I saw a few of his videos on youtube and he has a keen grasp of US and international politics. Of course, he would be no good at international politics if he didn't talk about the disproportionate influence of the Israel lobby on US foreign policy, which he does. He sounds pretty based.
John Joseph Mearsheimer (/ˈmɪərʃaɪmər/; born December 14, 1947) is an American political scientist and international relations scholar, who belongs to the realist school of thought. He is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago. He has been described as the most influential realist of his generation.[3]
Mearsheimer is best known for developing the theory of offensive realism, which describes the interaction between great powers as being primarily driven by the rational desire to achieve regional hegemony in an anarchic international system. He was a vocal opponent of the Iraq War in 2003 and was almost alone in opposing Ukraine's decision to give up its nuclear weapons in 1994, predicting that it would inevitably face Russian aggression without a nuclear deterrent.
His most controversial views concern alleged influence by interest groups over US government actions in the Middle East which he wrote about in his 2007 book The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. In accordance with his theory, Mearsheimer believes that China's growing power will likely bring it into conflict with the United States.
March 2006, Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt, the former academic dean and professor of international relations at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, published a Harvard University Kennedy School of Government working paper[40] and a London Review of Books article[41] discussing the power of the “Israel lobby” in shaping US foreign policy. They define the Israel lobby as "a loose coalition of individuals and organizations who actively work to steer US foreign policy in a pro-Israel direction." They state that it is not appropriate to label it a "Jewish lobby" because not all Jews feel a strong attachment to Israel and because some of the individuals and groups who work to foster US support for Israel are not Jewish. According to Mearsheimer and Walt, Christian Zionists play also an important role. Finally, they emphasize that the lobby is not a cabal or a conspiracy but simply a powerful interest group, like the National Rifle Association or the farm lobby. Their core argument is that the policies pushed by the lobby are not in the national interest of the US or ultimately of Israel. Those pieces generated extensive media coverage and led to a wide-ranging and often heated debate, including charges of antisemitism, between supporters and opponents of their argument. The article was subsequently turned into a book, The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy.
In 2011, John Mearsheimer wrote a back-cover blurb for contriversial author Gilad Atzmon's book The Wandering Who? A Study of Jewish Identity Politics: "Gilad Atzmon has written a fascinating and provocative book on Jewish identity in the modern world. He shows how assimilation and liberalism are making it increasingly difficult for Jews in the Diaspora to maintain a powerful sense of their 'Jewishness.' Panicked Jewish leaders, he argues, have turned to Zionism (blind loyalty to Israel) and scaremongering (the threat of another Holocaust) to keep the tribe united and distinct from the surrounding goyim. As Atzmon's own case demonstrates, this strategy is not working and is causing many Jews great anguish. The Wandering Who? should be widely read by Jews and non-Jews alike."[48]
Mearsheimer's endorsement of Atzmon's book was met with accusations of antisemitism by prominent Jewish writers and intellectuals. Alan Dershowitz wrote an article in response, "Why are John Mearsheimer and Richard Falk Endorsing a Blatantly Anti-Semitic Book?" It stated that the book "argues that Jews seek to control the world."[49]
Mearsheimer denied the charges of antisemitism in that he had "no reason to amend it or embellish" his blurb[50] and defended his position. Writing in regard to the charge by Goldberg that Atzmon is anti-Semitic and, by implication, so is his positive review of Atzmon's book, Mearsheimer responded: "Atzmon's basic point is that Jews often talk in universalistic terms, but many of them think and act in particularistic terms. One might say they talk like liberals but act like nationalists.... It is in this context that he discusses what he calls the 'Holocaust religion,' Zionism, and Israel's treatment of the Palestinians. Again, to be perfectly clear, he has no animus toward Judaism as a religion or with individuals who are Jewish by birth."
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