I write to thank you for your thoughtful remarks. I agree with most and those with which I disagree do no damage to my major theses.

I don't think you intend a "reply." To carry out that intent would require autocrats. Somewhere.

Speaking of autocrats--or at least wannabes--I lived in fear that one of those damn fools in what passed for a Trump foreign policy shop would talk him into attempting to seal the Mexican border with shoot-to-kill orders and claim that it worked for Germany.

I guess there is one place I might differ with you, and that is whether the US inspired other nations. There are rights galore in Eastern Bloc constitutions and much of the wording is either really familiar or mistranslated. All they lack is a rule of law.

And one of the great ironies of international human rights law is the lengths to which this nation has gone to avoid practical application of principles that were born on these shores.

But what do I know? When I was satisfied that I heard correctly the news that Bush the Younger had "un-signed" the Rome Statute, my response was, "Can he do that?"