OK time to tear up FQ, ( Hey, I need SOMETHING for a hobby
)
"I have always loved France BUT with the caveat that they (like the Italians) should stick to food, wine, art and beautiful women"
While Italy may not have much to brag about over the last 1500 years, at least they never lost to Mexico. And they DID beat Ethiopia.
"We have had an idiot (Clinton)"
Believe it or not, I don't really think BJ was an idiot, He strikes me more as an honestly corrupt politician who went were the winds of pay offs blew.
"two idealists, though from opposite ends of the spectrum (W and BO)"
The problem with W was that he was NOT at the opposite end of the spectrum, even when he had a Rep. majority the first 2 years he was to eager to "build consensus" both with the Dems, and with the rest of the world. Even though every "realist" in both parties knew that the Dems, regardless of what was best for the country, would f-ck him every chance they got he still felt it necessary to suck up to them. After 9-11 he should have reacted the same day and to hell with world opinion, ( which was almost universally on our side until the media and politicians managed to twist it to suit their own purposes).
OK time to tear up Tom, because like he said, its a hobby. Thing is, I'm better at it, at least in this case.

Three points
1) The Italians never lost to Mexico and beat Ethiopia? (I'm sure they have a parade for that one) Well, news flash we are losing to Mexico every damn day if you look at the invasion of illegals and drugs that come across our borders. The Soviets thought we could hold the Fulda gap when we don't have the will to defend the Rio Grande? Its not the French that lack (and yes this is piling on, but it is Tom

) cojones here, its us. As far as the Ethiopians, the Italians had to use nerve gas to defeat them They had an army where a WW1 mauser and a freaking SPEAR were standard issue. Their guys fought barefoot which is why the nerve gas was effective.
2 Clinton was not an idiot? He came in to power when the USSR was defeated, the Chinese were weak and the EU was just getting started. America was never in a stronger position since 1945. Truman remade the world to suit our interests under those circumstances. What did Cinton do? Ended a civil war in Balkans and got our asses kicked by the Somalis and failed to deal with Iran after the Khobar Towers before they had nukes and people were still afraid of us? Oh yeah, there was that Sudanese offer to extadite Bin Laden. Oops! But hey, we did get NAFTA.
3 W wasn't an idealist? He and Jimmy Carter, and BO were seperated at birth. All three believe that inside every foriegner there is a good American just waiting to get out. Give the Afghans a chance and Jeffersonian Democracy will spring from the ground like mushrooms. Democracy can be exported and its racist and wrong to say it won't work in a conservative muslim society. Girls will go to school (pay no mind to those folks throwing battery acid in their faces, they'll come around after we bomb a few more villages (W) or just sit down and talk about it (BO)). The thing is they thought we can change hearts and minds. We can't. We can just defeat our enemies physically and set the terms for a truce, we can never set the political culture of another country. Maybe, in defeat, they will emulate ours as they might think that maybe they can learn something from the guys that6 just kicked their butts. This was the case with Germany and Japan. Maybe they won't, as is the case with Russia. Either way its stupid to try as you can't force a free society on anyone, you either want it or you don't, which is what W and BO have yet to undertand.
FQ13