The Left's War on Sovereignty

I just watched a brief interview with John Bolton on Fox & and Friends. His comments on the show reminded me of his recent article in Commentary, "The Coming War on Sovereignty":

While the term “sovereignty” has acquired many, often inconsistent, definitions, Americans have historically understood it to mean our collective right to govern ourselves within our Constitutional framework. Today’s liberal elite, by contrast, sees sovereignty as something much more abstract and less tangible, and thus a prize of less value to individual citizens than it once might have been. They argue that the model accepted by European countries in the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which assigned to individual nation-states the right and responsibility to manage their own affairs within their own borders, is in the process of being superseded by new structures more appropriate to the 21st century.

In this regard, they usually cite the European Union (EU) as the new model, with its 27 member nations falling under the aegis of a centralized financial system administered in Brussels. On issue after issue, from climate change to trade, American liberals increasingly look to Europe’s example of transnational consensus as the proper model for the United States. That is particularly true when it comes to national security, as John Kerry revealed when, during his presidential bid in 2004, he said that American policy had to pass a “global test” in order to secure its legitimacy.

This is not a view with which the broader American population has shown much comfort. Traditionally, Americans have resisted the notion that their government’s actions had to pass muster with other governments, often with widely differing values and interests. It is the foreign-policy establishment’s unease with this long-held American conviction that is the motivating factor behind A Plan for Action, which represents a bold attempt to argue that any such set of beliefs has simply been overtaken by events.

Bolton's making specific reference to a new plan, from the Brookings Institution, under consideration at the Obama White House, "A New Era of International Cooperation for a Changed World: 2009, 2010, and Beyond."

In addition to Bolton's article, see Mark Steyn's recent National Review cover story, "Prime Minister Obama: Will European Statism Supplant the American Way?"

Steyn links to another Brookings author, Parag Khanna, and his article, "The Metrosexual Superpower: The Stylish European Union Struts Past the Bumbling United States on the Catwalk of Global Diplomacy."

Steyn has the take down of Khanna's piece

The war on sovereignty is a war on American power and leadership. And should should we indeed see the collapse of American leading role in world politics, we will see as well the collapse of Western civilization.