A visitor from another planet would undoubtedly think that medieval theocracy has replaced rational thought in US foreign policy and with the lapdog news media. In place of sober analysis, US politicians and the dutiful thought police have adopted a hysterical, nursery school portrait of foreign leaders who fail to pay homage to the demands of the US Empire. It is no exaggeration to say that the ludicrous, pop-religion morality that Reagan brought us with his talk of an “Evil Empire” is now the dominant ideological framework behind much of the foreign policy discourse in the US. Where Churchill shaped the Cold War with his notion of an “Iron Curtain”, the fears unleashed from the vicious attacks of September 11 were exploited with vigor around the one-dimensional, child-like notion that evil lurked in the Other-World beyond our borders. Such a crude picture fed the thinking behind “an axis of evil” and the justification for the US missionary destiny of imposing freedom and democracy on the rest of the world.

How do imperialist NGO’s work? US government agencies, foundations funded by political parties, wealthy individuals and corporate donors funnel millions of dollars to organizations in target countries. These organizations have no mass base and solely exist thanks to their funding and direction from abroad. They bear names that suggest that they are non-partisan and devoted to promoting civil society. In fact, they challenge the existing governments, dutifully support allegations of electoral fraud and manipulation, establish and promote pro-capitalist, oppositional media, business interests and pro-Western opposition. Left to their own devices, they would shrivel up and die. The template for these NGO’s was established and successfully run during the Cold War.

So with Ahmadinejad judged evil, the West panders to the post 9-11 hysteria. The existent Iranian nuclear power program becomes the cue for a campaign against an Iranian threat to create and use weapons of mass destruction, a reprise of the fraudulent, scare tactics leading up to the Iraqi invasion. The tame Western media sees no bitter irony in the US ruling class considering the use of nuclear weapons in order to keep the Iranians from possessing them. Nor do they recognize a moral asymmetry in denying Iran nuclear weapons while supporting and encouraging a hostile, aggressive nuclear power in Israel which arrogantly and belligerently disrupts peace in the Middle East.