I am an American, not by accident of birth but by choice. I voted with my feet and became an American because I love this country and think it is exceptional.

But as the arms-control scholar Thomas Schelling once noted, two things are very expensive in international life: promises when they succeed and threats when they fail.

I very much want to be in the business of creating content, of doing stories all over the world rather than figuring out what the business model is for 'Newsweek' on the iPad, although that's very important work as well.

I grew up in this world where everything seemed possible.

Religions are vague, of course. This means that they are easy to follow -you can interpret their prescriptions as you like. but it also means that it is easy to slip up -there is always some injunction you are violating. But Islam has no religious establishment - no popes, no bishops - that can declare by fiat which is the correct interpretation. As a result, the decision to oppose the state on the grounds that is insufficiently Islamic belongs to anyone who wishes to exercise it.

Having your fiscal house in order and having a more manageable macro-economic future is going to be very useful in creating growth.

But now, we are becoming suspicious of the very things we have long celebrated - free markets, trade, immigration, and technological change. And all this is happening when the tide is going our way. Just as the world is opening up, America is closing down.