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Link Copied.In June 1941, during the festival of Shavuot, a mob of Arab soldiers and tribesmen led a pogrom in the Jewish quarter of Baghdad, murdering well over 180 men, women, and children. The pogrom, known locally as the Farhud (“looting”), was documented by the late Baghdadi Jew and Middle East specialist Elie Kedourie in his 1970 book The Chatham House Version and Other Middle-Eastern Studies.
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Kedourie blamed British authorities for failing to protect the Jews, despite having taken over responsibility for Mesopotamia from the Ottoman Empire more than two decades earlier. He explained that the Jews could “cheerfully acknowledge” the “right of conquest,” whether exercised by the Ottomans or by the British, because “their history had taught them that there lay safety.” But the British failure to enforce the law and provide imperial order was the kind of transgression that ethnic and religious minorities could ill afford: traditionally, imperialism itself, most notably that of the Hapsburgs and the Ottomans, had protected minorities from the tyranny of the majority.
It wasn’t imperialism per se that Kedourie railed against, but weak, ineffectual imperialism. To be sure, the British had their hands full in Mesopotamia in 1941: given the tendency of the Arab masses toward anti-Western and anti-Zionist ideologies (a tendency that was itself at least in part a reaction to British dominance), colonial authorities were desperate to keep Nazi influence out of the Middle East.
As a result, the British ambassador opted for a lighter hand when at a certain point he ought to have used a heavier one. Be that as it may, what is not at issue, as Kedourie correctly stated, is the responsibility that conquest historically carried with it. Throughout history, governance and relative safety have most often been provided by empires, Western or Eastern. Anarchy reigned in the interregnums. To wit, the British may have failed in Baghdad, Palestine, and elsewhere, but the larger history of the British Empire is one of providing a vast armature of stability, fostered by sea and rail communications, where before there had been demonstrably less stability. In fact, as the Harvard historian Niall Ferguson has argued, the British Empire enabled a late-19th- and early-20th-century form of globalization, tragically interrupted by a worldwide depression, two world wars, and a cold war.
After that, a new form of globalization took root, made possible by an American naval and air presence across large swaths of the Earth, a presence of undeniably imperial dimensions. Globalization depends upon secure sea lines of communication for trade and energy transfers: without the U.S. Navy, there’d be no globalization, no Davos, period. But imperialism is now seen by global elites as altogether evil, despite empires’ having offered the most benign form of order for thousands of years, keeping the anarchy of ethnic, tribal, and sectarian war bands to a reasonable minimum. Compared with imperialism, democracy is a new and uncertain phenomenon. Even the two most estimable democracies in modern history, the United States and Great Britain, were empires for long periods. “As both a dream and a fact the American Empire was born before the United States,” writes the mid-20th-century historian of westward expansion Bernard DeVoto.
Following their initial settlement, and before their incorporation as states, the western territories were nothing less than imperial possessions of Washington, D.C. No surprise there: imperialism confers a loose and accepted form of sovereignty, occupying a middle ground between anarchy and full state control. All of these empires delivered more peace and stability than the United Nations ever has or probably ever could. Consider, too, the American example. The humanitarian interventions in Bosnia and Kosovo, and the absence of such interventions in Rwanda and Syria, show American imperialism in action, and in abeyance.This interpretation of empire is hardly novel; indeed, it is captured in Rudyard Kipling’s famous 1899 poem, “The White Man’s Burden,” which is not, as is commonly assumed, a declaration of racist aggression, but of the need for America to take up the cause of humanitarianism and good government in the Philippines at the turn of the 20th century. From Rome’s widespread offer of citizenship to its subject peoples, to France’s offer of a measure of equality to fluent Francophone Africans, to Britain’s arrangement of truces among the Yemeni tribes, to the epic array of agricultural and educational services provided by the Europeans throughout their tropical domains—Britain’s Indian Civil Service stands out—imperialism and enlightenment (albeit self-interested) have often been inextricable.
However patronizing this may sound, the European imperialists could be eminently practical men, becoming proficient at the native languages and enhancing area expertise. Nazis and Communists, by contrast, were imperialists only secondarily; they were primarily radical utopians who sought racial and ideological submission. Thus, the critique that imperialism constitutes evil and nothing more is, broadly speaking, lazy and ahistorical, dependent as it often is on the very worst examples, such as the Belgians in the 19th-century Congo and the Russians throughout modern history in Eurasia.Nevertheless, the critique that imperialism constitutes bad American foreign policy has serious merit: the real problem with imperialism is not that it is evil, but rather that it is too expensive and therefore a problematic grand strategy for a country like the United States. Many an empire has collapsed because of the burden of conquest. It is one thing to acknowledge the positive attributes of Rome or Hapsburg Austria; it is quite another to justify every military intervention that is considered by elites in Washington. Thus, the debate Americans should be having is the following: Is an imperial-like foreign policy sustainable? I use the term imperial-like because, while the United States has no colonies, its global responsibilities, particularly in the military sphere, burden it with the expenses and frustrations of empires of old.
Caution: those who say such a foreign policy is unsustainable are not necessarily isolationists. Alas, isolationism is increasingly used as a slur against those who might only be recommending restraint in certain circumstances.Once that caution is acknowledged, the debate gets really interesting. To repeat, the critique of imperialism as expensive and unsustainable is not easily dismissed.
As for the critique that imperialism merely constitutes evil: while that line of thinking is not serious, it does get at a crucial logic regarding the American Experience. That logic goes like this: America is unique in history. The United States may have strayed into empire during the Spanish-American War of 1898 and the resultant war in the Philippines. And it may have become an imperial Leviathan of sorts in the wake of World War II. At root, however, the United States was never meant to be an empire, but rather that proverbial city on a hill, offering an example to the rest of the world rather than sending its military in search of dragons to slay. Rather than Obama’s post-imperialism, in which the secretary of state appears like a lonely and wayward operator encumbered by an apathetic White House, I maintain that a tempered imperialism is now preferable.No other power or constellation of powers is able to provide even a fraction of the global order provided by the United States. Air and sea dominance preserves the peace, such as it exists, in Asia and the Greater Middle East.
American military force, reasonably deployed, is what ultimately protects democracies as diverse as Poland, Israel, and Taiwan from being overrun by enemies. If America sharply retrenched its air and sea forces, while starving its land forces of adequate supplies and training, the world would be a far more anarchic place, with adverse repercussions for the American homeland.Rome, Parthia, and Hapsburg Austria were great precisely because they gave significant parts of the world a modicum of imperial order that they would not otherwise have enjoyed. America must presently do likewise, particularly in East Asia, the geographic heartland of the world economy and the home of American treaty allies. This by no means obliges the American military to repair complex and populous Islamic countries that lack critical components of civil society.
America must roam the world with its ships and planes, but be very wary of where it gets involved on the ground. And it must initiate military hostilities only when an overwhelming national interest is threatened. Otherwise, it should limit its involvement to economic inducements and robust diplomacy—diplomacy that exerts every possible pressure in order to prevent widespread atrocities in parts of the world, such as central Africa, that are not, in the orthodox sense, strategic.That, I submit, would be a policy direction that internalizes both the drawbacks and the benefits of imperialism, not as it has been conventionally thought of, but as it has actually been practiced throughout history.We want to hear what you think about this article.
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Since 1959, Empire Today® has provided Carpet, Hardwood, Laminate, Vinyl, Tile Flooring, and Window Treatments to over 2 million satisfied customers. Offering quality, name-brand products, Empire Today can help you find the product you want, within your budget. Empire brings hundreds of samples to your doorstep. During your free estimate, an experienced Sales Representative will help you choose a floor, take room measurements, and provide an all-inclusive price estimate. And, there’s no need to wait weeks - professional installers can install in-stock styles as soon as the next day. Offering competitive low prices and comprehensive warranties, Empire Today is committed to ensuring your Carpet and Flooring installation experience is top notch and handled by qualified and experienced contractors. Original review: April 1, 2020Somebody that we were talking to had at least had heard about Empire.
We told her that we've been to a number of different places, checking out different carpets. The installation went fine. Everybody was good. They were well-qualified and did well. They were kind, courteous and helpful and did what they needed to do at that point.
They had to come back because it was such a monumental thing. We had to move everything in the house and we had way too much stuff in the house. So, it was a monumental deal to just move it and then move it from where you moved it to so they could put more down. But other than that, they did what they said they were gonna do. Even the salesman was courteous, kind and was good.
I communicated with the salesman and told him that we liked the carpet mats, and yet at the same time, I didn't realize that it would mat that much. And so, as far as tracking and anything laying on it, shows. Just every step you take shows. Every print and whatever.
And so, it's just unique. Some carpets do that and some don't. But I didn't realize this was going to do that. But we've done what we could do.
We can't change it. We'll live with it, but it's just the fact that we just somehow didn't realize it was gonna have that tracking ability just profoundly.
I even sent the salesman a couple of pictures. I could send him another one, but I guess he knows that we got what we asked for.The fact that he showed us a sample and we walked on it and so forth and felt it. You just stood on it. It wasn't long enough to walk on, but you stood on it, then made a decision.
He said it was like king of the walk and is wonderful and people liked it. A little bit of carpet we have in a lower room doesn't do the tracking at all. We just didn't have enough money to do it. I wouldn't wanna have it laid. If I had something to where you'd have both in the same place, if I could get something to put it down so it didn't have the contrast.
That would be helpful.I hope and pray the quality is all it is cracked up to be. We like the color and we chose that.
I'm walking on the carpet now and we're learning to live with it. It gives you a good feel and it's not abrasive like some. If you roll a chair that has rollers on it or if you sweep, it's interesting. As far as what we had picked out, both as far as flooring and carpet, we put down the flooring in the kitchen area, and then we put carpet throughout everything else basically, and I told my wife with what we were doing, if we would've gone that route, we would've had two different issues but we would've saved a couple of thousand dollars if we did what we were thinking about.So we paid a higher price, paid more funds for what we have, and there's a possibility it may be better. We surely were not being skimpy. We looked at several places. We looked at Lowe's and Home Depot, and then we also looked at a discount place in Georgia.
And so, if we had gone with what we were actually picking out, then it surely wasn't by any means the bottom of the line. It was quality, both as far as pad and carpet, but it would've actually been a couple thousand dollars less.The fact that Empire at least allowed us to purchase it and pay for it over the year with no interest, then I made the choice to do that just so we didn't have to spend all the money at one time. But in actuality, what we were gonna buy would've been a couple thousand less than what we put in this. We put 7,300 and some dollars in this. I don't have complaints with the personnel or the people or the installers. It's just the fact that we did not discern how it was gonna end up looking. Original review: Feb.
22, 2020There was another company that was advertising but I checked with Empire first. Somebody said I should’ve checked with those and compared.
I had vinyl plank installed in every room in the whole house although I wish that I stayed with my Hickory laminate. I let the rep from Empire talked me into the vinyl because of the bathroom. The Hickory laminate was my pick before the man ever showed up and even after he showed the other ones, I said that I liked my Hickory.
I wanted it in the whole house including the bathroom. The rep said no because of the water. He said that we had to put something else in there. So, they showed me the vinyl plank and it looked like my Hickory but I have a picture that I took of his board, and he showed me a little square that he has on the board.
I took a picture of that and I took a picture of the floor that was beside it on their picture. Everything looked shiny. After I got back here and Empire had it all done, there was nothing shiny to it though. It looks just like my Hickory. It was the same basic color, just a little bit redder or darker than the Hickory. But that doesn’t bother me because I love the color.
It’s just the smoothness of it shows all your footprints and it's hard to clean. You are constantly wiping around it or trying to dust it with dust mop.
I’m 70 and I have congestive heart failure and my kids wanted me to do it so that I wouldn’t be cleaning the carpets and getting down on that floor that I had because it was all white. I wish I had stayed with the Empire Hickory instead of going with this, but I can’t do my whole house over again.The installation team was wonderful. They were young and I was worried about that but there was enough of them so that my little dog and I could get back in. I was worried about how many days it might take them and what problems they might run into.
But they had it all done in one day and they were straight through lines, which was great. The only thing is, they’re not plumbers.
I had to have the commode looked at twice after they left because they had a problem with one commode. We were on the phone with their boss before they left because it wasn’t sealed. It moved when you sit down on it and so, it wasn’t straight. They went over to tighten the other one and that one began to leak a little. So, he talked to the guy on the phone again and then, they took something, fixed it and they had to saw the nuts off.I had to call my plumber in because I didn’t wanna call them back because I knew they weren’t plumbers.
I wanted a real plumber who knew what they were doing. My plumber tightened both of them for me and then, when I went to run the washer, the water wasn’t coming in. So, the plumber did that. I’m glad I tried the washer the night before the plumber come or I wouldn’t have known that and I had to call him back. But as far as the workmanship, the guys did a good job. I walked around with them and even the trims look decent. I was worried the trim was gonna be all marked up.Also, I had to call and file a problem with Wells Fargo because my Empire contract had me down for 9.99 for 48 months.
It was the contract that I signed and I have a copy of but when they gave me the bill for one year, after that, it goes 28%. I called Wells Fargo and they said that that’s not what Empire gave them. So then, I had to call Empire. I was supposed to contact them because the bank didn’t do anything. When I called the bank, the rep said that Empire hasn’t gotten a hold of them. I set up a dispute between us and right now, I’m waiting on somebody to get me started on my payment plan at 9.99 that I agreed to. I just want Empire to get this straightened up.
Original review: Jan. 28, 2020My sister had done some carpeting at her home in Indiana, and I thought it was fantastic in the price she had paid.
So I called Empire and a gentleman came out. The salesman was very kind.
He did the initial measurements and went over everything with me. He took his time and answered all my questions. On the day of installation, the crew came out. They were very professional and did everything. We did run into a problem at the end.
When it came time to sign the completion papers, I noticed that there was nothing due from me. I couldn't understand that as when the initial salesman came out, we had talked about financing. I told him I wanted to put a certain amount down.
When he wrote the receipt from Empire, he had written down the balance that was due. He informed me that when the service people come out, I would give them the check for the money I wanted to put down.
That was when things got crazy. The guy couldn't understand why I was trying to give him the money, since I'm not supposed to collect anything. I told him it was not the agreement we had agreed on. I got my receipt and showed him. I said that this was almost a $1,900 job here and I was putting $1,000 down and left the balance of 895. And that's the way the salesman had written it up and I showed him that receipt.
I told him that I was supposed to give him a $1,000 check that day. He was still confused. He would not take my check, and he ended up calling some office. And then I got very angry and upset. I thought that what he did next was very rude.The gentleman who came in to do the work was Hispanic, and there's nothing wrong with that. He had been here for about a hour or so, and had talked English to me the entire time. But when he gets on the phone to begin talking to whoever it was he was talking to, he stood in my living room and the whole conversation is in Spanish.
I didn't understand what he was saying. So I told him that I needed to understand what he was saying.He ended up having to get my banking information and my card number, so they can get the payment. I ended up writing him a check. At any rate, we did get it worked out because I did talk with the young lady and I explained to her what we had gone through with the initial salesman and what I was expected to pay.
She told that I was okay for $8,000. I said her I understood all of that.
And then she told me that I was down for the full amount to be financed. But I argued with her that I didn't want it financed for that much.
I told her I'm putting it down, and then finance it. That was when I got upset. It went absolutely crazy in the end. I felt like I was being pushed to finance the entire amount, and I kept telling the young lady that was not what I wanna do. But other than that, their salespeople and the crew that came out were fantastic.
I like Empire's product and the service was great. Original review: Dec. 18, 2019We were gonna do a whole house remodel and I started searching on Google. I found that Empire Today had very good responses. People were very happy with Empire, which was probably the main reason we chose them. We did a wood plank that's waterproof that has a cushion back on it.
When the installers came, they said that we bought the top-of-the-line. We had it put in the living room, dining room, kitchen, hallway, utility room and two bathrooms. We had it in everything except for two bedrooms and then we had carpet put there. At first, when the rep brought his samples in, he wanted to sell us some linoleum and we didn't wanna go that way.
We wanted it to look nice. My wife said we wanted some kind of a planking. So, he went out and that was the piece that he brought in.
It was a light gray color and that's what we picked. He seemed to know a lot about it.
He only brought us in one piece to pick from and that was kind of different. He would have brought us several but we told him ahead of time that we were going with light gray walls and white ceilings, and we already had the white kitchen in blackish gray granite, so he kinda knew the color scheme and he was good about it.We had a problem part way through the installation. We took for granted that every piece of what the rep brought us was gonna look that way. The crew started laying it and they had four light pieces together and then a dark piece, and it just didn't look right. So, we stopped and called the rep. The crew, in turn, pulled it up and started mixing the boxes so we wouldn't have such a variance and the floor turned out great.
They were here five days. When they put the gray trim down, when they cut it, the ends weren't gray, and I wasn't happy with that.We had this whitish, light brownish color on the end of the trim going down the hallway when it would bump up to a door casing. Finally, after a couple more times of coming back, they took some kind of a gray pencil and colored the ends of them and it made it look a little bit better, but we still have some that weren't all the way completed. But it's not bad. They had to match an existing door trim and the quarter round trim was just too big for it, so it would kind of stand out.
It was a $10,000 job and it turned out very nice. We've had several people compliment us on it.This was a 1985 manufactured home that sits on a slab. You're used to seeing light brown walls and paneling looking stuff. We completely changed it all up into light gray walls and charcoal beams, and then we also had the new white kitchen and the flooring.
We got all new blinds in now and switching all the ivory outlets and switches over to white, and we're going with the panels just to kinda make it look nice. It will probably be a home that me and my wife live in for the rest of our lives, so we figured we might as well fix it up the way we want.
We're very happy. A representative was assigned to us and we were given an appointment window, as a lot of companies do like from 8:00 to 10:00 or 10:00 to 12:00, and also a date for him to come.
He contacted us early in the morning at that date to confirm the appointment window then met us at the property. First of all, he asked us what we were considering and what price range we wanted. He had noted that it was a rental home, so he didn’t really try to convince us that we needed huge, expensive carpeting for those two bedrooms.
He said it was in a really reasonable price range. He showed us several alternatives, discussed the carpeting and the padding with us, the turnaround time, and the possible delivery times. After we had wrapped up, we had chosen the one that we liked.We were having the house painted at the time, so it was easy to match the carpet with the color of the new walls because they were being made new simultaneously. We chose the carpeting and he checked on a couple of possible installation dates. He found one a couple of days later in that same week then set our schedule and their schedule. The only thing that I was curious about was paying the deposit with a check, which got photographed and sent over the internet, then handed back to me and voided. It was a procedure I had not ever used before.
It was a little crazy to do it over the computer that way rather than just handing the check and have them turn it in. But it seems that the payment went through very smoothly, and the same method was used two days later when we had the carpeting installed.We had a window of what time that the gentleman would be coming to install the carpet, and they arrived in the first portion of that window in the day.
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But I don’t think they called ahead of time. They just appeared without making us wait all day long for them.
They were in and out of the home in a very quick and efficient manner. They measured, organized, cut the carpet, and put it down. They did a beautiful job and they finished within about two hours for the two bedrooms. We’re very happy with the product.In both instances that we’ve talked with the people who have come out to make the sale, they’ve been really interested in what we wanted to do and how we perceived redoing the house. They didn’t try to convince me to carpet my entire house since I told them I only wanted to carpet the upstairs and leave the wood floors in the downstairs. They didn’t try to twist my arm to change my mind.
They just sat right down and got to business with what I wanted. In our recent one, they didn’t say they could carpet the bathroom or they could do the adjacent room and add to this. They just said, “This is what you want, and these are our products.” They gave the price ranges and made recommendations for our rental because a certain type of fabric may hold up better than something else in the line. I thought that they very much took into consideration the audience they’re selling things to and didn’t try to oversell. Original review: April 4, 2020Empire Today is a known entity.
I learned things when the salesman came in that it seems to be at a fair price, and they could do the job very quickly. I got vinyl flooring that installs with no glue because I moved into a house with reasonably good wooden floors. There is a room that I am going to make into a painting studio and I don’t want to mess up the wood floors so if the next person in the house is not happy with the flooring, they can rip it all up.
The flooring is very nice and comfortable to walk on. However by Murphy's Law, a couple hours after the installation team went, I actually gouged the surface by putting a piece of furniture on it.
It is disappointing that the surface of the product is that fragile. I will tell people about my experience but I don't recommend it.
Original review: April 3, 2020I contracted to have Vinyl wood look bedroom flooring and living & stairs carpeting installed. I declined installation of the bedroom flooring because it was very poor quality. The salesman had me sign a contract for $11,293.61 for the total job. After declining the flooring Empire customer service reduced the cost of the total contract to only the carpeting cost of $3,959.60 which I understood as payment that included my $1200.00 deposit. The cost of carpeting was suppose to be $3,959.60 - $1,200.00 = $2759.60.
Wells Fargo sent me a payment plan for $3659.60. Empire is at fault because of the excessive charge for the carpeting. Original review: April 3, 2020I used Empire before and was always happy with them.
Recently, I had them install carpet in the two bedrooms including two closets, hallway, upstairs, and stairs up the steps to the upstairs. The sales representative was wonderful. Not only he knew that we wanted carpet, but he also offered these other services. Just to have him go through that due diligence, that he was used to just selling carpet and have to sell other things, I thought he was really good at it. He was also good from a carpet perspective, he didn't try to sell us on one thing. He understood what our need was.
We wanna leave in a couple of years so we didn't want some high-end things. He didn't try to sell us something more than what we needed and I thought that was really nice. The installers were very good about calling, 'cause I asked to call me and let me know the window that they were gonna be there. One guy had the badge of Empire on and he did not speak English.
He had another guy with him and then he had this kid. The one guy spoke broken English and the young kid was the translator. That didn't bother me and I could deal with that, but if you have an elderly person, that might be a little bit confusing for them. However, they were very professional. They put all their rugs down to make sure that they didn't ruin my floors. They were also respectful when I said that we had our bathroom redone and it cost us $10,000 and that they should not put anything in our bathroom furniture-wise.
They kept us informed about the status of where they were.But we had a little bit of a problem before they could start. For some reason, Empire thought that we owed them a check. We did the 12 months finance. The guy said to give him a check and I told him I won't. He wasn't mean about everything and was just following his rules so he told me to talk to his boss. He had to call this boss that spoke Spanish and had to go through all of these hoops because Empire did not have it written down right that my husband and I were approved for the financing and I didn't have to pay anything at the time.
Then the translator had to say that this is what's going on. So that kind of thing was a little bit of a hiccup. They were really quick though and put everything back the best that they could. I did not expect them to do that.
We ran the vacuum a couple of times on the carpet and everything's holding up well. There's nothing peeling off or coming off the walls. They did a really good job. Original review: April 3, 2020I purchased laminate flooring from Empire Today. I had it installed in the living room, the dining room and two hallways. I like the color of it. I found Empire Today to be of a higher quality than what I had seen.
The installation went really well. The guys were very professional.
They moved the furniture and did a good job. However, I was told one price and charged another price. That issue had been resolved now, but it took me making several phone calls talking to different people to get it resolved.
The year 1959 saw the founding of Empire Today in Chicago. Since then, the business has grown into a true empire with locations in the majority of U.S. States.Products:Empire Today offers carpet, hardwood, laminate, resilient vinyl, tile, even window blinds and shades.
Free-in-home estimates are available.Financing:Empire Today and Wells Fargo Bank offer financing, including an interest-free option, that charges no interest for 12 months. Another option gives you a 48-month payoff time frame at 9.99 percent interest rate.Warranties:Empire Today warranties run a lifetime in some cases, with a still-respectable 30 years in several other cases.Outdoor carpeting:Empire sells carpeting for porches, patios and decks. Their short pile height helps keep crushes and dents from forming.Installation:Installations are performed by independent contractors who work with Empire Today. Options include next-day installation and half-price deals.Best for:Luxury shoppers, budget seekers and people with pets and kids stand to find what they need from Empire Today.
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