[Pollster1]

Force for good? They’ve achieved economic imperialism via treaty and beggar-thy-neighbor in the European Union, their economy is the “social market economy” (which they regard as the enemy of the free market), and people think that if they re-militarize they will be a “force for good”. Curious POV.

Perhaps it is a curious POV, but given what we could become on the path our current leader has set, almost any counterweight is a good thing. I'm okay with economic imperialism if it helps decent people to resist socialism and communism.

[Olog-hai]

Anything Obama does is in the spirit of what you describe as “counterweight”. Something tells me that the people of the Roman Empire that were tired of the homegrown corruption might have also seen the Huns and Visigoths as “counterweights” to their own government, so be careful what you wish for. The social market economy is no enemy to socialism in any form.