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Romney acknowledges as much when he writes that Obama "always the skillful politician, will throw in compliments about America here and there."

In Cairo, Obama called the United States "one of the greatest sources of progress that the world has ever known. ... We were founded upon the ideal that all are created equal, and we have shed blood and struggled for centuries to give meaning to those words -- within our borders, and around the world." At the Langley speech, Obama told the CIA staff, "What makes the United States special, and what makes you special, is precisely the fact that we are willing to uphold our values and our ideals even when it's hard, not just when it's easy; even when we are afraid and under threat, not just when it's expedient to do so. That's what makes us different. So, yes, you've got a harder job. And so do I. And that's okay, because that's why we can take such extraordinary pride in being Americans. And over the long term, that is why I believe we will defeat our enemies, because we're on the better side of history."

And at his speech accepting the Nobel Prize, Obama said: "Whatever mistakes we have made, the plain fact is this: The United States of America has helped underwrite global security for more than six decades with the blood of our citizens and the strength of our arms. The service and sacrifice of our men and women in uniform has promoted peace and prosperity from Germany to Korea, and enabled democracy to take hold in places like the Balkans. We have borne this burden not because we seek to impose our will. We have done so out of enlightened self-interest -- because we seek a better future for our children and grandchildren, and we believe that their lives will be better if others' children and grandchildren can live in freedom and prosperity."

One of the most interesting essays we read was written by historian Walter Russell Mead for the journal Foreign Policy.

Obama's foreign policy follows in the tradition of Thomas Jefferson and more recently of Jimmy Carter, Mead writes. Obama's goal is to reduce America's costs and risks overseas.

In Obama's view, Mead writes, "Large military budgets divert resources from pressing domestic needs; close association with corrupt and tyrannical foreign regimes involves the United States in dirty and cynical alliances; the swelling national-security state threatens civil liberties and leads to powerful pro-war, pro-engagement lobbies among corporations nourished on grossly swollen federal defense budgets. ...

"Obama seeks a quiet world in order to focus his efforts on domestic reform -- and to create conditions that would allow him to dismantle some of the national-security state inherited from the Cold War and given new life and vigor after 9/11. Preferring disarmament agreements to military buildups and hoping to substitute regional balance-of-power arrangements for massive unilateral U.S. force commitments all over the globe, the president wishes ultimately for an orderly world in which burdens are shared and the military power of the United States is a less prominent feature on the international scene." 

Document 2: SSCI report (1) July 7, 2004

The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence published this initial report in July 2004 focusing on what the U.S. knew about Iraq prior to the war. The heavily excised excerpt reproduced here illustrates how much information remains closed to outside scrutiny. What is accessible shows that some U.S. intelligence officials considered CURVEBALL’s information problematic from the beginning, at least in part because of translation issues (he spoke in English and Arabic, translated into German and then back into English), and other “reporting inconsistencies.” (Because of blacked out text, it is unclear whether analysts identified this as a problem at the time.) What’s more, the lone American official to meet CURVEBALL before the invasion worried that he might be an alcoholic—and was not even sure the source “was who he said he was.”

Document 3: WMD Commission Report

This excerpt of the so-called Silberman-Robb Commission, created by President Bush, focuses on Iraq’s biological warfare capabilities and places heavy blame on the intelligence community for having “seriously misjudged” that potential.  The “primary reason for this misjudgment” was an over-reliance on CURVEBALL.  Among other things, the excerpt cites CIA European operations division chief Tyler Drumheller’s account of meetings related to the issue that were held in January 2003 with CIA Director George Tenet and Deputy Director John McLaughlin, as well as e-mails and interviews from CIA officials aware of those meetings, and the dramatic February 4 phone call between the division chief and Tenet.  The sessions, according to Drumheller, took place after he brought up German concerns over CURVEBALL’s reliability.  Tenet and McLaughlin, however, denied any prior knowledge of these events a few days after the report was published.  In his book, On the Brink, Drumheller asserts “there is a pile of documents two feet high backing up my story” (p. 205).

Document 4: McLaughlin Statement

Source: http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/wmd_mclaughlin.html

John McLaughlin, former Deputy Director of the CIA, issued this statement on April 1, 2005, denying he had any knowledge of CURVEBALL’s status as a potential fabricator until late 2003. However, European division chief Tyler Drumheller has contended that he notified his superiors in October 2002 of the German government’s suspicions concerning the source, and then contacted McLaughlin’s office directly on the matter in January 2003.

According to one transcript, these were her remarks:

Our president spent a year reaching out to hostile regimes, writing personal letters to dangerous dictators and apologizing for America, and what do we have to show for that? Here’s what we have to show. North Korea tested nuclear weapons and longer-range ballistic missiles. Israel, a friend and critical ally, now questions the strength of our support. Plans for a missile defense system in Europe, they’ve been scrapped. Relations with China and Russia are no better. and relations with Japan, that key Asian ally, they are in the worst shape in years.