ACROSS THE RUBICON

Did anybody see Chalmers Johnson Sunday night on C-Span2 Book TV? It was a rerun of an interview done in March at the Los Angeles Public Library by Warren Olney (of L.A. radio station KCRW), and it was mesmerizing. All Olney had to do was listen.

Johnson recently published "The Sorrows of Empire."  His thesis in the book, as it was on C-Span, is that 1) the United States is a modern empire,"thriving on fear and military domination" as ancient Rome once did, 2) the U.S. empire has already crossed the Rubicon on the way to oblivion, and 3) our Maximum Leader is speeding us on our way.

As C-Span summarized it, Johnson "argues that the ultimate purpose of U.S. military bases is not to maintain stability or promote democracy, but to defend U.S. hegemony. He traces U.S. world domination from the Cold War to today, then claims American militarism is irreversibly damaging its Constitution and the trust of its people." This continues an argument he began in "Blowback," another of his books.

Although Johnson taught history for decades at U.C. Berkeley, beginning in 1962, he opposed the '60s counterculture. What makes him doubly credible as a witness for the prosecution is that he was also a CIA consultant in those years. So he can't be accused of being a leftwing maniac. He's not only a brilliant historian, he's what's called "a biting writer."

Johnson certainly had bite on C-Span. It reminded me -- as have the hearings of the 9/11 commission -- that Gore Vidal's critics, especially Ron Rosenbaum, owe Vidal an apology for calling him a paranoid nut last year when he called our Maximum Leader and his cronies "the Bush junta."

Postscript: George Mattingly writes: "Jan, no, didn't catch Chalmers Johnson on CSPAN2 Sunday night. (Confession: I was out at the San Francisco Jazzfest catching Toots Thieleman, Kenny Werner, Airto, and Oscar Castro-Neves. Werner was so mesmerizing on piano that Toots proposed to him -- at how old? 185? -- saying "Kenny I am in love with you and this is the city for men to marry is it not?" A crackup -- and a great concert. ) I'm off to get a copy of SORROWS OF EMPIRE -- thanks for that tip: Just what I'm looking for (and absolutely right to give the nod to Gore Vidal, the most under-rated voice going). While I confess I'm an under-payer (as in zero), your column is one I WOULD pay for."

Thanks, George. I'm glad somebody besides my mother takes me seriously. To be truthful, even she had doubts.