Universal Nation

Barack Obama sees a world without borders a vision Islam shares.

IF CONFIRMATION were needed that Barack Obama's foreign policy will retain the same philosophical assumptions that underpinned George W. Bush's, it came quickly enough in the new presidency. Speaking to an economics college in Moscow on July 7, the new president said that the U.S. was distinguished by "a commitment to certain universal values." He repeated the phrase twice more in the speech, then used it a day later with respect to the crisis in Honduras.

Obama had told the Russians that he wanted to press the "reset" button on the American relationship with Moscow. Perhaps his listeners did not expect him …