Americans have, however, wielded influence on many occasions, and President Karzai is still smarting from many of them.
They must wield influence on corporate management through their voting power (which, in dual class companies, is restricted) and by loudly voicing their frustration and disagreement.
One final point worth noting is that "the Blairites" - Stephen Twigg, Liam Byrne and Jim Murphy - all chose to accept demotions, rather than leaving the shadow cabinet and seeking to wield influence on the backbenches.
Kerry, who, along with UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, has been leading international efforts to reach a truce, has been in regular contact with the foreign ministers of Turkey and Qatar as both countries wield influence on Hamas.
The logic of holding these "press" properties is to wield influence on behalf of the rest of the (much bigger and more profitable) media business and also to satisfy Murdoch's own power urges.
Books like "The Frugal Superpower" by Michael Mandelbaum, "The Limits of Power" by Andrew Bacevich and "The Dispensable Nation" by Vali Nasr all chart the country's inward turn and its reluctance, relative to previous decades, to wield influence on the world stage.
How can he presume to wield influence on the lives of women when he is celibate, has spent most of his life in a male-dominated church and opposes artificial contraception?"My grandmother rode a motorcycle in Ireland back in 1922," he told a panel hosted by your reporter at the World Economic Forum.
The American Gaming Association, which promotes and lobbies on behalf of casinos, wields influence on Capitol Hill and state legislatures across the country.
Most VC firms in Southeast Asia tend to source their LPs from Singapore, West Asia and China with a smattering of local families or conglomerates who wield influence on the ground in markets.
