Lindsey Graham's legacy: Relentless warmongering dressed in folksy charm

Lindsey Graham's legacy: Relentless warmongering dressed in folksy charm Submitted by Ammiel Alcalay on Thu, 07/16/2026 - 16:10 From the Iraq quagmire to Israel's genocide in Gaza, the late senator never encountered a military intervention he didn't like Senator Lindsey Graham arrives to speak with US President Donald Trump during a rally in Charlotte, North Carolina, on 2 March 2020 (Brendan Smialowski/AFP) Off While the ideological and propagandistic projection of American exceptionalism as a force for good in the world has taken some lethal blows lately, this fantasy remains alive and well when US politicians are eulogised, no matter how thin the homespun platitudes get. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who died this month , was generally portrayed as an avuncular figure who “got along with everybody”, as President Donald Trump put it , despite their once-acrimonious relationship. John Thune, the Senate majority leader, said Graham “believed in the might of America to achieve good in the world”.