get high, watch trash, ignore the news

Hey, the billionaires just want it more than me.

I doubt anyone will actually watch this, I guess, but it's pretty good.
Quick summary:
The idea that spreading democracy will create peace because 1)illiberal governments harm people's rights and 2) democracies don't fight each other, is flawed because a) nation building is hard, b) people would rather have stability than rights, and c) spreading "democracy" at gunpoint leads to resentment and resistance. Everywhere we've tried this has been a disaster.

This should be common sense by now, but there's still a lot of people espousing it.

Some problems with Measheimer:
1.He underplays the economic factors at play and oversells the seriousness of ideology. I think that, often, Liberal Hegemonic talk is just a cover for wars dictated by market forces.
2. He talks about States as solid atomistic actors. There are a lot of sub state level actors whose interests influence State actions. That is, a lot of what the US does in international relations is determined by the interests of companies in the military-industrial complex. These interests are often actually not in line with "America's" interests as a whole (e.g., Afghanistan)

I didn't know anything about the different schools of though in International Relations, so I thought it was interesting to read up on Realist and Liberals, et al. It's worth a watch if you want to kill some time.