Whether We Like Him Or Not

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A "Freudian Slip" occurs when a person misspeaks...but accidentally reveals what they were actually thinking. For instance, as the old joke goes, a man says "I meant to tell my wife Please pass the salt, but what I actually said was You've made my life an endless, living hell."

So, too, did Barack Obama reveal his inner thoughts when speaking before an international body at his Nuclear Security Summit, when he said "Whether we like it or not, we remain a dominant military superpower."

The obvious interpretation is that the president might like it better if the United States was not a dominant military superpower.

And of course, if we weren't "dominant" then someone else would be...causing us to wonder which country or countries does Obama believe to be more competent and morally responsible than the United States?

And finally, there's the president's assertion that the U.S. "remains a dominant military superpower." Remains?! Clearly, the assertion that we're "still" a superpower implies that our position at the top is in transition. A work in progress, that the president hasn't completed. Yet.

Odds are, Americans who rely on mainstream media for their news won't hear about the president's discomfort with America's position at the top of the current world order. But 47 world leaders got the message loud and clear.