Simon says, but Niall gets bashed

Trendy Scottish historian Niall Ferguson must feel like a lightning rod for American sensitivity about starting a new empire when he reads the letters to the editor after one of his articles appears, as in this example responding to a recent New York Times magazine piece. But what exactly is Niall's controversial neo-imperialist opinion? Basically, that British history marks a victory of solid instincts even as mistakes were made, the Empire wasn't all bad, the world can use the "right" kind of foreign interventions, but Americans may not have the fortitude for empire building, and apparently not the willingness to put up the requisite cash (at least under the current president). Even allowing for the controversial aspects of this, it's not much different from trendy English historian Simon Schama's view of the world, and yet Simon doesn't attract the same kind of hostility. Check out this interview with Simon from the London Times, containing the following highlights:

A bid for Private Eye's Pseud's Corner
[asked for historical parallels to Iraq war]
"The widening of the Atlantic rift in terms of the historical memory in Europe began as an exercise in cautionary pessimism. I mean Thucydides, the trajectory of it, leads you towards Syracuse, you know, and the debates over Syracuse because Alcibiades and Nicias which are just . . ."
[interviewer calls a halt at this point]

[justification for the Iraq war]
I do believe there were horrible things lurking in Iraq even if we haven't found them, and I do think the pond needed to be drained. It was entirely likely that they would get into the hands of people like al-Qaeda -- and even if they hadn't, it was absolutely clear that Saddam, over a period of time, wanted to be the extortionate lever in that part of the region.

[on Bush fiscal policy]
No, not in terms of the war, but of what we are up for now: that it may be a little difficult to have however many tens of thousands, maybe a hundred thousand, people policing and stabilising this part of the world over the next five years while you cut every single tax you can think of and fund social security and prevent Medicare from completely collapsing. There's an amazing Wizard of Oz craziness about basic sums...Whether you can finance that and be an empire is deeply moot. It's traditionally what breaks all empires

[getting more Fergian now....]
America is deeply about tourism, going there and coming back to air-conditioning. Britain wasn't. The Victorians were willing to build Tunbridge Wells in Simla [victorian India resort]


Maybe if Niall was just a little bit sillier, his opinions wouldn't raise quite so many hackles. Perhaps that's the plan.