Punching above their weight

I just listened to an interview with Secretary Clinton.  She stated rather nicely something that I have wanted to write about for a while.  

One of the most impressive things about the Netherlands is how small it is. That is, it has an impact on world politics on par with any European country, indeed even significant against giants like China and India.  Yet it has a population of 16 million people, 1/80 the size of China. It is home to the World Court. 

It is where they will hopefully someday try John Yoo, George the idiot king, Darth Cheney and the rest of the torturers and war criminals from the previous administration.  Well, ok, that's not going to happen, but given the depth of their crimes, it should.  

Anyway, this tiny country leads the way on issues of human rights, justice, personal liberty, and they feel deeply the noblese oblige of wealthy nations.  They sometimes get it wrong, but they keep evolving, learning, growing, leading.  They rank sixth in the world in providing developmental foreign aid.  How do they do this?  They don't exactly work themselves to death like the Japanese or Americans.  They maintain a robust military, but it still only represents 1.5% of the GDP compared to over 4% in the US.  I think the Dutch prominence in the world demonstrates the power of ideas. Just imagine what we are capable of in the US when we again couple great ideas to our tremendous power. 
 

Well, my opinion of Secretary Clinton has gone up a lot since her rather badly run presidential campaign.  This is due in no small part to smart statements like, "The Netherlands is a small country... [ the Dutch] really punch above their weight.''