This process has been visible since Vietnam and is now intensifying. The president surrounds himself with experts, with the cabinet no longer playing the role of chief advisers, and Congress acts more or less as an onlooker. The experts are focused on the issue at hand rather than on the broader question of American interests. Or more precisely, they confuse the area in which they are experts with the area the United States should focus on. As with domestic matters, the public loses not just control but also an understanding of what is going on, and under the presidential power of secrecy the
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