Quote:
Originally Posted by innerSpaceman
scaeagles, are you discounting the value gained with our allies when we have all those unproductive talks with our enemies? In reading the Obama quote, it seemed to me that's the emphasis he was making.
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That could be. However, international leadership and relations change all the time, even very recently. For example, recent elections in Australia and England - the two staunchest supporters of out policies - have put in power in the hands of leaders who want to move in a different direction. In France (and Germany to an extent), the exact opposite is true, as Sarkozy openly campaigned on a desire to work more with the US. Former Soviet satillite states, who 20 years ago were in opposition to everything we did, now are close allies.
Because of that, I can't stop to look at what sort of prestige we have in the world or what foreign leaders have to say about us. It changes all the time. With the cold war, we were covering the asses of Europe and of course they were going to support us because they needed us (France being the exception, as they even pulled out of NATO in the 80s for a while if I am recalling my history correctly).