"Maybe the US should only have ties with democratic countries."

Well, Raoul, you can't believe the nonsense that the US is a big believer in other countries being "democracies".

The biggest democracy in the world is India. The US has a pro-Pakistani tilt, and right now supports the military dictatorship there.

While Bush Sr. did tell the American people that the issue in Kuwait was the restoration of democracy, not oil, no one believed him. For one thing, Kuwait did have oil, nothing approaching a democracy.

Recently Bush Jr. was involved in trying to overthrow a democracy in South America, to install another military dictatorship. The democracy sold oil to Castro. Bad form.

The US has great relations with countries with which it can trade, doesn't with those it can't. France is a democracy, has different interests than the US, so is a bad nation.

Watch how well the US will get along with the oil-rich areas of the former Soviet Union, and those people had more "democracy" under the USSR than they do now. Rumsfeld was just over there, speaking as warmly and fuzzily as those guys know how.

The "democracy" idea is a cover, won't hold up. That's sad, but the "will of the people" which holds the most interest for this government is the will of the boards of directors of very large multi-national corporations.

Arf