Munaeem Jamal — Political Analysis & Global Affairs

  A single, brutal congressional primary in Kentucky during the summer of 2024 exposed the foundational delusion of modern American populism. Outside political action committees poured millions of dollars into the state to systematically dismantle Representative Thomas Massie, an isolationist who regularly opposed foreign aid packages. Right-wing media commentators immediately decried the onslaught as proof that Washington answers to foreign capitals rather than its own citizens. I watched this domestic political theater play out from my desk in Karachi, where the daily reality of global financial plumbing tells a vastly different story. The populist anger directed at foreign policy lobbying groups completely misunderstands the operational requirements of modern empire. Washington cannot simply retreat into a tidy, self-contained nationalism without instantly collapsing the core infrastructure of its global hegemony. My years managing international banking departments taught me tha...