In their total war for the right to be dubbed the peace candidate, Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama propose a greater reliance on international institutions as an alternative to unilateralism and ad hoc "coalitions of the willing." Clinton talks of a "preference for multilateralism." Obama urges "more determined U.S. diplomacy at the United Nations." Even Republican John McCain reflects a pale version of this critique, calling for greater attentiveness to the "collective will of our democratic allies."

Bruce Reed and Marc Dunkelman

From the Los Angeles Times, Thursday, April 24, 2008:

It's a rare moment when three African nations, in an effort to forestall violence, block a shipment of weapons to a neighboring country in political turmoil. It's perhaps even a historic development when those weapons were sold by a great power and were bound for a government that is not under United Nations sanctions and has every legal right to buy arms -- though no moral right to do so. So let us praise the courageous peoples of South Africa, Mozambique and Zambia for refusing to allow the Chinese freighter An Yue Jiang to unload its deadly cargo: 77 tons of rockets, mortars and ammunition, manufactured by a Chinese state-owned enterprise, purchased by the government of Zimbabwe and virtually certain to be used by President Robert Mugabe to repress his opposition following an election that he may have lost.

Real change has never been easy ... The status quo in Washington will fight. They will fight harder than ever to divide us and distract us with ads and attacks from now until November."

-- Barack Obama,

Pennsylvania primary night speech

With that, Obama identified the new public enemy: the "distractions" foisted upon a pliable electorate by the malevolent forces of the status quo, i.e., those who might wish to see someone else become president next January. "It's easy to get caught up in the distractions and the silliness and the tit for tat that consumes our politics" and "trivializes the profound issues" that face our country, he warned sternly. These must be resisted.

From the Chicago Tribune, Tuesday, April 22, 2008:

If you're an American girl growing up today, you may not want to be a professional race car driver -- but it probably would never occur to you that anyone would stop you just because you were born with two X chromosomes.

"I won the states that we have to win -- Ohio, now Pennsylvania. It's very hard to imagine a Democrat getting to the White House without winning those states."

Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints at the Yearning for Zion Ranch in Texas can be forgiven for thinking they are being punished for making just another "lifestyle choice." The compound of the polygamous sect -- a breakaway from the main LDS Church, which long ago forswore plural marriage -- was raided by Texas authorities, who took more than 400 children from their parents.

Thomas Barnett