Is it the job of the United States to restrain foreign countries?

Yes. That's the short answer.

Is it the job of other countries as well? What if China and Russia decided that it was their job to restrain the United States? With the implied intention of using nuclear weapons if necessary (an assumption which underlies all US foreign policy). Would you be ok with that?

What if China and Russia decided to go to war, or to join up and go to war against one of their neighbors? Would it be the United State's job to restrain China and/or Russia? Why? What if they don't want our restraining? Then what?

The long answer is: yes, so long as the particularly intimate relationship that exists between the US and Israel persists, so long as the US continues to be one of the pillars of the Israeli economy, and so long as the US remains a unipolar superpower.

So basically, as long as the US remains in the business of being world policeman and giving/selling weapons to Israel, then we should be best buds?

What if another country becomes a unipolar superpower and a bunch of Cubans are allowed to immigrate there. What if, over time, the unipolar superpower developed an intimate relationship with Cuba, since it has so many citizens of Cuban ancestry, and the superpower starts supplying Cuba with weapons and economic aid? What if Cuba decided to attack its neighbors with said weapons and then Cuba's superpower friend covered Cuba's aggression through UN Vetos? Would you be OK with that? After all, Cuba and the super power have a "Special Relationship" built on the same things you mentioned.

is, sadly, that Mr. Obama has had a polite, but firm discussion about just how much "change" the people that run America are going to allow. Don't expect too much.

"Now, that doesn't mean the prison will actually be closed immediately. The AP notes that "Obama's order will direct his administration to figure out what to do with the estimated 250 al-Qaida and Taliban suspects and potential witnesses who are being held at Guantanamo."

That's politics as usual obama style.

n/t

counties still under British rule. The IRA was not an official arm of the Irish or British States. I get so weary of the misrepresentation of a dispute that's been going on since 1601 over land and, yes, tribalism. The IRA killed Catholics too in a power-struggle which is much older and more complicated than what's going on in the Middle East for the last 60 years. The internecine duel in Northern Ireland was grinding to a halt as the vast majority of people on the island of Ireland wanted nothing to do with it. Yes, Senator George Mitchell had endless patience in bringing the intransigent people together more effectively than Pope John Paul 11 was when he pleaded with the IRA, on a visit to the Republic, to stop the blood-letting. The "Catholic" IRA ignored the impassioned words of the Polish Pope. Comparisions are odious and the comparison of the Middle East imbroglio to the "struggle" in Northern Ireland may be well-intentioned but is ill-informed.

Thanks! Okay, first things first! "Hail to the Cheif", out! Replaced by, of course "Theme from Shaft"! Then we gotta get some new faces on the money. There is so much to do! For some reason, I can't see anybody but Louis Armstrong on the $1 bill. It just seems right. But that still leaves the others.

And really, what about that whole "white House" bit? Maybe a little bit of re-decorating is in order by, no, not the "First Lady". From no on, she'll be simply known as "My Girl" and she will be played in with that. It's gonna be great.

PLEA TO OBAMA: CANCEL RISKY, RECKLESS 'SITTING DUCK' TRAIN STUNT

• What happened to Homeland Security warnings of "heightened risk" during Presidential transition?

• How about the late November FBI warning about possible Northeast train station attacks?

• "Amtrak Joe" Biden's longstanding warnings about security flaws along the Amtrak Northeast corridor -- why isn't he waving this whistle stop tour to a halt?

PREVENT A TRAGEDY. READ THIS LINK AND MAKE IT VIRAL. THIS IS NOT AN OVER-REACTION. PLEASE DO IT NOW:

http://wwww.nowpublic.com/world/plea-obama-cancel-risky-reckless-sitting-duck-train-stunt

OR (if link is corrupted):

http://My.NowPublic.com/scrivener

"We are going to bomb those suckers back to the stone age"

We all know this tune, don't we? You've only forgotten the words, Chris.

I know the words, but I don't think any bombs are in the works, at the moment anyway.

The reason? We are already at war with Iran, through Low Intensity Conflict that was authorized in a secret finding, signed by Bush, of "unprecedented scope", and bankrolled by the congress, controlled at the time by Democrats, to the tune of $300 Million. It is my opinion that the Intel that Bush shared with Israel was to cool its jets, proof that yes, America is "taking care of business" in Iran.

The $300 Million malignant growth is being set, and it doesn't need Israeli bombs to muck up the works. IMO America is merely going back to its Low Intensity, Divide and Conquer, South American methods or regime change.

...our traditional courts, which are the best in the world ...

ha hah hah hahahahahahahahhah!

Stop.

Our entire justice system, top to bottom, is corrupted and becoming a running joke, or it would be if it weren't so deadly.

To say it's "the best in the world" -- American exceptionalism yet again -- is insulting not just to the rest of the world, but to the many victims of its horrors.

It's a system of cronic justice delayed, deferred, compromised, and often absent altogether, which Anthony Romero knows full well.

It's a system where miscarriage of justice has become expected and in too many cases accepted.

Our courts and our justice system is not even close to "the best in the world."

< /rant >

Without the 'travesty of justice' I fear the American people will never understand what the consequences of embracing torture really are. One of them is that people like KSM get to walk if the government polluted all its files with his torture. All fury over that consequence should be directed at those who really botched his case: the people at the top of the government who ordered and directed his torture.

People act like letting him walk if you can't prove anything without his tortured confessions is something small, like getting off on a technicality. Torture isn't a technicality, the argument is like saying Ted Bundy was convicted on a technicality -- murder.

See how necessary those investigations at the top are? Without them, the whole justice system gets tangled up in knots over the people they tortured. What happens when the people who never did anything, but got tortured anyway, decide to bring their suits under the Torture Victims Protection Act? The cases get dismissed in front of a watching world because there is no evidence the Bush administration committed torture? Don't prosecutors want to see mass torturers go to jail as much as mass murderers? Are they less evil or something?

The 'punishment' of the American People for their part in sanctioning torture is to watch the trial of KSM knowing there is now a real possibility that he will go free.

Personally, I think it's an abstract argument. There is a lot of pre-torture evidence on KSM. Nevertheless, it's time to face the music, not change the tune.