Abstract

The new vision is based on a picture of the contemporary world that has risen well beyond opinion, to the heights of truism. The picture is sketched eloquently by the Times chief diplomatic correspondent, Thomas Friedman: "America's victory in the cold war," Friedman wrote a year ago, was "a victory for a set of political and economic principles: democracy and the free market." At last, the world is coming to understand that "the free market is the wave of the future -- a future for which America is both the gatekeeper and the model."