John Mearsheimer and Jeffrey Sachs | All-In Summit 2024
Guests: John Mearsheimer, Jeffrey Sachs
In-depth read · Key ideas, reasoning, and examples, organized by topic.
§01One bipartisan establishment? Sachs and Mearsheimer on the deep state
The panel opens with Dick Cheney's endorsement of Kamala Harris. Jeffrey Sachs says there is effectively one "deep state party" linking Cheney, Harris, Biden and Victoria Nuland, whom he presents as the constant figure of 30 years of Russia, NATO and Ukraine policy. These are Sachs's characterizations; no documents are cited.
I like to refer to the Republicans and the Democrats as Tweedledee and Tweedledum.
John Mearsheimer sees one exception, Trump, who tried in 2017 to beat back the deep state and mostly failed. Trump now vows to succeed; Mearsheimer would bet against him. He defines the deep state as the administrative state: bureaucrats in the Pentagon, State Department and intelligence community who gain a vested interest in the foreign policy both parties already push.
Sachs cites a 2017 Putin interview, in which new presidents arrive with ideas until men in dark suits explain how the world works, and says Bolton's memoirs describe tricking Trump when he disagreed. He dates the continuity to 1992, which he saw as an adviser to Gorbachev and Yeltsin.
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