Like nature, Israel's strategic relations abhor a vacuum. In the wake of the Obama administration's decision to drastically curtail the US's strategic alliance with Israel in the interest of American rapprochement with Iran and Syria, the Netanyahu government has been moving swiftly to fill the void.

On Monday (5/11), with Pope Benedict XVI's arrival and with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's visit with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak at Sharm e-Sheikh, two potential strategic alliances came into view.

Rather than viewing with alarm Mr. Obama's clear antipathy towards Israel, Mr. Netanyahu views it as an opportunity to pursue alliances in Israel's interest without regard to the wishes of the American president.

Which country receives the most in total foreign aid from all donors? The official numbers show Iraq at the top with $3 to $18 billion in aid (depending on how you define "aid") and all the other recipient nations of the world at less than $3 billion per year.

However, if you look at which nation benefits most from foreign subsidies, the U.S. would come out on top by a very wide margin.

Mr. Obama sat down yesterday (5/06) with the presidents of Pakistan and Afghanistan to seek a way out of the existential crisis now facing those two nations.

As reported by the press, Obama secured commitments from them for greater cooperation in the struggle against the "common threat," as well as assurances that Pakistan's nuclear weapons would be secure - in other words, the same promises and commitments that every White House meeting with Pakistan's leaders since 9/11 has invariably delivered.

Put simply, the Taliban, murderous as it is, is not the problem. The problem is the Pakistani military and the stubborn refusal of Washington to comprehend this basic reality.

Why do Mexicans only have one-third the per capita income (on a purchasing power parity basis) of Canadians and only one-fourth that of Americans?

The answer is that Mexicans are relatively poor because have been plagued by semidespotic regimes that have ignored the rule of law and often engaged in destructive economic policies.    

Mexicans have been free of their Spanish colonial masters for almost 200 years (almost as long as their American neighbors and far longer than Canadians have enjoyed independence).

Mexico has a better growing climate than Canada, and it is rich in natural resources -- oil, gas, and metals.

After a mere 100 days, the "Obama Doctrine" for our foreign and security policies has emerged. And it's terrifying.

The combination of dizzying naïveté, dislike of our allies, disdain for our military, distrust of our intelligence services and distaste for our own country promises the worst foreign policy of our lifetimes.

That includes President Jimmy Carter's abysmal record of failure.

The core tenets of the Obama Doctrine to date would make a charter member of the terrorist Weather Underground cheer.  Here's a compilation:

Would you prefer to live in a country that has:

(1) The rule of law with an honest civil service, strong protection of private property and minority rights, free trade, free markets, very low taxes, and full freedom of the speech, press and religion, but not a democracy?

(2) Democracy and a corrupt court and civil service, many restrictions on economic freedom, including very high taxes, with limited rights for minority religions, peoples and speech?

Many mistakenly believe democracy means liberty, but a quick review of world democracies show that is not true. Almost all democracies restrict economic liberties more than necessary. Many have corrupt court and civil service systems, inhibit women's rights, constrain press freedom and do not protect minority rights and views.

My president went to Trinidad and Tobago, and all I got was this lousy Che Guevara T-shirt.

At a Caribbean resort, Obama grinned through a semi-erotic encounter with Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, then failed to answer a "strategic rape" charge lodged against America by ex-Sandinista Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua (who knows plenty about rape).

Ignoring America's allies in favor of photo ops with anti-American leftists, such as Ecuador's Rafael Correa and Chavez, Obama blamed the United States for Latin America's problems.

Obama needs to get up off his knees. Foreign leaders have already pegged him as the wimpiest metrosexual this side of the men's grooming-products counter at Barney's.

Suppose you were appointed global economic czar, and your task was to bring the world's per capita income up to the level of Ireland – which is almost that of the US. Would you:

(A) Insist the world's rich nations transfer substantial wealth though massive foreign aid to the poor nations?

(B) Insist all nations adopt policies that would make them as economically free as the top 10 freest economies today?

In the current era of ideological polarization, throughout the West, the Right and the Left diverge on almost every issue. One of the few convictions that still unifies national security strategists across the ideological spectrum is that it would be a global calamity of the first order if al-Qaeda gets its hands on nuclear weapons.

Unfortunately, due to the rapid demise of nuclear-armed Pakistan as a coherent political unit, this nightmare scenario is looking more possible than ever. Indeed, if events continue to move in their current direction, it is more likely than not that in the near future, the Taliban and al-Qaeda will take possession of all or parts of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal.

Given the failure of the US's political strategies of securing Pakistan's nuclear arsenal by supporting Pakistan's government, and fighting the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, it is becoming apparent that the only sure way to prevent the Taliban/al-Qaeda from taking control over Pakistan's nuclear weapons is to take those weapons out of commission.