^the only area where the usa is still the undisputed leader is in military power. and even america's friends worry about that, maybe not right now, but for the future. a great nation suddenly on hard times, with a population not used to them, and with great military resources, may be tempted to play that card to get back what it feels it deserves. even your friends who don't believe that has happened yet are afraid it might. bush scared the hell out of the rest of the world, obama seems an improvement, but who knows what he'll do if he feels cornered? and who knows what the next guy, regardless of party, will do.^

Somebody blew up chunks of New York City and Washington D.C. We could have erased Afghanistan in a single night, but the vast majority of our military power remained on the shelf. We've spent several years of warfare now going door-to-door with ground troops instead of standing back and turning entire districts harboring attackers into smoking craters, which is how things would have been done in WWII. We could have destroyed our enemies without losing a single American life. We took another path.

I really don't think America has anything to prove as far as military restraint goes.