Is America the only country in the world that could run a prison camp where prisoners gain weight? Between April 2002 and March 2003, the Joint Task Force returned to Afghanistan 19 of the approximately 664 men (from 42 countries) who have been held in the detention camps at the U.S. Naval Base in Guantanamo Bay. Upon leaving, it has been reported, each man received two parting gifts: a brand new copy of the Koran as well as a new pair of jeans. Not the act of generosity that it might first appear, the jeans, at least, turned out to be a necessity. During their 14-month stay, the detainees (nearly all of them) had each gained an average of 13 pounds.

In America, where 13 pounds is what many of our citizens' chins weigh, the prisoners' slightly enlarged girth might seem negligible. But given the low-bit-resolution video footage we have seen of stooped and shackled men in orange jumpsuits, and the collective protests from international human rights groups, the revelation that the men detained from last year's war would leave the Guantanamo prison camps sporting a larger pair of trousers than the ones they showed up with comes as something of a surprise.

Australia's military has joined a stream of uniformed visitors from close allies of the United States helping their Chinese counterparts get over the long-range "shock and awe" effect of the Iraq war's recent display of advanced US military technology.

Slouch hats appeared on the parade ground outside the Ministry of National Defence in Beijing this week as the visiting Australian Chief of the Army, Lieutenant-General Peter Leahy, took the salute from a guard of goose-stepping soldiers.

Leahy later joined a discussion on regional security issues with Chinese officers, headed by the deputy chief of the general staff, General Xiong Guangkai, second-in-command of the 2 million-strong People's Liberation Army, as part of a visit aimed an increasing "mutual understanding and confidence".

Britain, another member of the Iraq invasion force, has also stepped up contacts with the Chinese military with a port call in Shanghai last week by the guided-missile destroyer HMS Liverpool.

The overtures come as the Chinese military establishment continues to digest lessons from the Iraq war, which saw some initial expressions of belligerent anti-American nationalism by Beijing that have now turned to sober evaluation of Chinese capabilities compared with the West.

A panel of top US military and China experts has just concluded that despite Beijing's intense efforts to modernise its armed forces, it remains at least 20 years behind the US in terms of military technology and capability, and that both globally and in Asia the US could extend its edge beyond 20 years with greater resources and regional sea and air bases.

After helping steer President Bush's tax cut through Congress, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) is preparing to tackle an even more challenging task -- a sweeping overhaul of the federal regulatory system.

Under his radical approach, outlined at a little-noticed speech last week, Congress would be tasked with approving or rejecting all standards issued by government agencies.

The majority leader's May 21 address to the free-market think tank Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) has been overshadowed by the passage of the tax cut.

But after playing a key role in cutting tax rates, DeLay now wants to cut regulations. Reshaping the government's process for issuing standards will likely prove even more politically more challenging than tax cuts to move through Congress.

Various Republican efforts for regulatory reform since the GOP takeover of Capitol Hill in 1995 have largely stalled. But DeLay is now calling for a complete overhaul of the way standards are set.

Much of the speech last week went over familiar ground; DeLay accused regulators of trying to play God and said a typical American family spends $8,000 a year on hidden regulatory costs.

But then the lawmaker, nicknamed The Hammer, dropped a policymaking bombshell: He said Congress should write -- or at least approve -- all government regulations.

"Congress is the branch of government most responsive and accountable to the people," DeLay said, "so it's Congress who should be making -- or at least approving -- these rules.... The regulatory state simply cannot be trusted to hold itself accountable. It has no voters, no constituents, no one to answer to."

DeLay noted that legislation can take years to pass but government standards can take only months to become law.

These are confusing times, and Hanson wields a few simple ideas with blunt force. Western culture, in his view, emanates from ancient Greece and prizes consensual government, private markets, self-criticism, and rational inquiry. Where such values are found, political, economic, and military preeminence follow. The non-Western world lags behind the West because it does not share in the Greek cultural legacy, having opted instead for despotism, theocracy, illiberal markets, and the plain old laziness that has men whiling away afternoons playing backgammon in the cafes of the Middle East.