More evidence in favor of my belief that Microsoft is in big trouble if it expects to fuel its growth by expanding its OS domination into new foreign markets.
4:37:16 PM    

There are millions there who need our help just as the victims of Saddam did. But these countries don't have the immediate strategic importance to the U.S. that Iraq did. So, our help has been limited.

Cynical liberals or conservatives say it's because conservatives or liberals (respectively) don't care, of course.

The real reason seems to be that historically it has always taken a number of factors, including substantial pure U.S. self-interest, for action to be taken in any given case. War is perceived as too expensive to engage in every opportunity to help. Americans care more about the lives of their children than about the lives of other people's children, and we care about our economic expenditures too, so it takes a lot of kinds of motivation, all summed together, for us to choose to send troops in a given case.

And when all those factors don't line up, it seems so impossible that anything will happen, that it doesn't seem even worth trying -- the effort would be wasted. It seems better to "choose one's battles wisely". So the foreign political situation, no matter it's evil nature, is largely ignored. Not because of not caring, but because of a sense of helplessness and hopelessness in the face of the overall network of realities that are in the way of enabling anything positive to happen.
5:16:41 AM