American Decline

Discussion in 'World Events' started by tetra, Jan 18, 2002.

  1. tetra Hello Registered Senior Member

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    144
    Does anybody think that the US is REALLY falling behind other nations? I mean in such a way that could jeopardize its dominance in the world.

    NASA has been almost eliminated from congressional budgets, there is a recession/pseudo-depression going on, which shouldn't happen during the war.

    I mainly blame TV. I know it sounds kind like I'm an old hippie or something, but have you watched American News channels??? Its 24 hours of non-stop criticizing the government and upholding idiotic public views on science and technology.

    America shouldn't have to suffer because its a slow news day.
     
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  3. goofyfish Analog By Birth, Digital By Design Valued Senior Member

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    America certainly has its shining city scenes and quaint, historic places, but it is also a place of wind-blown ghost towns, half-deserted cities, rotting factory hulks, streets of weed-choked lots, broken sidewalks, abandoned cars, and some of the most hopeless and frightening ghettos found anywhere. Cheap kit-building donut shops, painted cinder-block department stores, and, here or there, along rivers and lakes of sign-jumbled asphalt, touches of injection-molded Elizabethan or Federalist charm.

    Welcome to sprawl on the grandest scale in the world: great hunks of America remarkably ugly, both visually and morally.

    American corporations - and this includes professional sports franchises - often resemble feudal lords making ransom demands of towns or states expecting a new plant or even a future for an established one. A fractured political system and endless sprawl encourage practices that not only rot the foundations of civil society in America, but have vast implications for world trade under globalization.

    The surprising thing, is that Americans generally accept these practices, rarely demanding of their governments and industrial leaders any public accounting or solutions. What message does this send to the world? Would YOU follow our lead?

    Peace.
     
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  5. kmguru Staff Member

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    American decline with respect to what? It is more like other countries are climbing the economic ladder while we stand still. We have been growing with respect to the rest of the world since World War I. It is the last 15 years we have slowed down - more like others are catching up. That is not bad. We should not protect our pre-eminence in this world. We want others to grow to same level as we are. There are bumps along the way.

    In 1971, I was buying a hot dog from a street vendor in Chicago. I will never forget what she said. She emigrated here from a village in Greece because she was told that America is flowing with milk and honey. You embark from the plane and see pocket change on the tarmac or streets. (Once I did pick up a dollar bill from a street, and many dimes)

    Without American consumption, the world economy will come to a stand still. Everyone including China wants to export to USA. Why? In fact in a way, we are carrying the whole planet on our back for a very long time. So, basically, if America goes - so goes the planet.

    Yes, we have problems at home. But we are a BIG country. No other country with the possible exception of China will be able to comptete with size and structure. Russia tried and failed because the people there were forced to cooperate while we came here on choice. The problems what goofyfish talking about will take time to solve. The process has already started. In the past, middleman who rarely contribute to the productivity of the society and are basically social parasites were rampant. This is changing albeit slowly. Case in point: Dell Computers taking out middleman and supplying products directly to the consumers. Once that model is integrated, our productivity will go up. It will not be easy. Millions of parasites ...err...lawyers will find a way to control and impose laws through their brothers and sisters in capitol hill to control and keep their kind in power.

    If America goes down, it will be those parasites doing...same way both Greek and Roman civilisation collapsed. Few producers and a lot of suckers. The people here are smart - hope that does not happen to us.

    But...you can never tell...Sadam is still in power in the cradle of western civilisation. (Iraq)...
     
    Last edited: Jan 18, 2002
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  7. bun Registered Senior Member

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    America in Decline?

    goofyfish says, in part: "A fractured political system and endless sprawl encourage practices that not only rot the foundations of civil society in America, but have vast implications for world trade under globalization."

    Please turn in your computer/modem, your auto, any food you haven't foraged or shot yourself, and the fridge it's in...... those are all products of the evil corporations you disdain. Endless sprawl? The endless sprawl includes hundreds of thousands of acres of federally owned and federally protected lands. A lifestyle which may be more to your liking is still available for those who wish it. The Mennonites and Amish live a quiet agrarian existence, without electricity, without the internal combustion engine, and without other "evils" of modern life.
     
  8. kmguru Staff Member

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    11,757
    While this may be off topic, I could not help , when read about the Amish is that, they too depend on our civilization to protect them from outside chaos. Imagine, if there would be a situation where we lose generating ability of electrucal power (EMF bomb or whatever), we too will go back to the dark ages and the first thing the mob population will do is invade their quiet existence...

    Just a weird thought....
     
  9. goofyfish Analog By Birth, Digital By Design Valued Senior Member

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    What Price Humanity?

    Almost true. Those are all products of the human mind.

    The human mind is the essence and core of our humanity. Technology came about because of the human, thinking, rational mind. Think about all the concrete examples you and I take for granted as technology: automobiles; life-saving medicine and surgeries; factories which give us all kinds of modern conveniences such as cellular phones, fax machines, and computers.

    At what point do we pause to help an impoverished third-world country that never had an industrial revolution (much less a post-industrial, technological one). I see the misery and mediocrity in these countries and ask myself, "Why does the United States have so much? How much do we need?" The answer, apparently, is "more." As a consequence, we watch (if the mega-media corporations deign that we should) other societies stagnate and slowly, painfully die.

    Technology used to be a consequence of our humanity. Now it is technology for technology's sake. Humanity be damned. Store more. Move information faster. Now we deploy software systems that are so complex that they outstrip our ability to engineer reliability into them. Patients have been killed by software errors in radiation-therapy machines

    Technology should open up our choices, allowing us to be more free - not subtly limit our freedom, forcing us to adapt to its restrictions. I am beginning to feel that technology is becoming a threat. If not to our literal survival - though some of it certainly is - then to our identity as "humans."

    Perhaps the aborigines of Australia were actually way ahead of the rest of us when they noticed that the more one has, the shorter life feels.

    They got off the treadmill when their tool count had risen to total of five (counting the digeridoo.)

    Peace.
     
  10. Mr. G reality.sys Valued Senior Member

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    America -- the United States of America -- will be in true decline when its people leave it to move elsewhere -- just as still today the World's masses are falling all over themselves, and one another, trying to get into the US of A.

    Decline? By what rational standard?
     
  11. orthogonal Registered Senior Member

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    579
    I've been steadily decoupling from the rat race for some time now.

    I never shop in box stores (Walmart, etc.). If I do decide to buy something I find the highest quality item possible (U.S. or European manufacture), and keep it nearly forever. I don't own a television. My wife and I currently grow about 25% of our food in our ever expanding organic garden. For the past 16 years we've made all of our household electricity from a hydroelectric turbine on our brook. We have no children. With our own hands, we painstakingly built a one bedroom, 750 square foot cottage in the woods, from the highest quality materials we could locate. I could put all my personal possessions (my clothes and all of six books) into one cardboard box. My wife quit her job about a decade ago in favor of staying home to work in our garden, to make all our food from scratch, to make most of our clothes, and to practice her craft of pottery. In the decade since she's been at home we have incurred absolutely zero debt, in fact, roughly 60% of our income goes into savings each month. I hope to retire in a year or two, at least by age 46.

    Our life has improved immeasurably since we set out on this path of "decoupling" from the rat race. I'm a human again, not just another consumer. "Things" are not important. People are important. Ideas are important. My time is more valuable than anything I will ever own, or any money I will ever make. I can't do much about the madness of our government. But I do have control over the madness in my own life. My life isn't perfect, but I know that I'm in control of my own destiny.

    "When your time comes and your whole life flashes in front of you, will it hold your interest? How much of the story will be about moments of clarity and grace, kindness and caring? Will the main character-you-appear as large and noble as life itself, or as tiny and absurd as a cartoon character, darting frantically among mountains of stuff?" Affluenza, DeGraaf, Wann, Naylor

    Michael
     
  12. kmguru Staff Member

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    11,757
    I congratulate you Orthogonal for choosing such life style. As long as you and your loved ones are happy - that is all that should matter.

    I am trying to get there. It will take some work because I have kids. I believe that when you die, you can not take physical posessions with you, however you can take the knowlege with you incase there is an after life (just an insurance, I suppose). So I have devoted my life in the pursuit of knowledge - arts, science, medicine, technology, economics, sociology and so on....

    It gets easier since one can get several encyclopedias in just a few CD-ROM or DVD-ROMs. Then there is internet - a vast source of true and false knowledge. So, I am happy....

    Back to American decline....only when people start to leave...It has happened before. A whole group of people including Columbus wanted to go to India some time past. After India's decline, almost everybody wants to get out of there. A good indicator...
     
  13. orthogonal Registered Senior Member

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    579
    Hey Kmguru,

    I really shouldn't have mentioned my not having kids. Kids are wonderful. I think they could be a help rather than a hinderance in finding the right path.

    My only concern is when I hear people say, "I live for my children." I then imagine that their children will live for their children...ad infinitum. No one ends up living for themselves.

    Anyway, it sounds as if you have your own good life Kmguru.

    It appears to me that unfortunately, my hard won knowledge will turn to mush some few moments after my heart fails. If I had a child, I'd pass on my genetic information. In any case, there's no doubt the atoms in my body will soon form new life. I'm just borrowing them for the moment. Nearly every atom in my body has already been recycled through a vast number of living beings.

    I study and learn only for the pleasure of it. Should I happen to stumble on a good idea, I would like to pass it along. But you do make a good point Kmguru, ideas, both good and bad, live on in humanity as a whole.

    As for the "decline" in America:
    The infrastructure may be crumbling around us, but our only true strength is now, as it has always been, in the values of our people. Americans are among the finest people on the planet. It would be a such a treat should our politicians one day come to reflect these values.

    Regards,
    Michael
     
    Last edited: Jan 25, 2002
  14. bun Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    31
    America In Decline

    goofyfish states in part:
    "At what point do we pause to help an impoverished third-world country that never had an industrial revolution (much less a post-industrial, technological one)."

    Certainly right after WWII, US foreign aid expanded dramatically. Since the 1960's, I belive, much of the $10 billion a year or more has been to third world countries. So after more than $400 billion, there's been no improvement? Maybe improvement is more dependent on the people themselves than on money from abroad.

    < I see the misery and mediocrity in these countries and ask myself, "Why does the United States have so much? How much do we need?" The answer, apparently, is "more." As a consequence, we watch (if the mega-media corporations deign that we should) other societies stagnate and slowly, painfully die.

    The US is a compassionate and generous country. We are always first in line to respond to crises and disaster with food, medical supplies and support, and money.

    <I am beginning to feel that technology is becoming a threat. If not to our literal survival - though some of it certainly is - then to our identity as "humans."

    as a neo-luddite, you aren't alone. You may be interested in reading Kirkpatrick Sales, "REBELS AGAINST THE FUTURE: The Luddites and Their War on the Industrial Revolution."

    So is there a national model somewhere in the world that you feel is preferable to ours?
     
  15. goofyfish Analog By Birth, Digital By Design Valued Senior Member

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    Re: America In Decline

    Or maybe the U.S. should tie its foreign aid to progress against corruption in recipient countries. Graft and theft on a massive scale in many Third World countries not only wastes Americans' resources and perverts their purpose, but fosters violence and religious extremism as a reaction to corruption.

    Yes, it is. Should it remain blindly compassionate?

    Neo-Luddite?

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    I do not distrust or fear the changes brought about by new technology. Nor do I raise moral and ethical arguments against the excesses of modern technology to the strictly extent that it threatens our essential humanity. I am more concerned with the apparent bovine-like complacency of people to accept without questioning.

    Peace.
     
    Last edited: Jan 20, 2002
  16. in vivo Registered Member

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    24
    Orthogonal---bravo! You seem to be leading an amazing, fulfilling life.

    Tetra---excellent thread. One thing, I wouldn't necessarily single out television as the evil. Television---is serving an important function in the United States. It satiates the "drones."
    When I was studying anthropology, we actually researched its integral role in the lives of the low-income, inner city populice. And the antenna just won't do, we're talking five HBO's,MTV,and Home Shopping! People who need assistance from the government to pay for their housing and food, will oft fall apart if their cable is out.

    Goofyfish, definitely agree with you about the feudal lords. The one thing that you wrote that especially struck me was that Americans generally accept these practices---they sure do---these "drones."

    Most people in this country are not leading amazing lives. I think the affluent of this country should be on the look out. Nothing can bring you down like social decay. And its happening big time in this country.

    In a recent study regarding care of mothers and children where 140 countries were studied, the United States ranked 11th; Sweden was #1, Canada (a large country---to which a great many foreigners immigrate to), the UK, and Australia were ranked higher than us. One of the problems stated was teenage pregnancy. And though the numbers have declined slightly, its nothing you'd notice in an urban setting. Girls regularly seen in clinics 13, 14 years old and pregnant. Not too surprising that infant mortality is a problem in this country. Or did you even know that? Can you imagine being the parent of a 15 yr-old boy or younger and having to pay his child support for him?? Sexually transmitted disease is rampant (can be tracked through the Health Department if your interested) with 1 in 6 people infected with HSV. In some groups I've studied 80% or greater had been recently treated for some form of STD, including HIV. And I'm not even going to go into violence or illicit drug use.

    The United States has also come up short in the educational arena---and there's been plenty siting American children were falling behind other countries like England, Japan, Canada...etc. How much time does the AVERAGE american parent spend raising their child/children? Children can be placed into daycare for 40 hours a week or more starting as young as 6 WEEKS OLD and often are. You can bet your @SS that when little joey is in daycare from 8am to 5:30 he's spending more time with his daycare provider than his parents. So that begs the question---who's really raising joey? And the educational thing? Have you been seeing lately in the news how much money is being allocated towards bringing up american children's exam scores? Look closely at the programs being used. They're not really worried about helping to create a creative, intelligent, free-thinking, WELL-EDUCATED child they want more "drones." Their focus---standardized testing.

    Start looking at the flow of the dollar in this country. If the majority of Americans continue to live in some sort of daze, I can see a very rude awakening coming. If your the type that passively watches "Home Improvement" reruns five times a week with drool in the corner of your mouth and a cheeto crumbs on the spare-tire, brush off the crumbs and start following what the government---mind you---YOUR government's up to. What are you doing to live a more amazing life and ensure that same quality of life for your children?
     
  17. Adam §Þ@ç€ MØnk€¥ Registered Senior Member

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    I have no problem with material possessions. They're nifty. Computers let Orthoganol use the internet, a massive collection of material things put together by massive corporations. Material stuff and materialism is good, it literally creates the future. However, material things are still nothing but things. They mean nothing in themselves. Like money: damn useful stuff, but it's intrinsic value is jack diddly, it's just little bits of paper and such. It's an odd mix of values involved when you discuss the worth of materialism. A person who moves out to the woods and has nothing to do with the rat race may or may not contribute much to society, to the advancement of the species. An advertising executive obsessed with material crap may, with one campaign idea, create thousands of jobs in a third world country and keep thousands of people alive. Materialism does damn good things.

    As for the USA. Well, it's the biggest economy ever, but also the biggest debtor ever (Japan being the biggest creditor ever). I doubt they will ever pay back what they owe. They don't even keep up to date with their UN membership fees. Yes, they foot the bill for a great number of supposed UN operations, but those operations come out of the UN Security Counil, in which the USA has dominance and veto power, and in the end they are primarily USA activities. Is the USA powered by materialism and the dollar? Probably. Is that good or bad? Well, they pretty much built the internet, we needed their money to build the international space station, they saved Australia's arse in World War Two with their massive resources and industry. The USA's materialism is productive. Unfortunately, the people at the higher echelons of that materialism sometimes do the very wrong thing, such as dumping millions of tons of grain at sea rather than donating it to starving nations, just so the local grain prices aren't damaged.

    Is the USA going downhill? As the population increases, and with it the population density, crime rates are getting worse in many types of crime. People are getting fatter and lazier, or so I hear. Blind faith in religion is rife, or so it seems to me. When the World Trade Centre was hit, I saw on TV an American saying something like "I don't care who did it, let's bomb ALL those un-christian bastards!" That's just charming.

    One thing concerns me in all this. I would not be surprised at all if some year soon the USA president was made the new Pope of an American christian church, both a political and religious leader. Separation of church and state? But don't they swear into office on a christian bible? And aren't there places in that country where it is compulsory to teach creation and illegal to teach evolution?
     
  18. kmguru Staff Member

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    11,757
    USA is a mega-Enron. It is a house of cards that could fall in 8 years...unless we also clean house. There is a lot to learn from Enron.
     
  19. Adam §Þ@ç€ MØnk€¥ Registered Senior Member

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    Yep: start shredding records early!
     
  20. Chagur .Seeker. Registered Senior Member

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    2,235
    Hey, Adam ...

    Re."I would not be surprised at all if some year soon the USA president
    was made the new Pope of an American christian church, both a political
    and religious leader."

    Have you noticed how Dubby's rhetoric has been taking on more and more
    of a tent evangelist's cadence and vocabulary?

    You may be more prescient than you realize.

    Take care

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  21. goofyfish Analog By Birth, Digital By Design Valued Senior Member

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    If you would like a rather interesting viewpoint, try The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers , by Prof. Paul Kennedy.

    In summary, he believes that all hegemonic powers eventually and inevitably succumb to "strategic overreach". That is, the hegemonic power of the leading nation of the era is dependent upon maintenance of the status quo, and in order to maintain that status quo the leading nation is required to assume greater and greater strategic obligations. Those strategic obligations consume manpower, treasure and resources without providing any additional financial or other benefits to the leading nation - remember these obligations are assumed to protect the wealth and power of the nation which it already has. Eventually, the leading nation is no longer able to sustain these increased strategic obligations and withdraws from them, quietly or under military pressure from upstarts, and begins to decline, to be replaced by another nation or nations.

    To make his point, Kennedy looks at the experiences of the dominant European powers from 1500 on, namely Spain, then France, then Britain, then Russia and the US. The British provide his classic example, demonstrated by the fact that Britain was a more powerful and dominant nation in the 18th and early 19th centuries than they were in the later half of the 19th and early 20th centuries, despite the fact that the British Empire was considerably larger in terms of land area and population in the latter time period. The reason was that Britain effectively controlled what later became its Empire in the earlier time period through economic and diplomatic power, and only rarely had to resort to military power to maintain that control. It was forced to take direct control of the Empire (and therefore raise troops to defend the empire, etc.) when other rising European powers infringed on the areas. IOW, Britain had to spend money on an increased military in order to protect what it had controlled through non-military (and considerably less costly) means before.

    Kennedy's thesis has much merit, however, I feel there are two primary problems with it. First, he assumes, at least to some extent, that military and economic power is a zero-sum game. He is probably right when it comes to comparative military power, but is likely wrong when it comes to economic power. The second problem is that it ignores qualitative and technological advances in militaries. These may result in the reduction, or least no real increases, in military spending in order to maintain or increase comparative military power.

    And, of course, Kennedy foresaw Japan as the next hegemonic power. :bugeye:

    Peace
     
  22. Adam §Þ@ç€ MØnk€¥ Registered Senior Member

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    Of course it didn't help Britain when some people sworn to serve the King (Washington and his buddies) turned traitor and they ahd that little war. The British has round trips of months to organise supplies and troops; the rebels had an entire massive continent full of supplies right behind them. In terms of the rise and fall of empires, that mere accident of geography screwed the Brits right up, contributing greatly to the decline of the British Empire. I wonder how a theory covering empires in general manages to take into account singular phenomena like that.
     
  23. Teg Unknown Citizen Registered Senior Member

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    672
    Boy, you bought into the propoganda a little too easily. Are we declining? It all depends on our view of knowledge. Rome fell when Christianity dominated its idiology. We have succeeded in seperating the secular from the otherwise. It all depends on whether that lasts. There have been some signs of this form of decline. Consider Creation Science, slowly gaining steam as an alternative ot actual science. Also there is a rash of other religious fundamentalism. At this point it seems the greatest threat comes from the prophecies of catastrophe. If the system breaks it will take a while, unless someone launches a salvo of mass- destruction to bring to pass an Armageddon.

    Globalization: it is an idea of merit. Make everybody dependent on their global neighbors and you acheive an antiwar position. Also we need a unified disarmament pact. Eventually we will need a joining of nations/religions. As long as we remain fragmented we are a threat to ourselves.
     

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