As international forces launched attacks against Libya on Saturday, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton struck a tone highly unusual in the annals of American military interventions: humility.

When we think of the American culture we primarily think of the culture of the United States or the ethnic melting pot that the US is. The term American has, first and foremost, a nationalist connotation not the geographic one, and refers to the people who live in the US.

A day after giving the go-ahead for joint military strikes against Libya, President Barack Obama and his staff tried to refocus his first-ever trip to South America with a brief tour of the city and a speech hailing Brazil’s economic might and vibrant democracy.

President Barack Obama was not in Washington when the first missiles struck targets in Libya. As the US went to war at the weekend – the third on his watch – he left for Brazil to discuss trade.

Public diplomacy was believed to be a job solely for the state department but it takes more than Foreign Service Officers to do the job well. It is important for every citizen, resident, official, supporter, etc. of a nation to do their best to fairly represent the nation they associate with to a foreign audience.

Science diplomacy fosters communications and international collaborations with scientists in nations with which official U.S. diplomatic relations might be limited or strained.

When Barack Obama lands in Brazil this weekend, he will find a country transformed. In little more than a decade, some 30 million people have been lifted out of poverty and the country has risen to seventh place in the world economy.

Obama is set to depart Friday night on a five-day trip to Brazil, Chile and El Salvador — his first journey in the Americas south of Mexico. But with the crises brewing elsewhere, few outside the region may notice.