Absolutely does in international relations. The US’s present leadership is due to that and nothing else. Lets not forget the US entered Europe and the Pacific on the backs of force and retains its primacy there vide force.
Huh. By that metric, is China the “leader of Asia”, for example? ISTM that “leader” in this geopolitical context is generally used to imply some demonstration of leadership, not just being big and strong. Likewise, is Russia the “leader of Eastern Europe”?
China is contained in the Far East by an even stronger power (for how much longer, who knows). Ditto Russia in Eastern Europe. Russia is still dominant in the Caucases, C Asia and you know, Belarus, Moldova etc.
Its an interesting delusion Americans have that their leadership is due to their benevolent nature rather than raw naked power. No one in the Middle East nowadays, or Indo-China a generation ago or Latin America since ever has ever has any doubts.
Quite.
[ And Americans shown this truth ascribe it to envy and hatred. ]
But that’s not an answer to my question. Within Asia itself, is China “the leader”? Likewise Russia within Eastern Europe?
Or is “the leader” exclusively a global concept, so that only the world leader is entitled to the term?
In any case, even if the term “leader” per se in this geopolitical context is just a size/strength metric and has no moral connotations, ISTM that a phrase like “Leader of the Free World” definitely does.
The President of the US is the “Leader of the Free World”?
Well, let’s see. I’m a part of the “Free World,” and yet I did not get to vote for or against the current US President.
Given that the majority of citizens of the Free World did not get to vote for Leader of the Free World (anybody else note how USSR-ish that sounds?), I will disregard the US President as “Leader of the Free World,” and instead refer to him as “President of the United States.”
Or “Cheeto in Chief.” Depending on how I’m feeling.
Did you read your article? The US became a so-called “flawed democracy” under Obama.
Now, I am more than happy for folks to quit calling us, and by extension our president, the Lead of the Free World. Let some other sucker country take on that mantle and see how well it fits, and how much it likes being said leader.
It’s the weirdest phrase.
Like an assumption of ownership or something. Fuck. Off.
In an ideal world, yes. But the brute fact is that the world system as we have inherited it from the post-1945 settlement is substantially an American creation and the size of the American economy and military, and the soft power impact of American culture, necessarily make the USA the leader.
That settlement (well 1945 and 1989 modification) is no longer particularly valid.
Nah. He’s the *President *of all of the United States. I’m not one of those who are still so in denial that I can’t accept he’s “my President.” He’s my President, all right. He’s just not my leader.
When all but one of your actions your first week in office are met by widespread protest in the street, you ain’t leadin’ shit.
Corrected version in accordance with Gaudere’s Law:
“I am seriously wondering if you do not know that no spaces go between the end of a sentence and [del]it’s[/del] its ending punctuation.”
More seriously, I find that on my iPhone, the “return” button is very close to the “space” button, and when I’m typing with my thumbs, I often hit “return” instead of “space”. Since there’s no preview function on Tapatalk, mistakes of that sort often slip past me.
I always put a space before these characters. Such was the way in printed books before the 1960s, and such it will always be ! Don’t all decent people ?
Closed-up spaces just look cheap and nasty! Seriously how many electrons are you saving?
Back near the start of the 20th century, periods and commas came close following the end of the word, exclamation marks and question marks were further away, and colons and semi-colons were even further away. By those standards, Northern Piper was correct in his typography, for he passed away in WWI and participates on the internet today as a ghost, using what was correct when he was living.
Right-wing Americans probably do. But we’re not all right-wingers.
But it exists. And if the only alternative on offer is a return to old-style Great Power manoeuvring, as Putin more or less openly argues for and seems to be trying to get Trump to go along with, then the outlook is bleak indeed.
Well, better than mushroom clouds.
Kobal2 puts the spaces before punctuation, too and (s)he is definitely from [del]Remulac[/del] France.
NM, I get it now. Sort of weaksauce but I get it. 
But see, that’s an example of a typo, which I explicitly said was not what I was commenting on.
Surely the rhetoric on the Statue of Liberty can’t apply in perpetuity. There comes a time when it just isn’t practical or sensible to welcome more and more immigrants. One may argue that the time isn’t yet, one may argue that it is, but the invitation can’t be open-ended.
As for Leader of the Free World that’s just a statement of fact rather than an endorsement of politics. The US is a free country still until the Constitution changes.