History demonstrates that previous military drawdowns invited aggression by our enemies. After World War I, America drew down forces until the U.S. Army had fewer than 100,000 men in uniform. That weakness invited Nazi aggression in Europe and the imperial Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor.

The more we are consuming oil that either comes from places that are bent on our destruction or helping those who are... the more we are enabling those who are trying to kill us.

But I really believe it is in America's interest as well as that of the free world more generally to stop Iran from getting its hands on nuclear weapons. This regime has threatened to wipe Israel off the map and bring about a world without America, and either of those is a really bad prospect.

Too many countries that do not play by the free trade rules of the World Trade Organization - including, notably mercantilist China and monopolist Saudi Arabia - have been allowed in, to the detriment of both the WTO and the liberal trading environment it is supposed to sponsor.

Unfortunately, the cyber threat to 'the grid' is only one means of eviscerating the soft underbelly of American society. Another which has been getting increasing attention could be delivered via the kind of nuclear-armed ballistic missile that Iran and North Korea have been developing: a strategic electro-magnetic pulse attack.

Unbeknownst to most American investors, significant portions of their public pension, mutual fund, life insurance and private portfolios are comprised of stocks of privately held companies that partner with state sponsors of terror.

The object of China's strategy is inexorably to supplant the United States as the world's premier economic power, and if necessary, to defeat us militarily.