I've found these documents very troubling, not because I couldn't see it unfolding over the last few years, but because I viewed it as simply the actions of a great power doing what it had to do to defend its interests, perhaps exaggerated and overdone somewhat by ideological imperatives, but still essentially supporting what should be the policy of a great but benign nation: enlightened self-interest. I might not have agreed in detail or in policy, but neither was I willing to see the country do nothing to protect itself. I know full well this is a competitive and hostile world and we are truly beset by real enemies that wish to destroy and humiliate us.

But this concept of premptive meddling, and if necessary, the use of naked aggression, not just against our foes, but against anyone who might conceivably someday challenge us or even get in the way of our plans, undermines the moral force that has allowed us to be a world leader and to promote our ideas of prosperity, freedom and peace. If this is how the world sees us, based on the policy statements of our own leaders, we have lost that moral high ground. I cannot imagine Eisenhower or Goldwater ever having subscribed to these ideas.

I don't see all recent history through these lenses, and I am fully aware that the details of this concept were never fully implemented, and are not likely to be so implemented now. But that these philosophies have been a factor in our foreign policy and that those responsible for them still have influence, and power, has done severe damage to our position in the world. And the fundamental ideology that promoted these ideas is still firmly entrenched in many of the power centers of our society.

I really need to think about this, I suspect many of my key assumptions have been challenged, and I have to sort things out. Just let it be said, when I read that NYT article, my first instinct was "this cannot be, my country would not do this, it is a lie."