The Obama administration has tracked down and killed Osama Bin Laden, Anwar Al-Awlaki and other Al-Qaeda leaders. Yet, Republicans and some Democrats in Congress remain intent on challenging the administration's policies for handling captured terror suspects. Those lawmakers insist that captured terror suspects should be held at the US prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and prosecuted by military tribunal. They have repeatedly rejected President Barack Obama's push to close Guantanamo and oppose the administration's effort to detain suspects at facilities in the United States and try them in federal courts. The dispute could jeopardize the latest defense bill in Congress. The administration has accepted restrictions on its detention policy in previous measures, but now officials are pushing back. Meanwhile, the Republican race for a presidential nominee is being driven almost entirely by concerns over taxes, joblessness, the deficit and the dismal state of the US economy. That's even the case when it comes to foreign policy. Texas Gov. Rick Perry wants a reassessment of how to wind down the war in Afghanistan and whether money is “best spent with 100,000 military who have the target on their back.” At the spectrum's other end, Ron Paul seeks radical retrenchment because, in his words, “we're going broke.” Economics is increasingly driving how Americans think the US should act in a changing world. The tone also shows America has in many ways moved on from the Sept. 11 attacks and a decade of foreign policy defined by the Bush administration's war on terror.
