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Oh, I'd say we have more than a presence in the world. We've bombed another country on average every 2 1/2 years since WW II. Call me a bumpkin, but that's more than a mere presence. What we have is a different kind of empire, commensurate with the times and our resources. We don't thump folks to take them over, we thump folks so as to obtain/retain the resources to thump more folks to access more resources ... well, you get the drift. We don't export our values, we export the antithesis of our values. Is there a dictatorship in the world we haven't supported? The middle east is full of autocratic govs we're propping up. I wouldn't call that exporting values, well maybe I guess, if our values have changed a tad. And it seems they have, since I'd have a difficult time recognizing conservatives on any the boards of the republic, for instance.