[mark_l_watson]

+1 I think you are probably correct. The US government must have tons of blackmail worthy "dirt" on a very large number of positions in other countries.

If we can set morality aside and speak of practical matters: my country has some tough problems. We spend as much on our corporate military industrial complex as all other countries put together (or very close to it). This "investment" has paid off nicely for us in maintaining the $ as the world's reserve currency. Even though I spent a good part of my life working in the defense industry, it seems pretty obvious that this "investment" is doing little else but making special interests very wealthy. I have my own opinions on how we can make our country safer while spending much less money.