity politics" for divide-and-rule by stripping away crucial context (class/capitalism/imperialism). The main difference is the flavour of their rhetoric to neutralize class conflict:
a) Republican Party uses more vulgar scapegoating: The Reactionary Mind: Conservatism from Edmund Burke to Donald Trump
b) Democratic Party coopts appearances without altering the systemic structures (liberalism = cosmopolitan capitalism).
--Having read my fair share of Chomsky/Hedges/Zinnin the past, I'm now focusing on capitalism's structures (its abstraction is its power). So, why revisit an introductory social critique of US imperialism? I’m always compelled by accessible works connecting US domestic issues to US empire:

To question the U.S. military’s inherent virtuosity is seen by the ruling elites as not only a threat to the legitimacy of war, but also to the legitimacy of the American system of profit and power that requires war.

...Even "Progressives" (esp. in the US) are abysmal at acknowledging connections to US empire (AOC: "what Venezuela really needs right now is more democracy" in the middle of a US-backed reactionary coup/Western sanctions).
--One concern I have with how this book is packaged is the risk of only preaching to the choir. How do we communicate to those who have been conditioned to just repeat "support our troops"?
...The easiest way to counter accusations of being "un-American" when questioning US empire is to start with US veterans who are anti-war/anti-empire; Smedley Butler (War is a Racket: The Antiwar Classic by America's Most Decorated Soldier) should be widely known:

I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.

Thus I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. […] I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-12. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. […] During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. I was rewarded with honors, medals, promotion. Looking back on it, I feel I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three city districts. We Marines operated on three continents.

[-Common Sense, Vol. 4, No. 11 (November, 1935), p. 8; bold emphases added]

...today, we have Veterans for Peace, Maj. Daniel A. Sjursen (A True History of the United States: Indigenous Genocide, Racialized Slavery, Hyper-Capitalism, Militarist Imperialism and Other Overlooked Aspects of American Exceptionalism), Col. Lawrence Wilkerson (War is Not About Truth, Justice and the American Way: Col. Lawrence Wilkerson on The Real News), etc.
...I do not see enough "Progressive" Democrats championing this, leaving a vacuum filled by right-wing "libertarians" like Ron Paul (who equates military interventions abroad with publicly-funded social services at home as all just tyrannical government interventions vs. the mythical capitalist "free market").

The Good:
--Having recently followed co-author Danny Haiphong’s interviews, I found this book’s thesis compelling:
a) Radical change does not just come from learning better history; it requires the unlearning of cultural ideologies (lenses to interpret history). I always refer to Vijay Prashad's fantastic unpacking of mainstream media's imperialist censorship.
b) Key cultural ideology = the dual myths of American Exceptionalism and American Innocence.
--Given the focus on culture, many examples used are drawn from mainstream American culture. Yes, this includes sports (the last time I heard a critique of sports as an entertainment industry was from Chomsky haha).
--Highlights:

1) Liberals frame American history (led by Founding Fathers) as a progressive force (Exceptionalism), where racism is a past aberration (Innocence). The authors counter with Manifest Destiny’s genocidal conquest, as well as the American (counter)Revolution to fend off abolition (The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the United States of America). Excusing Founding Father slaveholders as “products of their times” (Innocence) omits the history of slave revolts and abolitionists.

2) Liberals frame US saving the world in WWII (Exceptionalism); this is countered by US’s late entry as US corporations funded both sides, US elites’ hope for fascism to stamp out communism/radical unions (Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism), US corporate elites' plan for a domestic fascist coup (“The Business Plot”, which actually tried to recruit the aforementioned former-Marine Corps general Smedley Butler before he exposed it: The Plot to Seize the Whitehouse: The Shocking True Story of the Conspiracy to Overthrow FDR), Hitler himself looking to emulate US systemic racism (Hitler's American Model: The United States and the Making of Nazi Race Law), and US dropping 2 atom bombs to pivot towards the Cold War and intimidate the USSR. Plenty more since:
-Prashad's Washington Bullets: A History of the CIA, Coups, and Assassinations
-The Jakarta Method: Washington's Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program that Shaped Our World
-The Management of Savagery: How America's National Security State Fueled the Rise of Al Qaeda, ISIS, and Donald Trump
-Killing Hope: U.S. Military and C.I.A. Interventions Since World War II
-The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner

3) In response to protests of racist statues, Liberals frame racism as issue tied to the Confederates/“white trash” while keeping their own hands clean (Innocence), as portrayed in the mythical 1936 Alabama of To Kill a Mockingbird, i.e. Enlightened liberal lawyer (like a JFK; the book was published in 1960 after all) saves hopeless black American from rural redneck mob. However, this manipulates the class dimensions, where Liberal elites perpetuate systemic racism towards capitalism’s surplus populations:
a) Actual history of working-class, Communist anti-racist organizing in the 1930-40s Alabama: Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists During the Great Depression
b) Liberal hero FDR's 1934 New Deal Federal Housing Administration's redlining, where the celebrated "American middle-class" was built on segregated home-ownership: The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America
c) Democrat Bill Clinton’s crime bill and welfare cuts furthering the War on Drugs/prison industrial complex (The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness), Obama's deportations and drone strikes, and Hillary's (Secretary of State) military aggression (Honduras/Libya/Syria).
d) Behind all this is Wall Street (which does not discriminate between bribing Democrats or Republicans), where fortunes have been made financing the slave trade (The Business of Slavery and the Rise of American Capitalism, 1815-1860) to segregation/redlining to subprime mortgage predatory lending (NINJA loans - No Income No Jobs or Assets) leading to mass foreclosures.

4) In response to protests for immigration rights, Liberals frame the US as a nation of immigrants (Innocence) and a melting pot to seek the American Dream (Exceptionalism). However, Lisa Lowe is cited on the violence of inclusion (where higher-class minorities perpetuate Exceptionalism; reminds me of Prashad's The Karma Of Brown Folk) while the roots of lower-class immigration (capital’s freedom of movement while labour is restricted by militarized borders) are ignored.

5) In response to Kaepernick’s protest of the US anthem in the NFL, Liberals frame this as his freedom which US troops died for (Exceptionalism). Similarly, regarding Alt Right hate speech, the ACLU resorts to “our constitutional values” in protecting free speech (Exceptionalism). However, the authors point to long history of violent censorship of labour and black radicalism by US intelligence. Highlighted is the significance of previous connections of domestic issues with empire.
-Ex. Black Against Empire: The History and Politics of the Black Panther Party
-Ex. Vijay Prashad on US Civil Rights in the context of global decolonization.
-2020-09-14 Update: for those put off by the sports chapter on black athletes being exploited (which indeed is a unique pop cultural aspect of this type of book), the booing for NFL players linking arms in a "Moment of Unity" *after* the national anthem is a useful reminder. "Keep YOUR politics out of MY sports. Your politics do not affect me; you are here only to entertain me."
...Exploitation is messy in the real world with various layers and contradictions, ex. US working-class soldiers (many coloured) killing poorer people abroad for empire.

6) US aid is framed as Exceptionalism, but the authors counter that this often comes as military “aid” to sabotage challenges to US corporate profits, followed by economic “aid” to entrench private power (SAPs, debt, NGOs replacing sovereignty): The Divide: A Brief Guide to Global Inequality and its Solutions.
...In the case of Africa, China’s alternative of business partnership with investments in technology and infrastructure is seen as a threat, with the US ratcheting up military “aid” culminating in AFRICOM and the R2P destruction of Libya. Much more to add on capitalism/imperialism's political economic structures (see below).

The Missing:
--Given that Obama was a frequently used in examples, I was surprised to not find some analysis of Obama (single-handedly?) derailing the anti-war movement that was building against Bush Jr.
--The Russiagate chapter could be more clear on how this distraction neutered US progressive media.
--Structures of capitalism/imperialism: what are the structures behind the scenes, in particular the geopolitical economic structures that are normalized ("business as usual")? Accessible intros include:
-Hickel's The Divide: A Brief Guide to Global Inequality and its Solutions
-Varoufakis' Talking to My Daughter About the Economy: or, How Capitalism Works—and How It Fails
-Utsa Patnaik' The Agrarian Question in the Neoliberal Era: Primitive Accumulation and the Peasantry
-Chang's Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism]
--Global South voices: much needed for global solidarity.

[Ailith Twinning · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cathartic.

This is an anti-imperialist lens that focuses on taking off the blanket of willful ignorance (innocence) of our crimes, and the belief in our blatant lies about intentions (exceptionalism). It's not so much about the history of any individual story as the overall trend, otherwise the thing would be a twelve volume set. As an example, Roberto and Danny mention that another book only devotes one sentence to Indonesia, and then says "See, we were involved, we supported that government.", but you aren't going to get the whole story here, you need to read elsewhere (I think Chomsky has a book or two that includes more of the history --edit: The Jakarta Method came out after this review, read that). But, here's the helpful thing: If you read a more standard, or official, history about the US *after* reading a book like this (or Sherman and Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent, or Gross' Friendly Fascism), then, often, the actual facts are there, they're just surrounded by "But those (pick a slur) deserved it/We're the good guys" . And if you want more uncommon histories, with untold stories, well -- people tend to use Zimm's "A People's History" as a Leftist billboard. Start with those.

An example of what I mean: This book doesn't contain a history of the Korean War, obviously, but it does gesture to American war crimes of a kind that can only be called genocidal - particularly the deliberate bombing of dams. "This Kind of War" by Fehrenbach does tho, and actively delights in intentional genocide, but, the way the story is told, America was the victim of that war. America's own crimes were forced upon it by the 'Dirty Commie Bastards'. America is the good guy, but war is hell. It tells that kind of story, but, it does include most of the pertinent facts from the American side, including that bombing the dams was deliberate, and calls to genocide written by soldiers and generals to defend or delight in their own actions.

As much as I hate the book, that one might be a good "use what you've learned" after reading this.

[David Wineberg · Rating 3 out of 5]

Life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness - plus slavery and genocide. Those are the founding principles of the USA, as Roberto Sirvent and Danny Haiphong do their utmost to explain in American Exceptionalism and American Innocence.

American exceptionalism means anything the US does is excusable, because it is done to promote democracy and humanitarianism. American innocence means anything the US does is without ulterior motive, because the US is a new country without European empire baggage. The book explores these two (of five) great American Myths. The authors don’t mention the others: the Chosen nation, the Christian nation, and Nature’s nation. See my review of Myths America Lives By, by Richard Hughes.

For whatever reason, the authors did not take the final step (that Hughes did), showing that the same single factor underlies all the myths. That is white supremacy. It is there and obvious, but they treat it rather remotely as an adjunct and not the true foundation. They only go as far as saying they are “interrelated”. But it’s there on every page.

Similarly, they don’t expand on the ignorance of history that Americans demonstrate. Americans live in the future, with only a nod to the present. There is no past. “You’re history” is a death threat in the USA, Hughes says in his book on the same topic.

The authors initially present plenty of memorable historical facts to back the claims:
-The first Thanksgiving was not in 1621, but in 1637. It celebrated not the harvest, but the massacre of 700+ Pequot Indians in Connecticut, not Virginia.
-Scalping was a white, not Indian preoccupation, as scalps were required by law to receive cash bounties from local governments and civic organizations, according to an 1890 US government report.
-The 13th Amendment abolishes slavery except as penalty for crime. So it’s still legal.
-The Revolutionary War became necessary when England banned slavery and armed black soldiers in the Caribbean, threatening the American colonies’ way of life.
-Hitler cited inspiration from American racial policies in Mein Kampf.
-The National Football League mandated teams standing for the national anthem only in 2009, when it began accepting $11 million from the National Guard as a sponsor.
-Since the end of World War II, the US military has killed an estimated 20-30 million people around the world.
-If democracy is better, it should be spread by example, not by invasion.
-The USA ranks 41st in the World Press Freedom Index, just behind Slovenia and ahead of Burkina Faso. It toes the official line on innocence and exceptionalism, heroic soldiers and white saviors, despite the available truth.

Meanwhile, internal statistics put a lie to the greatest nation on Earth:
-nearly 19 million at less than half the (inadequate) poverty level
- more than 50% earning less than $30,000
-nearly half unable to raise even $500 for an emergency
- 114,000 New York City public school children homeless
- more than 18 million homes vacant
-nearly half of all job paying minimum wage or less.
This, the authors say, is the real face of American exceptionalism.

So far, a powerful, rational indictment of The American Dream.

Then, less than half way through, the book goes off the rails. It makes true statements out of context, attributing blame and evil where it is not warranted. For example, professional sports are described as modern slavery for blacks, purely for the enjoyment of whites. Blacks don’t like being traded from club to club, the authors say. But left unsaid is that before blacks were allowed in the leagues, white players were paid a pittance, and had to move from city to city with no say in their own futures. There was no free agency. In my own lifetime, NHL stars made $10-$25 thousand dollars a year, no pension and no benefits. Now NFL stars make upwards of $100,000 - per game. Endorsements flow easily to black stars, who are idolized by millions of both blacks and whites, as they gobble up the caps, shirts, jackets and shoes endorsed by the players. This is hardly an industry designed to enslave blacks, as the authors position it. And where exceptionalism fits in, they don’t say.

Similarly in international aid, yes, the USA exploits developing nations. So does China. When countries stop paying, China seizes their national assets. The USSR just took the countries over entirely. This is a well worn strategy –taking advantage of the poor. It was neither invented nor perfected by the USA. Accusing charities and NGOs of leading that exploitation is totally unsupported in the book, though it assumes that is the truth. The authors claim Africa has all but been taken over and destroyed by American aid, NGOs and charities. But if that is true, the same can be said of the whole world.

The authors slap sentences together to make it seem like all evil comes from America. In a paragraph denouncing the military’s AFRICOM office and the war in Libya (which they bring up repeatedly), they insert the sentence: “Muammar Gadhafi was brutally assassinated without trial,” making it seem like American soldiers did it. Gadhafi was shot with a single bullet by a Libyan irregular who discovered him in a drainage pipe, and feared (correctly) that he was armed and dangerous. No Americans were present. This kind of loose treatment by the authors negates the important work they began with.

They also confuse white supremacy with garden variety corruption. They accuse the Clinton Foundation of “siphoning” billions to billionaires to build hotels in Haiti that will profit them, rather than helping the poor. This is an example, they say, of the “white savior industrial complex” when in fact it is just crony capitalism at work. No exceptionalism present.

It also becomes endlessly repetitive, with the authors dropping in the same facts in passing. That the USA has more than 800 overseas bases is mentioned at least six times in different chapters, but never in a discussion of whether this is good or bad, successful or a failure, cause or effect, useful or a fraud. Even simply pointing out that there are fewer than 200 countries in the world, and at least half would never even consider having a US base would have given the fact some perspective.

“Our book is best read as an invitation to consider the new kinds of questions and new kinds of possibilities that might emerge once the ideologies of American exceptionalism and American innocence are debunked and discredited …. Renouncing our ties to ‘America’ would force us to rethink whose lives we mourn, who is my neighbor, and what worlds are possible.” But there are no suggestions, and the final words seem to just want to destroy the country altogether.

It’s not an invitation; it is black rage. As for Indians, they get jettisoned very early, except for the occasional use of the word genocide as in “slavery and genocide”. The book is almost entirely about blacks.

There is nothing wrong with black rage. It is valid, justified and important. It’s just not what was promised.

David Wineberg

[Randall Wallace · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jefferson didn’t want slaves emancipated and warned emancipation “would threaten U.S. society itself” - thoughts perfect for the Jefferson Memorial. Joy James writes that “emancipation is given by the dominant” while “freedom is taken and created.” Not yet finished, Jefferson added, “Blacks being unable to forget the terrible wrongs done to them would nurse murderous wishes… while whites would live in a state of anticipatory fear that urged preemptive violence.” Ah, the joys of white projection. The Somerset Case of 1772 outlawed slavery in England and the writing was on the wall that for colonists to continue slavery, there was no other option but to “secede from the union”. Isn’t it funny that no historian has yet noted that the South seceding from the Union in 1860 was not the first but the second Succession? As Gerald Horne points out, the Revolutionary War was fought by slaveholders (and the Founding Fathers) to keep slavery alive after the Somerset Decision. How charming – the American Revolution was a battle by white supremacists. And we continue to wonder where all that white anger comes from today. As Glen Ford writes, “The settlers fought for the ‘freedom’ to enslave millions, to slaughter every people in their path; to claim and steal a continent they had not even properly mapped.” Did you know when the British retreated from Yorktown, “George Washington’s men lined the shore braying, ‘Give us back our niggers’.” There’s your patriotic Revolutionary War – fought for white freedom and liberty. “Another visionary would call this Lebensraum, the eradication of millions for a higher goal, to serve a superior people.”

The King Philip’s War of 1675 spelled the end for Native American resistance in New England. Lisa Lowe points out that abolitionists weren’t key in stopping British slavery, but the constant threat of slave revolts throughout the empire was. Lisa says that what the media calls “terrorism” is often “the uprising of defenseless subjugated people fighting against state-sanctioned violence”. This book calls the United States, “the spoils of land theft and slavery.” American Icon Ben Franklin had this to say: “The majority of negroes are of a plotting disposition, dark, sullen, malicious, revengeful, and cruel in the highest degree.” Ben maliciously and vengefully calling others malicious and vengeful, nice one. So much for the lessons of the Enlightenment.

We prattle on about WWII because it’s the only war in which we can find anything positive to talk about. Cesar Aimee reminds us that the West only turned against Hitler he started colonizing white people instead of the long-approved racist “other” list of Arabs, Indians and Blacks. How else do you explain this: On the day before Pearl Harbor, the U.S. had $475 million invested in Nazi Germany. We weren’t out to liberate Japan but to “prevent it from colonizing East Asia” and taking stuff we needed. The killing of 300,000 with the firebombing of Dresden wasn’t strategic but was a demonstration to Stalin of what we too could do without moral qualms. The Soviet Union made rapid economic and military development through “the collectivization of feudal agriculture.” The US supported guerillas were invading North Korean villages in 1949, before the war started and don’t forget the killing of 20% of Cheju Island for uprising against the wildly unpopular government of the South. The US then kills three million Koreans delivering unto them 635,000 tons of bombs with a chaser of 30,000 tons of Napalm, of which Churchill said he never imagined the U.S. would ever use it on people. White supremacy is the core of American capitalism and imperialism. We are 5% of the world, yet have 25% of the world’s prisoners. Blacks are 13% of our population yet are 40% of our prison population. Think of it as the socialization of slavery – no more plantations, and no more auction blocks. Read the third verse of the Star-Spangled Banner. The recent musical Hamilton was but “an entertaining monument to white supremacy.” No mention of Hamilton marrying into a slaveholding family and helping to buy and sell their slaves for them (what a thoughtful guy). Alex Nichols saw it as “blackwashing” – injecting diversity into a white thing. After the show, don’t think about the “brutal origins of the American state”, but just take a badly-lit selfie with the marquee. Isn’t making nationalism multicultural fun? “By suggesting everyone believed slavery was okay back then, we equate everyone with every elite white person.” Nicely said. Our monuments to Washington, Jefferson, Cook, Columbus, Lee, and Jackson naturalize dispossession. Freedom, you see, is reserved in American history for the civilized (read white) but not for the savage.

40 billion dollars more leaves Africa than enters it every year. But China is doing it better than we are because they hit upon a novel idea: they treat Africans as business partners instead of “charity cases.” There is a huge reason while no African country has asked for AFRICOM’s help. And we will never ask their permission; that would affirm their humanity. “The U.S. has a record of military aggression unmatched by any communist government in history.” We focus on Iran and Syria because they stubbornly have an independent political and economic posture and we can’t stand that. AIPAC’s job is bribing public officials. Isn’t it funny how many angry Americans will rant on about how terrible Cuba is and when the subject turns to comparing Cuba to Saudi Arabian abuses, the conversation just dies. Cuba uses it’s “meager resources to advance human rights.” Imagine any mainstream media taking on “U.S. militarism, settler-colonialism, anti-Blackness, the police, or the idea the U.S. is a force for good in the world.” American fawned over Malala Yousafzai and no one mentioned that the Mujahideen that hurt her was funded by the US government while the prior Soviet government had fought to eradicate illiteracy for young girls like her. It is impossible for Russia to be seen as to have good intentions and according to our media they always must have some sinister plan. Rachel Maddow mentions Russian “collusion” on 53% of her broadcast, knowing she has only unproven allegations, and few on the Left bat an eye. Demonizing Russia prepares the People for another war. Meanwhile, “The U.S. is hands down the most violent war-maker in human history.”

When Blacks are told to “dream big”, but that doesn’t mean fighting “for social and economic justice”. Oprah shills the myth of the American Dream in every show to keep up consumer confidence. Oh yum! Let’s intentionally prescribe only individualist solutions for systemic problems. Obama puts a Presidential Medal of Freedom around Madeleine Albright neck, and then warmly embraces her for the cameras knowing full well she had told Leslie Stahl and all of America on 60 Minutes, that the U.S. killing 500,000 Iraqi children as a sacrifice was “worth it”. Obama lends Israel $38 billion over the next decade knowing that the occupation fits the UN definition of Genocide. Obama tells Spanish voters repeatedly “Si, Se Puede” then rewards their votes with deporting 2.7 million undocumented immigrants (more than Bush). And don’t forget Obama’s lovely 2009 coup in Honduras. While Facebook gushed over Michelle’s fashion choices, Obama’s administration “increased Pentagon transfers of battlefield weapons to police by 2400 percent by 2014 (that’s 3/4 of a billion dollars). Does any bureaucrat think that people of color will feel safer seeing an MRAP in their community? Obama’s administration uses the FBI for surveillance on the Black Lives Matter movement. I’m so glad we had a black president to stop that shit from happening. Obama prosecutes a record number of whistleblowers under the Espionage Act, but didn’t he look fabulous doing it? The biggest elephant in the room was that Obama clearly escalates the policies he promised to “change” during his campaign - but let’s face it, those kids of his are so adorable. Then Obama takes us into Libya and the Ukraine. No regrets there, ha ha. Obama wins a Nobel Peace prize and tells an aide in 2009 that he was “good at killing people”. Luckily for us progressives and radicals, his dog Bo is ridiculously cute. Racists are all about gratitude. In their minds, slaves were grateful. Black America today should be grateful. People of color should for some reason be grateful to a nation that oppresses them. For the modern racist, discussing slavery means somehow bringing down America. Note throughout U.S. history, white nationalists (KKK, etc.) got a free pass, while black nationalists got nailed by COINTELPRO and still get targeted by the FBI.

2 out the 32 NFL head coaches are black yet two-thirds of the players are black – What does that tell you? Watching the NFL draft is like watching a modern-day slave auction and prison is the modern-day plantation. Did you know that gangster rap only got pushed hard when corporate heads saw that it was wildly popular with white kids? Hillary Clinton may mark the end of the politics of inclusion mixed with exceptionalism. Being female and black, “Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama certainly diversified the rule of U.S. imperialism.” One of the biggest myths in the U.S. right now is that, “Trump is the first U.S. president to tolerate violence”. Our media tells us to be outraged by other countries (Syria, Russia), but not to consider outrage at our own. We get to critique other countries ad nauseam, but God forbid other countries critique us back. Note that U.S. environmental groups don’t go after the U.S. Military for either extreme pollution, or profligate energy use. In their natural habitats, Ivy League cowards (Yellowbelli activus americanum) prefer to not offend the big donors.

In 1999, a Memphis jury implicated many government agencies in the death of Martin Luther King. They say on 9-11, terrorism arrived in the United States. Really? American blacks know that terrorism has always been here. Native Americans were taught a level of terrorism by white invaders they couldn’t comprehend. Even intentionally killing all their buffalo was a textbook example of terrorism as was the earlier destruction of countless native orchards. I can picture lazy white settler-colonials complaining while terrorizing natives, “Stop running from my hatchet! Come on, quit squirming!” or “What you said by smoke signal, really hurt my feelings!”

Colin Kaepernick’s crime was “linking the national anthem to Black oppression.” Before 2009 players didn’t have to stand, but that changed when the Pentagon fueled the NFL with eleven million dollars to recruit financially disadvantaged people to enlist and take part in their new wonderful lotteries – In the first lottery the enlisted winner gets free PTSD while on tour – in the second they get raped – in the third, the enlisted winner commits suicide, as a result of them joining the US military. Lest I seem overboard, every 65 minutes in the United States, a veteran commits suicide and wins that third lottery. To make it even more patriotic and noble, each suicide (22 per day every day) will also take out their family and loved ones. No wonder there are such long lines to enlist. The US military is in 50 of the 54 countries of Africa (nothing racist about that) and we have special ops forces in over 150 nations now spreading goodwill, false promises, and chlamydia.

The US press is ranked “41st in the recent World Press Freedom Index”; Even Estonia and Surinam are now totally kicking our ass! We bombed Libya over 60,000 times in six-months without first verifying any of the claims against it? Who would bomb without verification? We would. In 2016, around the world, 26,000 American bombs were dropped. Isn’t it funny how all United States war crimes are forgiven if they are ordered simply by women (Hillary) or Black (Obama) members of the ruling class? Diversity and inclusion make it difficult for Americans to acknowledge that representation does not necessarily lead towards justice. Inclusion has become a central focus in our politics precisely to keep deep questions from ever being asked. The Department of Defense told two film productions, The Hulk and Tomorrow Never Dies, to redact their references to the Vietnam War. Black Panther and Independence Day laughingly show the CIA and U.S. military championing human rights and freedom. More than one half of Americans today earn less than $30,000 per year. They don’t have $500 for an emergency. That’s America. Did you know we have “over 3,000 counties have water systems with lead counts higher than Flint, Michigan”? 45,000 people die in the U.S. every year from lack of health care. Did you know our intelligence community began with suppressing factory workers who dared to demand an “eight-hour day”? You only want to work from only 9-5? Impossible. This was obviously a super-cool book, and hence my five stars.

[Carlos Martinez · Rating 5 out of 5]

This important work of Marxist sociology and history relentlessly unpicks the foundational myths of the United States which, with their accompanying ideology of exceptionalism and innocence, act as a “cultural drug” that serves to pacify and deceive the masses.

Picking up the historical baton from Howard Zinn, its authors Roberto Sirvent and Danny Haiphong expose the extraordinary violence and cruelty that accompanied the colonial settlement of the Americas and the establishment of the United States.

While children in the US are made to recite sugar-coated fairy tales about the “founding fathers” and “pilgrims,” they instead highlight the “violence, empire, genocide, slavery, dispossession and white supremacy” that constitute the real origin story.

Particularly interesting and original is the authors’ discussion of the assumption of political innocence, which means that Americans tend to “remember slavery and settler colonialism as events of the past, not as structures of domination that haunt our present.”

Similarly, illegal wars and coups can be considered “aberrations” and “mistakes,” as opposed to being clear examples of the fundamentally imperialist and predatory nature of US capitalism.

The idea of American exceptionalism provides another cloak for capitalist marauding. If any political movement or oppressed country opposes the actions of the US government or armed forces, it must be because they “hate our way of life.”

US values and beliefs are so wonderful and exceptional that it’s only fair and correct that they be spread throughout the world, delivered by weaponised drones if need be.

The more subtle variants of American exceptionalism and innocence assert that while the US and its predecessor colonies used to do some bad things — genocide, slavery, colonialism, racism, war — the trajectory has been towards a state of democracy, freedom and justice.

Such a narrative ignores uncomfortable truths such as the fact that the US, with around a 20th of the world’s population, holds a quarter of its prisoners, and that 40 per cent of these are of African origin. Since 2001, nearly one-third of all young black males are, or have been, incarcerated or on parole.

Prisoners are forced to work for large corporations for practically no payment under a system that can reasonably be described as a form of modern slavery. Meanwhile, people like Leonard Peltier and Mumia Abu-Jamal remain behind bars, having spent decades locked up because of their commitment to indigenous and black rights.

Wars in Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia, along with a proxy war in Syria and support for regime-change coups in Venezuela and elsewhere, show that US imperialism is still very much a phenomenon of the present.

By exploding the myths of exceptionalism and innocence, Sirvent and Haiphong aim to break down apathy and help build a powerful movement of opposition to capitalism, racism and war and thereby to participate in the fundamental task of our era — constructing a path towards socialism.

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/artic...

[Larry Bassett · Rating 4 out of 5]

As is the case of all of my reading these days this book was experienced in the audible format while following along with Kindle words.

If you do not believe that the words racism and imperialism and capitalism can be readily applied to the United States, you might not much like this book. If you are determined to stick up for the US you will find many deficiencies with this book as I would agree that it is sometimes glib and condescending of our glorious nation. The authors do indeed sometimes get a bit carried away. But you do have to concede quite a few points to them for trying to get us to see the reality of our history as well as our present day.

I would have to admit that this is probably only a three star book as far as the skill of the writing goes. But I had to give it an additional star for bravery in attacking the issues pretty head-on. These guys do avoid being pretty easily labeled as communists. But anti-racist and anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist our labels that they welcome readily. My opinion personally is that we should all seek such labels.

This is also a book with a considerable number of footnotes if you are a person who likes that aspect of back up. I do have the impression that there are quite a few footnotes from the same sources.

[Wick Welker · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gut punch to the myth of American exceptionalism.

If you're an American and have scarcely had your world view challenged, prepare for a complete dismantling of American history, culture and exceptionalism. American Exceptionalism and American Innocence present unassailable evidence that the ideas of American exceptionalism insulate, hide, propagate, and justify what would otherwise be atrocious acts if committed by another country without the otherwise false garb of righteousness. It is under the innocent claims of naive do-goodery that the American public and voters endorse American acts of war, terror, murder and imperial predation.

You'll find multiple treatise within about the global wars perpetrated by the United States under the guise of protecting the sacrosanct western ideologies of free market capitalism. What America has done during global wars in Korea, Chile, Russia, Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Libya, Japan and Europe during the world war have had one purpose: assert global domination. The United States has been engaged in war during 90% of its existence. A vast propaganda machine of concentrated media moguls feeds the public ideas of innocence and exceptionalism to justify what is otherwise abject murder and terror. America indeed is the author of the largest terror campaign ever created. America is largest war-mongering nation in history.

And the American public does not benefit from the spoils of the war machine. Living within a social structure of white supremecy, weakened labors forces and monopolistic power the majority of Americans have only seen wage stagnation, exorbitant living/medical costs and a suppressed voting force. Black American wealth particularly has been stagnate to those of whites all while the popular white opinion is believing in the myth of meritocracy to blame black Americans for an imagined moral failing.

The authors provide scathing analysis of the American political system. Both the democratic and republican party are two arms of the same corporate infiltration into American politics. We receive harsh condemnation of both the Clintons and Barack Obama. Bill in the 90s eviscerated welfare programs while perpetrating the image of the "super predator" while Obama did almost nothing for black America and only expanded atrocious assaults on civil liberties through centralized spying. Not only did Obama deport more undocumented immigrants than and previous president, his legacy is stained by murderous predator campaigns that would otherwise be acts of terror if done by literally any other country. According to the authors, Obama has really only served to aid the concept of American exceptionalism by appearing cosmetically inclusive all while doing nothing for NORMAL American people. The politics of inclusion only serve as vehicles of power, never to really inact meaningful change to those who need it most. Hillary was a complete failure as a candidate, failing to capture a skeptical voting public from the wiles of the demagoguery of Donald Trump. Needless to day, the neoliberal legislation of Trump and his republican predecessors have been an absolute disaster for the working American in the forms of corporate deregulation and corporate tax cuts.

The authors have nothing positive to say about the United States, rather that America is the natural course of how power behaves. I would argue that the concept of this book is a model based on very good data. The ideas presented herein don't necessarily represent reality but it likely fit along the model presented quite nicely. While I agree with almost everything the authors say, I would admit that perhaps SOME decisions American leaders made in the past might have been honorable acts made in good faith. Now it's likely that those acts were made within the auspices of American innocence.

At any rate, this is a healthy book to read. It will expand how you think about America and all the fables that support it.

[Peter Mumford · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's not much I'd say is wrong with this book beyond a few nitpicks, and that I honestly don't know who this book is for. I feel most of the content has been covered thoroughly (and better) by other authors, ironically despite the fact that some of the subject matter in this book covers events after said authors have stopped writing . To this books credit, it does make sure you know who these authors are as well as their works. The writing style strikes a good balance between accessibility and density. It's not as easily digestible as Parenti, but you're not going to have to slog through it like Chomsky. If you're interested in left politics maybe check this out, but despite one of the goals of the book being accessible I wouldn't say this is one of the books you start with.

[Erin Crane · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wish I had come across this book years earlier because I think it’s a good introduction to many things I’ve learned through more hodgepodge ways.

Having said that, it’s still not an ideal book for me. It has a lot of detail that I just can’t take in. I skimmed a good bit because I never remember historical details. What I can remember are ideas, and I took what I could from this. It’s one of the more radical things I’ve read, which I do appreciate.

[T · Rating 5 out of 5]

As Pulitzer prize recipient Chris Hedges says: "If you are not dedicated to the destruction of empire and the dismantling of American militarism then you cannot count yourself as a member of the left and you are certainly not socialist. This is not a side issue. It is THE issue. There will be no genuine democratic, social, economic, or political justice, until we destroy our permanent war machine. Militarists and war profiteers are our greatest enemy, they are, as Karl Liebknecht said, "the enemy within"

An important topic which was well researched. I look forward to more by these authors.

[David02139 · Rating 3 out of 5]

I went to hear the authors talk about their book at a bookstore here in town and bought it. They make a compelling argument about how exceptionalism is interwoven into everything that is done in U.S. policy and what is valued. Would have been nice to read more about what to do about this and how to address this, but as the authors stated in their presentation, that was not the thrust of the book.

[Aaron Curmi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I learned about this book through the Rev Left Radio podcast several years ago. The host was interviewing Danny Haiphong, one of the co-authors of the book, on the show and he made many points I agree with, so I decided to check it out.

I will say that I did enjoy this book, despite only giving it three stars. My reason for not giving it a higher rating is that I found it to be emotionally charged in many places, which I tend to try to avoid when looking for academic dives into any particular topic. There were also a few areas which seemed a little too simplistic in their analysis. However, overwhelmingly, this is a very well-sourced and supported work. The authors are thorough and detailed while also making the topics easy to follow and understand. As with many books critiquing U.S. domestic and foreign policy, this one seems like something everyone should read at some point. If not the entire thing, its essays are nicely divided into easily digestible sections which could be used as shorter readings to inform oneself or others on a specific topic. I say this as a teacher who can see its usefulness in a classroom setting - the essays are powerful tools which could be used to provide much needed perspective on a variety of topics.

Overall, I am glad I read this. It contained a lot of information I had already learned elsewhere and ideas that I already agree with, while also shedding light on some areas I either did not fully understand or required a bit more explanation for me to grasp. And I felt it achieved that goal for me. I would highly recommend this book to anyone willing to learn about critiques of U.S. policy and how they can shape their thinking and actions to help try to do something about it.

If you are at all interested in critiques of U.S. policy and how to move forward, give this one a read.

[Denise · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not quite who this book was intended for - not American nor having the slightest wish to ever reside there, for one. Also, preaching to the choir anyway: Every time I hear someone refer to the good ol' US of A as "the greatest country in the world" or grandly announce that it's "the leader of the free world", it triggers my gag reflex. As was therefore to be expected, quite a bit of what the authors have to say here reflects my own thinking on various matters, though not in all instances. Like, say, on the subject of Russia: Sure, Putin's not Satan and present-day Russia isn't the source of all evil, but not demonizing a person or a country is one thing. Claiming that every accusation made against them within the past decade or two, be it on human rights violations, a lil' spot of (attempted or successful) murder here and there, election interference, etc is either untrue or wildly exaggerated on the other hand? Yeah, let's maybe not go overboard here...

[Amy Fox · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I believe the overall thesis has merit and needs to be more widely discussed, I see the same underlying problems as in many left-ish echo-chamber-y political volumes:

1. Critique is cheap. We need solutions.

If there's are ongoing political, environmental, or technological problems in the world, then what are some solutions? What could be done in theory? What have people actually tried? What works?

You know what understands this principle? Cookbooks. Want something to eat? Here are some options, and how to make them. Be like a cookbook. Get the theory and history down, then examine options.

Without solutions, you might as well write a thoroughly-cited hardback that just complains about the weather.


2. Not engaging with counterarguments or nuance

Many people both understand that the USA's international relations have done terrible things, yet many people who are relatively smart and informed still support the USA. Entire countries that are more democratic than the USA ally with it. Why? I believe it's because people and countries see the USA as at least a useful ally against other world powers, who they perceive as equally ambitious, but morally worse. They may perceive that the USA is slowly learning to do better.

Just looking within the United States, many perceive the federal government as a stabilizing and gradually improving influence on otherwise-unchecked internal states, (usually the former Confederate States). They perceive the American status quo as the least bad of the available options, which is another way of saying "It's the best choice, all things considered." What do you say to that?

Has the USA ever done anything right? What could the USA do right? How is it better than some alternatives? Can it oppose other empires without being a jerk? Where is there hope? What should the USA do with all its power?

You have to engage with complexities like this if you want to change minds.

[Marc · Rating 1 out of 5]

A pretentious collection of half-truths and half-lies, flanneled with a whole lot of rhetoric to confuse you along the way.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

An accessible and educational read - a lot of information on the US military and prison industrial complexes, immigration and international policies that have affected nations and people worldwide for good or bad (but mostly bad).

I would be interested in an updated version because it feels very “both sides are equally bad” and there’s no doubt both political parties have had their hands involved in negative policies, but the past few years in terms of domestic politics it’s felt especially one-sided in terms of harmful ideologies and policies being introduced.

I did learn about some of the policies of past administrations that I wasn’t aware of prior to me becoming more politically involved, many of which were needlessly violent or cruel.

I think the topics and timeline that this book and chapters are so broad and widespread, it would have helped me to retain more information with some personal accounts and stories of the impact from these policies. As it stands, I feel like a lot of the information blended together or felt like I already knew about it, but it just felt like another thing to add to the shit pile that is the country’s history.

Moreover, this is another book that talks about everything that the government and political actors have done wrong in the past, but no recommendations on what we the citizens and people without influence can do to take action about these moving forward. There’s minimal mention of protests against these policies historically that I know have taken place. Essentially some note to end it on with some hope would have been appreciated. But who knows, maybe that’s the intent?

[blank · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hypnotizingly cathartic . . . Perhaps a new adaptation of guilt but with limitless possibilities, American Exceptionalism and American Innocence contributes a historico-cultural analysis to the fields of unlearning and undoing. Imagine guilt with no baggage, a sort of paradox of setting oneself free from an unrelenting churning of the imperio-racial patriarchal-classist war-mongering machine. What’s worse than fascism? The USA. Tie your exceptional and innocent boot straps as tight as you want, Sirvent and Haiphong, with the help of the work of many spectacular prior sources, will work to have them displaced and replaced with, hrrrmm, reality. Warning: the new footing will become more comfortable only with callousness, no more Dr. Scholl’s inserts.

If nothing else, read it for Glen Ford’s afterword.

Mayhaps more to come to this review (yawn).

[S · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautifully anti-imperialist. Will be really approachable to come back to. Particularly generative was the chapter on pinkwashing/“inclusive” shift in the systems of state violence.

[Kevin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like this book quite a bit as it's a wide collection of short pieces that address and debunk a whole bunch of lies America pushes to make it sound like it's a force for good and innocent.

[Lawrence Grandpre · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good book for liberals who want to go beyond liberalism, the media cycle, and begin to decode from the affective and conceptual limitations of Democratic party-style politics, which sees minor concession to social equality as tied to a vision of American exceptionalism which locks in an imperialist foreign policy and frames out a more comprehensive vision of social justice.

One chapter short of being really great.

One of the biggest examples of American innocence is the innocence of the white/multiracial left in their relationship with Black organizers. They have often been deep dissent, backstabbing, and undermining of Black organizations by white class centered organizers. Similarly, despite the history of the failure of the American left, the left is deemed innocent and exceptional in its moral purity. This obscures a pragmatically rooted analysis of the success of Black organizing and the failure of the left.

The book broaches the topic of failure of the anti-war movement, and if it only was able to apply its understanding of the nature of whiteness to the anti-war movement, maybe it would have an explanation beyond "people felt beaten down by failure and were seduced by the cheap thrills and minor victories offered by neoliberal identity politics". Is it possible the anti-war movement was from its inception an attempt to secure white privilege and once Vietnam and the draft ended they essentially said "mission accomplished" and become Clinton Democrats?

This colors the book's engagement with questions of anti-blackness, which are generally good but at times puzzling. Why cite Saidiya Hartman's critique of reparations when Hartman very explicitly is a theorist not involved in any direct politics? Why no analysis of the long history of reparations being a galvanizing call for diverse forms of political engagement which would seem to be the forms of politics the book calls for? Instead, the book sues Black theory to dismiss calls for reparations as a "liberal reform", despite other Black theorist calling them a necessary call to radically revision politics. It seems like the author's political imagination can't conceptualize Black demands in and of themselves being radical, creating the same sort of political myopia you critique liberals for.

A good book that desperately needs to take its own advice. Definitely would recommend, but needs to be read with a critical eye.

[Jamie Bee · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was not quite what I had imagined it to be. In much of my nonfiction reading lately, I've been wanting to read about the concepts of fake news and truth as these are often topics of discussion in these modern times of the Trump Administration. While this book mentioned fake news on the cover, it goes far deeper than to expose current media. In fact, it looks at the course of all of American history through the lens of American exceptionalism and American innocence. The authors posit that these two concepts have created atrocities that the average American cannot appreciate.

First, let’s define the terms. American exceptionalism is the idea that we, as Americans, believe that we are the pinnacle of what democracy represents; how we create democracy, therefore, must be the right way. We believe we are exceptional and right. The concept of American innocence follows from this. According to the authors, this is what kicks in when we try to resolve the cognitive dissonance of seeing our sometimes morally abhorrent actions as laudable. We see these actions as such either because we believe the ends justify the means or we no longer see former reprehensible actions as relevant.

The book of explorers a variety of topics through these twin lenses, everything from Trump to slavery to Broadway’s Hamilton to global-reaching humanitarian efforts by celebrities. The book is always harsh in its appraisal of our past and present actions. This is not an easy read. In fact, I would say once it has been read, it cannot be unread. You may very well find yourself starting to see current issues and statements made by the government and the press through the eyes of exceptionalism and innocence. I think it is good to have an awareness all these issues, but I think the message could have been delivered in a less *we suck* way. A more kind and forgiving presentation—rather than a strident, shaming one—might be more apt to persuade and empower.

I received a free copy of this book, but that did not affect my review.

Read my other reviews at https://www.readingfanaticreviews.com.

[Eila Mcmillin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I feel like the basic theoretical framework is really valuable and interesting. Where Sirvent and Haiphong go off the rails a little bit is in their application of that framework to relations with Russia and China. More could have been done to tease out how anti-Asian sentiment within the exceptional/imperial worldview impacts relations with China, as well as Afghanistan in the brief section about Afghanistan, but the authors come off as a bit too rosey eyed about China and Russia, as well as past and present European imperial powers. Does white supremacy function in how we perceive a rising China, absolutely, BUT that doesn't mean we should downplay the seriousness of the actions of the Chinese state/military in Hong Kong or Xinjiang. Yes we should consider the benefits of Chinese aid and development in Africa, but let's not pretend that the PRC is motivated purely by solidarity and goodness in their institution of programs in Africa.
Generally, I think the authors broadened their argument to geopolitics in an interesting way, but rather critically are missing a lot of nuance in some of their arguments and evidence, and that really kind of takes away from how powerful this work could be.

[Matthew Christopher · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very good, very dense book about the structures of American "exceptionalism" and the necessity of tearing those structures apart. The book revolves around a central thesis of the military being the chief enforcer of the sociocultural norms of the United States, which brooks no opposition to its aims. Nothing in here is untrue, and the thesis is valid. However, this book does lose a star, because the chapters read more like disconnected essays rather than a progressive narrative. This isn't a huge problem, but I did feel myself repeatedly missing the forest for the trees, particularly in the middle parts of the book. This is an extremely nitpicky note, but in a book that virtually every American needs to read in service of tearing down genocidal norms that the country embodies, it does detract from the thesis the smallest amount. Regardless, everyone should read this book, particularly those outside of power structures who have unthinkingly bought into the exceptionalist narrative.

[Keith Wheeles · Rating 3 out of 5]

Unflinching look at America's moral history. Not easy to read for a fully indoctrinated baby boomer who spent their career in the military industrial complex. But compelling and well-supported. Starting with America's original sin (slavery), it examines our ongoing dual standards for intervention in other countries, racism, and justice. Worth reading.

It does not focus on how the US view of our specialness prevents us from recognizing and adopting sensible best practices from other countries. There are a number of areas in the which the US is clearly not a top ranked country (life expectancy, infant mortality, income inequality) and some where our ranking is just terrible (gun violence, healthcare costs, incarceration). But we fail to learn from other successful modern societies because we view ourselves as special (WWII does a lot of heavy lifting for this view, but that was rather exceptional and not recent).

[Keith Grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quite simply one of the most important, painfully honest books any white American could read to acknowledge , clearly understand and finally counter the utter BS we are spoon fed as the “story of America” from the 1600s right up to this dark dark year of 2019. Many will not get past the first chapter if that. This book requires white Americans - including myself born with every unfair white male privilege granted to me at birth - to come to terms with the scourge that is our exceptionalism and innocence, and how it so negatively impacts the “other” classes around the world on an hour by hour basis.
Thank you Roberto Sirvent and Danny Haiphong for this most important work you have provided for those willing to acknowledge our reality.

[Misha · Rating 5 out of 5]

How many stars? It is hard to say. For exposure probably 5. Did I like it? No, I felt disgusted. So-no stars? Looking at current events I am wondering when people will open their eyes, if ever. When there is nothing can be done?

[Tucker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wide-reaching thesis. I blogged on Medium.

[Debbie Rojas · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good book to read and difficult in both prose and thought.

[Emīls Eglītis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Has some interesting points but some of the most important parts are written from a far too liberal & utopian perspective

[S. Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book. I need to say that up front, because the vast majority of this review is going to criticize the one flaw I found in it. So like I said, great book. Anybody in your life who is caught up in the anti-CRT movement could benefit from reading about America's not-so-innocent roots in this book. American Exceptionalism and American Innocence is about dispelling the myth that America is an ideologically pure country by digging through its imperialistic history with a fine-tooth comb. From slavery and genocide to incarceration and civil rights, American Exceptionalism will rip the wool from any eyes still blinded by the lies taught in elementary school history classes. Objective, receptive eyes need only apply, however; biased eyes will see only ungrateful, unpatriotic trash-talk.

The one flaw I feel compelled to point out in American Exceptionalism is the flaw that invariably occurs when outlining an extreme ideology, ignoring information that may weaken or contradict your argument. In the case of American Exceptionalism, the authors stumble repeatedly around the giant fascist, loofa-faced, shit-gibbon in the room, Donald Trump.

You would think that you would get an earful of Trump in a book published in 2019 about American imperialism and racism. Poster-child for the problem, you would think. But it appears that the authors are so hell-bent on exposing the hidden lie of American Exceptionalism that they are afraid to actually point out the worst of his actions and utterances that resulted in HUGE public outcries, out of fear that the public reaction to his lunacy would overshadow the argument that the vast majority of the (white) American public are completely blind to America's brutal history and continued transgressions against humanity.

This isn't readily apparent in earlier chapters that focus more on the past history of America, but once we get into conflicts with Russia and immigration issues, the silence on the Trump front is deafening. According to the authors, Russia was a completely innocent victim of the 2016 elections, and were falsely accused of interfering with the U.S. election to deflect from Hillary losing the election, with Putin being unfairly maligned by Democrats just to save face. Every discussion involving the Cold War or other interactions between the U.S. and Russia invariably sides with the reality that Russia is the innocent victim at the hands of the evil capitalist American regime, and while we can all agree that the American demonization of Communism has been a false vendetta pushed by capitalist fears of collectivism and a self-determining work force, painting Russia (and Putin) as wide-eyed innocents is just as disingenuous as any Red Scare propaganda. These extreme left-wing authors (and I don't mean that as an insult) don't hesitate to adopt right-wing tactics such as disinformation and straw-man arguments when wading into this territory, including falsehoods-by-omission or cherry-picking choice quotes from a sea of data to make it sound like the exception has become the rule.

I know it sounds like an odd accusation, but how else do you explain an entire chapter on American Borders and Immigration - written DURING the Trump presidency - in which the vast majority of discussion is about how bad Bush, Obama, and Hillary (who wasn't even president) really were when compared to Trump's "offhand comments." It is almost as if the authors felt that the American public's (and world's) reaction to Trump might demonstrate that not all of America has bought into the exceptionalism myth, and even more distressing, perhaps not all of (white) America is blindly complicit in upholding the myth.

I see this willful disassociation often from people who desire the claim of being "beyond politics" to a point where both left and right are absolute evils, where whichever position seems politically closest to their own ideology gets the hardest pushback. The concept seems to be that if you are against a two-party system, then you must see everything the two-party system does as wrong, regardless of anything else. So if we are anti-American Exceptionalism, we can't really be focusing on anything positive that ANY American president has done, can we? I readily admit that Bush, Obama, and Hillary deserve the vast majority of accusations leveled against them, and I'm not here to carry water for the DNC. I voted for Bernie in the primaries, okay? But the volume of anti-Obama material when compared to the many excuses made for Trump's administration as just an unwitting victim of nefarious DNC propaganda... well, it just leaves a bitter after taste.

In short, a great book, but if you need to make excuses for Trump in order to strengthen your argument, maybe you need a better argument.