[krapp]

> I am advocating what we did to the Nazis and Japanese.

How is this not an equivocation with WW2? I apologize if I misinterpreted what you wrote, but it seems pretty obvious.

By "political capital" I was referring to a quote by George Bush, and the Bush doctrine in general. Mainly, that any goodwill we might have had to build a robust global coalition for anything has more or less been squandered by the debacle that was the adventure in Iraq, and the premise of the "axis of evil", and "you're either with us, or you're with the terrorists."

[javert]

Because the states that harbor terrorism are not the civilizational or military equivalents of Nazi Germany or Japan. They are much closer to fruit flies.

A country that acts morally, in its own self-defense, does not need political capital. If nobody at all sides with the US, fine. But nobody is going to side against the US that matters in a just, morally correct war to stop state sponsors of terrorism.