 My name is Murray Hebert from CSIS's Southeast Asia program. Our guest this morning is Ambassador David Edelman of Singapore. Ambassador, welcome. Thank you. Good morning. Good morning. It's a delight to have you. Could we maybe start talking a little bit about the Singapore-U.S. relationship that's been a strong relationship for a long time? How would you characterize it today? Well, U.S.-Singapore relations are at an all-time high. Things have never been better. The historic foundation of the good relations, of course, is military to military cooperation and that continues. The trade and investment aspect of the relationship, I think, has developed better than anyone could have ever even imagined. And now this third part, the political and economic dialogue, I think, is becoming more institutionalized, if you will. So I couldn't be more pleased with the state of the relationship. The U.S. and Singapore did a free trade agreement. And free trade agreements are sometimes controversial in the U.S., maybe in many other countries too, but in the U.S. it's often thought that U.S. companies are losers. Singapore probably has a different story, right? Well, Singapore is probably the freest trading nation on the planet. And I think the U.S.-Singapore free trade agreement, which went into effect in 2004, is a great example of a success story for the United States and American businesses. Tiny Little Singapore represents America's fifth largest trade surplus, in large part, I think, because of the terms of that agreement. In February, there was a conference here in Washington at CSIS. There were three ministers here, but at the same time, there were bilateral meetings happening with official Washington. And there were three agreements signed. Could you talk a little bit about what those agreements were and how the U.S.-Singapore relationship will benefit from these? Sure. This is what I referred to when I said sort of the other part of the relationship becoming more regularized or institutionalized. On February 1st, we launched with Secretary Clinton and Foreign Minister Shamogan a strategic partnership dialogue between the United States and Singapore, which for the first time sets up an annual alternating meeting at the very high level to talk about economic and political issues and cooperation between the U.S. and Singapore. At the same time as that launch, we also signed an agreement which provides for third-party activities where the United States and Singapore will jointly work on capacity building in third countries. We're going to start with an initiative in the Lower Mekong, and it promises to be an important part of this relationship for many years to come. Singapore had an election last year, a couple of elections last year, and the opposition did better than it had traditionally. Is politics in Singapore changing? Well, I'll use the same word used by Prime Minister Lee. The elections in May of last year were watershed elections. I think there was a level of discourse and political dialogue that perhaps had never existed previously in an independent Singapore. So while the United States doesn't get involved in local politics, we simply hold ourselves out as a good example of a multi-party democracy. You couldn't help but observe the increasing political dialogue in Singapore. Going back to U.S.-Singapore relations for a second, the U.S. has taken a policy of rebalancing toward Asia as President Obama announced when he was traveling through the region last November. Is there a role for Singapore to play in cooperation with the U.S. in this rebalancing exercise? Oh, absolutely. Singapore is critical to America's rebalancing in Asia. We don't have a better friend in East Asia than Singapore, which has served as our anchor, if you will, in Southeast Asia. So Singapore continues to be a very hospitable business climate for American businesses where more than 2,000 U.S. firms have important decision-makers and operations. It continues to be a place where the United States Navy and the United States Air Force enjoy great access and cooperation, and I think those relationships will grow and continue to be an important part of America's pivot or rebalancing towards Asia. During the elections last year and subsequently, the blogs and websites have played a more active role in Singapore. Do you see that, that the electronic media being able to play a significant role in opening up Singapore's political discourse? Well, the electronic media and social media have played an important role in elections all over the world. I think the 2008 presidential election in the United States, in some ways, were a milestone for the impact of that media in our country. So Singapore is no different. They're a part of the trend, and I suppose the speech and the back and forth and puts and takes that occur in the discussion online will continue to be increasingly important in Singapore in the same way they will be increasingly important in every other country in the world. Great. Thank you very much, Ambassador Adelman. Thank you. Thank you, Murray.