There is a very disquieting sense in which, despite the rhetoric of Cairo, President Obama's foreign policy is drifting back into the well-worn (and highly dangerous) ruts of the previous administration. Offered for your consideration, as Rod Serling used to say, are two bizarre and troubling occurrences this week. First, Secretary of State Clinton appears in an interview on ABC's This Week to threaten a possible Iraq-style US invasion of Iran. The transcript : CLINTON: I think it is U.S. policy to the extent that we have alliances and understandings with a number of nations. They may not be formal, as it is with NATO, but I don't think there is any doubt in anyone's mind that, were Israel to suffer a nuclear attack by Iran, there would be retaliation. STEPHANOPOULOS: By the United States? CLINTON: Well, I think there would be retaliation. And I think part of what is clear is, we want to avoid a -- a Middle East arms race which leads to nuclear weapons being in the po...

... is that he believes in the right of the State to kill prisoners, as long as the State is careful about it. According to the AP , Bob Barr wrote recently to the Clemency Board in Georgia on behalf of convicted killer Troy Davis: Barr wrote the board Wednesday saying he is "a strong believer in the death penalty as an appropriate and just punishment" but said the proper level of fairness and accuracy required for the ultimate punishment has not been met in Davis' case. Maybe part of this non-Libertarian belief in the State's right to execute prisoners is part of the reason that Bob Barr is polling at 2% in North Carolina, whereas Dr Michael Munger--a death penalty opponent--is garnering 6%. Food for thought, eh?

Two weeks ago I had the good fortune to interview Dr. Michael Munger , the Libertarian Candidate for Governor in North Carolina. My initial question to him involved the top three initial priorities for a Munger administration. I'd like to share the first two of them with you [the other one concerned attracting jobs]: First priority : I issue an executive order placing an immediate moratorium on capital punishment in the state. Then I commute the sentences of everyone on death row to life in prison without parole. Third priority : I would create a study commission to check over the cases of all citizens incarcerated in NC's prisons for purely nonviolent crimes. (Embezzlement is violent, by the way, even though it is theft by stealth.) These crimes would include: possession of small amounts of any drug, prostitution, etc. And then I would take the resulting list of nonviolent offenders, after it had been checked to make sure that NO crimes of violence had been committed by anyon...

I can recall with some pride as a Libertarian that this is what North Carolina gubernatorial candidate Mike Munger said he would do first if elected: First priority : I issue an executive order placing an immediate moratorium on capital punishment in the state. Then I commute the sentences of everyone on death row to life in prison without parole. On the other hand, I read with emotions and thoughts that are difficult to describe the Question of the Day at Delawareliberal, Does not giving a crap if someone is dying and having nothing good to say about “said” dying person make you a bad person? , where I found comments like this: [Dorian Gray] So everyone deserves our respect because they just so happen to have been born…like a blind compassion… now I understand why there are so many people who still believe this quaint religious shit. [Joe M] I think it’s sad that a guy like Falwell died. Not because I thought he held any value as a human being, but for the pain of loss his loved one...