How American taxes get spent:

It’s a good thing to see that Americans really seem to care about politics a lot more than here in the UK - we’d never get a decent debate like this going over here.

Still, America shouldn’t be the policeman of the world, not now anyway. Even if we were to restrict it to practical terms, with America’s foreign relations wrecked because of Bush, it’d be increasingly hard to get co-operation from abroad.

That said, I would still prefer to live in an American-dominated world than one under the governments of Russia and China…

Perhaps not in poitics, but I think BBC 4’s Moral Maze is a delightful and frequently thought-provoking program on a range of issues.

I would just as soon there were no policemen of the world. But if somebody has to do it, it shouldn’t be a single government or alliance with highly nationalistic interests, such as the US or China, or Russia. At best, perhaps, the UN–but even there, I have grave doubts.

The UN relies on the majority of member states co-operating and following its rules - alas, something which does not happen often, yet considering the alternatives, its the best chance we have.

Here’s to the end of blind idiocy!

The UN is often paralyzed when it comes to the “Big Issues” (like the Sudan, or Milosevic’s Greater Serbia) because there are too many nations with competing interests. But the alternative is having One Big Bully that enforces its own interests. That being the case, I’d much rather have King Log than King Stork.