I agree that world opinion as such is not an issue. But if we use nukes first -- for any reason -- we will see an explosion of hatred against us that will make what we experience today seem like an Easter egg hunt. I'm talking a total global economic embargo, UN resolutions branding us a rogue state, maybe even "quarantine actions" by foreign forces. The new treaty with India will go up in smoke. Russia and China will completely freak out and kick off an arms race of 1914 proportions. No more cheap Wal-Mart crap from China; no more cheap labor in Malaysia and Indonesia; even the Japanese might recoil in horror. Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, and the Gulf states will likely cut us off. The stock market could very likely collapse, creating a deflationary slide. It'll be bad.
We'll eventually have autarky here -- either by choice or because no one else in the world will trade with us. I'm all for choice, myself. It sure beats the alternative.
Keisha from MN here, the prophecies of the near death (I had one too, when in a coma) all tell of horrible things, it foretells of the bankrupcy of the U.S. I don't even want to think of one nuclear going off, our world today is more messed up than when we were in Vietnam, Russia and China , China according to Ned Dougherty's vision. Man oh man, I have never seen such instability , cataclysmic changes in the weather too, there are those who say that weather has a profound effect on that stability. I think that President Bush may know something he doesn't dare tell us , about Iran, and that he knew it from the get go....