Oh Gerald, you've been playing Risk too much with your family every Christmas.  You're starting to think that if you control North America, you can control the world.  I can't believe that the G&M actually pays you to write this stuff.  I've played Risk and I've never found that North America has taken me to world domination.  I guess the reality is that no one actually cares who the next US President will be.  The only thing that is certain is that the US will have a crappy President.  But it really doesn't matter because Congress controls the money, and it's the money that controls what the executive can do.  So whatever way it goes in the US election, it's going to be a player out of Asia or Africa who's going to occupy the rest of the board.