U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Tahir Hasan, of Headquarters Detachment, 1st Battalion Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, on patrol at a gas station in Abu Dashir, Iraq, Aug. 19, 2008. Combat patrols routinely visit local merchants in order to ensure fair market prices on goods.

This year, the world's problems continue to push in on the United States, even on issues that most people would consider "domestic." The high price of energy is closely linked to the use of foreign oil, and the United States depends on unstable parts of the world to get it. The mortgage crisis and credit crunch at home are spreading to markets worldwide. The war in Afghanistan continues, and may, in fact, be getting more difficult to win. And Osama bin Laden and the al Qaeda terrorist network still exist and still pose a potential threat.

Sometimes, election campaigns get caught up in roaring debates and dueling attack ads over which candidate is “stronger” or more “patriotic” or which one did or did not slip up when quizzed on a foreign policy factoid.

Obviously, nobody wants weak, unpatriotic dummies in Congress or the White House making decisions about the country’s international affairs. But sometimes these campaign scuffles (and the media’s obsession with them) get in the way of talking about issues and ideas that are critical to the country’s future.

Whether we like it or not, the United States is the world's only superpower, with the largest military and the biggest economy on the planet. In fact, our economy is four times as big as second-ranked China, and we spend roughly ten times what they do on the armed forces. Much of the world watches Hollywood movies, surfs an English-language Internet on Windows computers and eats at American fast-food franchises. In many ways, no one can touch us; in other ways, everybody wants a piece of us. Unfortunately, a lot of people around the world either blame us for what goes wrong or expect us to fix it pronto. Being the world’s only superpower actually isn’t as much fun as it sounds.

For one thing, despite American wealth and power, the world is not a place where the United States says "jump" and everyone else asks "how high?" The events of 2008 show that clearly enough. We can't just tell the Iranians to stop their nuclear research; we can't order Saudi Arabia and Venezuela to pump more oil; and we can't lock Israeli and Palestinian leaders in a room until they settle their differences. The modern economy is global – we buy and sell all over the world, and so does everyone else. Countries like China and India are growing rapidly, challenging the U.S. in world markets, and they are strong enough to push back against U.S. policies they don't like. The European Union is much more powerful economically than any of its individual countries, and their currency, the euro, is an alternative to the dollar for many international businesses.

U.S. Navy sailor Benjamin Thiel provides security while patrolling through a village in Farah province in Afghanistan, July 31, 2008.

For most Americans, the fundamental question about foreign policy is: what makes the U.S. secure? And what does security mean?

Certainly security means safety from direct violent threats: terrorists and hostile governments. Preventing more countries from getting nuclear weapons is a security issue, too.

But security can also mean a lot of other things. It can mean ensuring that Americans have jobs in a global economy, where we're competing with factories in Indonesia and call centers in India. It can mean ensuring a stable supply of oil and other energy sources. And it can mean dealing with long-term threats like climate change or the spread of disease, and even protecting the safety of the U.S. food supply.

So how do we make ourselves more secure? Which approaches are most likely to produce the results we’re aiming for?

Here are a few more questions voters might want to think about (and ask candidates) as they focus on the country’s foreign policy:

• Is the U.S. putting too much or too little emphasis on working with other countries?

  Sometimes politicians debate whether the U.S. should go it alone or work more with our allies to get things done. In the real world, however, it's usually not an either-or choice; there aren't that many international problems the U.S. can solve completely on its own.

  Stopping the spread of nuclear weapons – a major goal for both the U.S. government and its allies – is a classic example of this. One of the major foreign policy successes of the past few years is North Korea's decision to shut down its nuclear weapons program after developing several atomic bombs. Key pressure came from the so-called Six-Party Talks led by the U.S., and the influence of China in particular was important in reaching a deal.

  Doing something about Iran's nuclear program is another matter. Iran says it’s only interested in peaceful uses of nuclear power, but the U.S. and its key allies believe Iran is working on developing nuclear weapons. Iran is already under international sanctions because of the program. Some in the U.S. argue that only force will stop the program, but right now there would be little support for it from our allies. And there's serious question about whether the already overstretched U.S. military could take on another major conflict. Much of the election debate may focus on whether it’s better to talk directly with Iran or hold off on talks until the Iranians begin to show more evidence of good faith.

• Are we striking the right balance between using the military and using diplomacy?

  Foreign policy experts often talk about "hard power" and "soft power." Hard power means military force and economic sanctions, like cutting off trade – basically leaning on another country to get what you want. Soft power means diplomacy, public relations, cultural exchanges and other tactics designed to improve our image abroad and persuade others to go along with us.

  Some foreign policy experts say we've let soft power go and relied too much on hard power in the last few years. They point to America's negative image abroad as proof. But most experts insist you need both kinds of power to get anything done, and the question is often about when to emphasize “the carrot” versus when to emphasize “the stick.” Debates over the use of hard versus soft power will almost surely emerge in discussions about what to do regarding Iran, Syria, Cuba, Venezuela, and to a certain degree, China. China may not be a major military or terrorist threat to the U.S., but it is a powerful economic competitor. There is a lot of debate about what approaches will be most effective in getting China to improve its human rights record and treatment of Tibet, stick to fairer trade and economic policies and curb its greenhouse gas emissions.

• Do we have a smart, effective strategy for countering terrorism?

  Questions about how the country is using hard versus soft power are critical, but -- not to get all Chuck Norris about this -- nobody believes that soft power would change Osama bin Laden's mind, or that of his hard-core al Qaeda operatives. Terrorists themselves have to be arrested or killed. But even in this case, soft power can make hard power more effective. We need the help of other countries to pursue terrorists, and anti-Americanism can make that help harder to get. It could be the difference between a foreign police official jumping on a lead right away, or letting it sit in his inbox for a while. Hatred of the U.S. could make more people turn toward terrorism, or it might just make people more reluctant to help us fight it. One major argument is whether hard-nosed tactics, such as the prison for suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay, benefit us by getting information from suspects or hurt us by damaging our human rights record.

  Some experts question whether the "war on terror" approach is the right one. Other countries that have long dealt with terrorist movements, particularly in Europe, see chasing terrorists as a police problem, more like cracking the Mafia or drug cartels than fighting another country. Others say that when a government is shielding terrorists, as the Taliban did in Afghanistan, nothing short of military force will work.

• Do we have a sound strategy for Iraq?

  All the experts agree the violence in Iraq has dropped substantially this year and that some progress has been made politically. Beyond that, the consensus gets murky.

  Take, for example, the 18 benchmarks set by Congress to measure U.S. progress in Iraq. These range from controlling the level of sectarian violence and disarming the various militias operating independently of the Iraqi government, to offering amnesty to insurgents and ensuring a fair distribution of oil revenue among Iraq's ethnic groups.

  But how well the U.S. is doing in Iraq depends on who you ask. The last time top U.S. leaders testified before Congress in April, they said progress was made on 12 of the 18 benchmarks; and by July the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad said all but three benchmarks were met. But the independent Government Accountability Office was more skeptical in a July assessment, saying that progress was made on security and key legislation has been passed, but the overall U.S. strategy needs to be updated. Other groups, ranging from the conservative American Enterprise Institute to the liberal Center for American Progress, have issued their own reports and differ widely on the results.

  For most Americans, the question is "when can the troops come home?" Surveys show that majorities of Americans want to withdraw. The Iraqi government itself has said it hopes U.S. troops can withdraw by 2010. But a major question is how well the Iraqi government can handle the infighting between the nation's three major religious and ethnic groups (Sunni Muslims, Shiite Muslims, and Kurds). The goal of recent U.S. strategy has been to use American troops to control the violence while allowing the Iraqis time to make political accommodations leading to a stable government. If violence increases again – or if a political deal between the three groups fails to take shape – the situation may deteriorate.

• Do we have a good strategy for Afghanistan?

  Afghanistan, to most Americans, is the war without controversy. The U.S. and its NATO allies invaded Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks to pursue al Qaeda and the Taliban regime that protected it. Since then, U.S. and NATO troops have been supporting the new government there, but the Taliban has recovered some of its former strength in the country. This summer, coalition casualties in Afghanistan have outpaced deaths in Iraq, even though there are far fewer troops there. Pentagon officials warn that some of the troops being pulled out of Iraq may need to be sent to Afghanistan instead. So the next president and Congress will have to make some tough decisions about U.S. troop levels and how much money to spend on the war.

• Are we putting the right amount of emphasis on our role in the world as opposed to what we do here at home?

  For a lot of Americans, the time and money that elected officials invest in addressing problems abroad seems like attention taken away from problems here at home. But this isn't an either-or choice. Certainly, money spent on defense or foreign aid could be spent on something else (or not spent at all). But what happens abroad obviously affects us at home. We can’t just take our ball and go home. On the other hand, American activities and involvement abroad have sometimes created more problems than they solve, so just “being involved” in and of itself isn’t enough.

  A stable, cooperative world where other countries play by sensible political and economic rules is one where the United States is more likely to thrive. We need other countries to cooperate with us on problems like global warming and international drug trafficking. Wars and other disturbances that don’t seem to have all that much to do with us can cause serious disruptions in our supply of oil and produce waves of refugees and immigrants. So the question of striking the right balance between addressing international problems and taking care of problems at home is a critical one.