The Dawn of the New Age of the American Empire, for real?

I used to regard the phrase "American Imperialism" as an anachronistic historical concept, as a hyperbolic description of the dominance of U.S. popular culture around the world, or as Philippine leftist rhetoric.

But just today, I have read allusions to a new American empire twice, both from North Americans.

This morning I read a few chapters of Why Nations Go To War, a book my mom got from her college and which she left here in the Philippines for me to read, the last time she was here. The author is John G. Stoessinger, Ph.D. (Harvard), "Distinguished Professor of Global Diplomacy" at the University of San Diego.

... the United States, for the first time in its history, fought a war of choice, not of necessity. By going to war in March 2003, it put into action a doctirine of preempting in order to remove a dictator and to attempt to turn his county into a democracy. By doing so, the American republic took a first step toward becoming an imperial power.

Top officials in the Bush administration actually convened a seminar on June 16, 2003, on the subject of "Rules and Tools for Running an Empire." [323-328]

Then, while doing my daily skimming of articles indexed on Arts and Letters Daily, I read Colby Cosh's column, "Does America Need a Foreign Legion?" The column begins its argument for an American foreign legion with the observation that "today little energy remains behind U.S. resistance to the imperial temptation. President Bush's 2000 electoral promise to pursue a 'humble' foreign policy has become a joke. Sept. 11 proved it is no longer in his power, or anyone else's."

Ugh.