The Great American Decline: Self-Inflicted?

Your reasoning seems to be flawed. Junk science indeed, there was a short period when the earth warmed minutely and has since leveled off for the past nine years. No evidents of it being man made, a hoax for sure.

You remark that the Bush administration "broke down" ,although I disagree, it was difficult to accomplish much with the likes of Pelosi, Ried, Shumer, Durbin, and the rest of the obstructionist.

I'm wondering what allies you are referring to in Europe?

I can't name one instance of torture, can you?

Stranger2315

We have to consider that there is a dialog going on between the rulers and the ruled. They tend to reinforce and reaffirm each other. Though I can offer no proof of this: I do not think a man like Bush would have been electable anywhere else. I did not follow the 2000 presidential election, I just read a few reports and listened to George W. Bush for five minutes. My impression was extremely negative. I thought him a populist, articulating that which the latest poll told him to say. Yet, he was elected (voted in by the Supreme Court, I should say).

The ideas he represented, poll or no poll, was what you wanted to hear at the time. The seeds of self-destruction exist within America. Those seeds exist within other societies, too. Just not so readily apparent. The participant above, stranger2315, is a symptom of what is ailing America, the price you are paying for diversity. When such a one appears, good people go elsewhere. Obstructionist? A case of the pot calling the kettle black, I should think.

Had we handled things right, what is now deemed American "decline" could have played out very differently. We will never know, of course. And we won't know for a long time whether the next president can begin the titanic task of raising us up again. All is hardly lost: despite the rise of China and India, and Russia's rumblings, there is still no credible rival to superpower status. But let's not kid ourselves about the cause of our problems.

I think he's right - I've thought these things for years, I'm just glad to see people saying these things in Newsweek instead of CommonDreams (meaning many people are reading it). I think it is very unfortunate that any talk like this during the lead-up to the Iraq war was deemed un-patriotic or pandering to terrorists. As a nation, we really do need to step back and look at what led us to this state.

He's also right on the point that 'the government is broken'. What in the world can we do to fix it, though? Is it fix-able? Any thoughts?

Yes! For generations Americans broke their backs to ensure that their kids would live a better life than themselves. This kind of determination and perseverance, and sense of self worth, has been at the core of the American story of success.

I am certain and quite devastated though, that I think that this attitude is severely lacking and sometimes absent from the minds of newer generations. The generations before us were so successful at ensuring a comfortable lifestyle that, although recently the poorer classes have been suffering, the current youth have experienced a level of nurture and comfort unprecedented in the world. (everyone thinks they can live in "The Hills")

As an effect of this phenomena, I think Americans are losing touch with what really makes America a great place to live. Quick money, and the ROCK STAR lifestyle, filled with glamorous purses and pimped out rides, basted in alcohol and peppered with drugs, is such a great illusion of success that many lower and middle class teens and young adults completely forget that America is built and run by actually "doing things".

Everyone wants a bigger piece of the pie but no one wants to bake it.

In the past, if you wanted to live the life, you likely actually contributed to society by writing a book, inventing something, building up and industry, and etc. Now, however, people get rich by flipping houses, ripping a beat, or dissolving and consolidating industry. The latter of which was infuriating just to type. The more people get paid to do NOTHING, and sometimes to actually regress, GUESS WHAT? There will be less actual THINGS and SERVICES to go around. The dollar will inflate. People will be out of jobs. Oh wait, ITS HAPPENED.

"Can-do" is cliche, but it is really what we need. If you want to get rich, please, and I beg, please do something you think people will actually benefit from. Provide a good or service that didn't exist before. However, in this age, you might not make as much money as if you liquidated a factory. But if everyone actually DID SOMETHING for their community for the money they earned, we would all live a richer lifestyle as a result.

I repeat: Everyone wants a bigger piece of the pie but no one wants to bake it.

On torture:

In October 2003, during a surprise inspection of Abu Ghraib, the International Committee of the Red Cross discovered Janabi naked, chained, and bruised in a cell in the "hard site" of the prison. He was a so-called "ghost detainee" who was intentionally hidden from the Red Cross on subsequent inspections and held without appearing on the prisoner lists.

The lawsuit – which alleges multiple violations of U.S. law, including torture, war crimes, and civil conspiracy – notes that CACI provided interrogators used at Abu Ghraib and that L-3 employed all translators used there. Stefanowicz was linked to Abu Ghraib abuses in military court martial proceedings and was said to have directed low-level U.S. military personnel in detainee interrogations.

(source)

The United States isn't going anywhere. You can take that pretty much any way you like it and it works. It could mean that we're spinning our wheels, or have come to a stop...or it could mean that the United States is going to be here for a long time like England, or France, or China, or Egypt.

The guy is right, our current tapestry of troubles could have been avoided in many ways--and nobody is afraid of Bush any more as evidenced by this, the Olbermann rant, many others before, and even more to come--more brazen attacks on the guy that's headed out the door. Hirsch isn't blaming the people of the U.S. The decline is Bush-admin-flicted.

Bush deserves it but, at this late date, it's not exactly brave. I'm glad people are getting to say these things and there are definitely people who deserve to get in their own personal I-told-you-so. But there are people that were chastised publicly and lost their job for saying or predicting these things back way before Colin Powell went to the UN. They deserve an hour or two of prime-time.

I remember thinking that there must have been some real intelligence (the CIA kind, not the kind that is missing from between the big ears of the President--well, both kinds are missing but...I'm not being brave either), real intelligence that was truly condemning, but couldn't be made public due to the danger it would put our intelligence-gatherers in. There was no way we would attack another country on false premises. I really didn't think that Bush was that brazen or dumb, or evil, or whatever it would take to do that. Surreal.

It seems like almost all of the Bush policies felt wrong at a gut level...financially, environmentally, scientifically, religiously...yep, everything.

Well, he's about to be gone and I don't care what kind of party you belong to or who you're going to vote for. I'm kinda tired of all the negativity and bickering. Whoever we get is going to be better than this guy. We should all be patting each other on the back and thanking whoever we like to thank for that. We can't go any further down or it won't be a decline, it'll be the end. But there's hope because it's almost Summer. Which means November isn't far behind. I feel a little like a schoolkid who is getting ready for Summer, right after Christmas, but it works for me. He's leaving office and I'm pretty happy about it.

It doesn't mean that I see things as peachy or rose-colored or whatever. But if the guy that wrote this article could find a silver lining to the attacks of 911, I don't feel too bad trying to find the upside to the end of the Bush administration...which is nigh my friend...nigh.