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Page added on August 4, 2018
The Decline and Fall of the American Empire
So what would the decline of America look like? I don’t ask the question because I think it’s happening (yet?), but because even the most inveterate optimist should be interested in the dangers, if only to ward them off.
Here’s the cleanest tale of hypothetical decline I could come up with, keeping away from the more partisan or hysterical scenarios, or those involving a catastrophic deus ex machina.
Imagine that the United States gets through the presidency of Donald Trump without a crippling constitutional crisis. Still, the shrill public debate — which will continue well past Trump’s time in office — will continue to prove unequal to the task of addressing the nation’s most pressing problems.
In recent years, the underlying rate of productivity growth often has been about 1 percent, and rates of economic growth are not even half of what they used to be. Meanwhile, America will have to increase taxes or reduce spending by about $2,200 per taxpayer per year to keep the national debt-to-GDP ratio from rising ever higher, and that figure predates the Trump tax cuts. To fund that shortfall, the U.S. will cut back on infrastructure maintenance. At least one-third of this country will end up looking like — forgive the colloquial phrase — “a dump.” The racial wealth gap will not be narrowed.
Aging and entitlements will force the president, whether Democratic or Republican, to look for a mix of spending cuts and tax increases. The spending cuts will diminish the range of the military, and the tax hikes will ensure that economic growth doesn’t pick up. The integrity of Medicare and Social Security will be (mostly) protected, but the U.S. will lose the ability to project power around the globe.
Over a period of less than five years, China will retake Taiwan and also bring much of East and Southeast Asia into a much tighter sphere of influence. Turkey and Saudi Arabia will build nuclear weapons and become dominant players in their regions. Russia will continue to nibble at the borders of neighboring states, including Latvia and Estonia, and NATO will lose its credibility, except for a few bilateral relationships, such as with the U.K. Parts of Eastern Europe will return to fascism. NAFTA will exist on paper, but it will be under perpetual renegotiation and hemispheric relations will fray.
One area of major technological advance will be drugs, and I don’t mean beneficial pharmaceuticals. The opioid crisis eventually will subside, but new waves of ever more powerful addictive substances will arise. Easy home lab production will make interdiction at the border fruitless. More than 80,000 Americans already die from alcohol every year, and more than 60,000 from drug overdoses. Total losses from addiction will rise.
Other technologies will indeed provide a bounty, but not all of it will be positive. Artificial intelligence and facial and gait surveillance will lead to unprecedented invasions of privacy, causing another 1 or 2 percent of Americans to decide to “live off the grid.” The impact of assassin drones will be curbed — by filling the skies with police drones. Public crimes will plummet, but public spaces in major cities will have a depressing sameness, due to the near-total absence of spontaneous behavior. Advances in recording technologies will make most conversations in public, and many in private, remarkably bland.
Driverless cars will be “the next big thing,” but they’ll make roads more crowded. The elderly will insist on their driverless car rights, and defeat economists’ proposals for new congestion charges. Americans will spend another hour a day in their cars, although texting and watching TV, rather than driving.
The very worst fears about climate change won’t come true. But a nagging succession of storms, plus required adjustments along the coasts to accommodate a rise in sea level, will eat up about 0.5 percent worth of economic growth. So when America does occasionally approach 3 percent growth, in terms of living standards it may feel more like 2 percent.
Shall I present my own petty gripes? Due to the limited selection on Netflix streaming, fewer and fewer people will watch the great movies of the past, thereby neutering the durability of the 20th century’s greatest art form. And live performances of classical music — another of the West’s most significant and beautiful achievements — will cease to be regular in all but a few major U.S. cities.
So what in this description sounds so implausible? Is it that you think productivity growth will come in at 3 percent? That it will all be worth it because advances in medicine will allow us to stick around in decent form until age 135? That technological breakthroughs will extend the reach of the U.S. military further yet? That the Mars colony will be awesome?
Just how lucky are you feeling?
78 Comments on "The Decline and Fall of the American Empire"
joe on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 8:37 am
Make Merkel Great Again (please migrants)
“https://www.livetradingnews.com/merkel-and-eu-have-germany-in-edge-of-collapse-100591.html#.W2hOIns1hJ8”
“Industrial orders in Germany fell more than expected June, official data showed Tuesday, as global trade tensions weighed on Europe’s top economy.
New contracts at industrial firms plunged four percent month-on-month, federal statistics authority Destatis said in figures adjusted for seasonal swings, following a 2.6 percent increase in May.”
davidrussell on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 9:53 am
This all sounds plausible and it really doesn’t sound like the collapse of America. It sounds like America will be more boring yet more peaceful and safe. We’ll not have tremendous growth but we won’t work as hard either. We should be healthier, longer-lived but maybe not as well entertained. So we’ll have to seek out live performances and old films. Maybe we’ll have to learn to play music on our own.
I think the author left out a lot of positive things.
GetAVasectomyAndLetTheHumanSpecieDie on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 10:08 am
For some reason I am fascinated by this new extermination phenomenon happening within these three group: White, Japanese and South Korean.
Japanese and South Korean seem to be self exterminated because they don’t see the point to work 60 hours a week for a big corporation and have no life.
White seem to be self exterminating because the see that the earth is overpopulated and they know they won’t be able to provide a good quality of life for their children. So white women say, I am not having kids. So white people also see this mass migration in Western white countries by Black and Arab and they only see race war for a futur. So they prefer not to reproduce.
I also think that western white countries are now totally gone and finished. France, Canada, UK, Sweden are dead. I am just waiting for a race war to start. White cannot win a race war because we are not enough and must white men are so feminized, weak and lack any form of courage.
The only white that will survive will be in Russian Eastern-Europe. These countries never implement full retard feminism, white guilt polices and don’t care about being politically incorrect.
I do indeed live in interesting time. I am witnessing peak oil, overpopulation and the extinction of there group of people.
GetAVasectomyAndLetTheHumanSpecieDie on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 11:08 am
This guy is the following video is expressing his feeling as why western culture is done.
I don’t know if he is aware of peak oil or not. It is interest to hear what average white people feel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdS8JxFCXRw
GetAVasectomyAndLetTheHumanSpecieDie on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 11:43 am
Peter Thiel is also talking about Western culture dying. Thereis an overpopulation abd peak oil component to western culture dying. But there is also a human component. Theil talk more about the human component of western culture die off.
Some interesting comments
Mr Thiel, I am a Dutch unskilled labourer. I do not have a degree of higher education at all, nor am I a millionaire. But what you say I discovered many years ago myself. Most politicians have studied law, sociology, political science, history or economics. ALL pseudosciences! ALL these people are IDEOLOGUES and thus very dangerous people, for dogmas controll their thinking. So what you say is old news for me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JTnztV5oJQ
makati1 on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 6:41 pm
“The U.S. Government To Fork Out A Half Trillion To Service Its Debt In 2018”
That is only a bit less than the cost of SS. Wars of choice and debt is killing America.
“…if we assume that the interest expense for July-Sept will also be up 10%, then the estimated total debt service for fiscal 2018 will reach $506-$510 billion….
If the United States had to pay a 6.6% interest rate on its $21.2 trillion in debt, it would amount to a mind-blowing $1.4 trillion a year. This is precisely why Central banks will not allow their interest rates to rise unless the market forces rates higher. If that happens, well then, the U.S.A. Titanic sinks to the bottom. That was the interest rate in 2000)…
…China is receiving around $27 billion a year in interest expense from the U.S. government while Japan gets $24 billion for holding over $1 trillion each in U.S. debt. (Maybe that is why China can invest it in projects around the world and buy gold?)”
https://srsroccoreport.com/the-u-s-government-to-fork-out-a-half-trillion-to-service-its-debt-in-2018/
“All I can say is that the next few years are going to be one heck of a surprise for most Americans.” AMEN!
makati1 on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 7:05 pm
Jewish controlled American insanity:
“US Military Aid to Israel Set to Exceed $3.8B, or $23,000 Per Year for Every Jewish Family Living in Israel”
https://www.globalresearch.ca/us-military-aid-to-israel-set-to-exceed-3-8b-or-23000-per-year-for-every-jewish-family-living-in-israel/5649698
“The massive funding for Israel’s military is the result of the 2016 U.S.-Israel Memorandum of Understanding on security assistance between the Israeli and U.S. governments, which called for annual funding of $3.8 billion — or $23,000 per year for every Jewish family living in Israel — FOR THE NEXT TEN (10) YEARS!”
Did YOUR family get $23,000 from the government last year? Pure insanity! LMAO
makati1 on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 7:28 pm
More food for thought:
“The concept of the United States as a sovereign nation is a mirage: the reality is a miasma resulting from the stench of decades of controlled dysfunction and destabilization to bring the nation to the brink of collapse while giving the taxpayers the illusion they’re still free and that their votes in the rigged elections still count. All throughout the United States the quality of life – employment, family structure, faith, and true communities of neighborhoods and neighbors that help one another when needed and still mind their own business…these qualities have almost completely vanished….
The United States is being turned into a total surveillance state in preparation for a “collapse,” the complete enslavement of its citizens (Socialism into Communism, complete with gulags), and its dissolution and subsequent “absorption” into the system of global governance…. (The Great Leveling)
…all of the computers, cell phones, devices in the home, CCTV cameras, data recorders in the cars, trash recycling firms (sifting your trash), satellites, drones…all of it is caging us in….
The cage has to be emplaced, and laws made: laws to try and wrest our remaining freedoms from us. They want the guns, they want to adulterate the vote (allowing illegal aliens to vote) and destroy the fabric of society. They want to destroy the United States.”
http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/how-the-coming-global-state-is-being-reached_08062018
Jeremiah Johnson is the Nom de plume of a retired Green Beret of the United States Army Special Forces (Airborne). Mr. Johnson is also a Gunsmith, a Certified Master Herbalist, a Montana Master Food Preserver, and a graduate of the U.S. Army’s SERE school (Survival Evasion Resistance Escape).
Nuff said.
Cloggie on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 10:28 pm
Battle Canada-KSA intensifying. On Saudi initiative, no more direct flights between the countries and thousands of Saudi students retracted from Canada:
http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/streit-um-festnahme-von-aktivisten-saudi-arabien-stoppt-fluege-nach-kanada-a-1221946.html
The entire confrontation was unleashed by a TWEET by the Canadian FM Freeland about incarcerated Saudi “activists” of the feminist persuasion.
KSA is a key ally of the US empire.
MASTERMIND on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 10:40 pm
Clogg
Nobody fucking cares..You are like a teenage brat..Gossiping political news..
I just hope you know you are wasting your last final years before total collapse hits your home..
Cloggie on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 10:48 pm
You care, you are foaming at the mouth while trying to moderate this forum, in vain of course.
Come on millimind, gives us again one of your obsolete, moldy 2010 links admitting that Americans have become third-world level incompetent, to the tune that their transition is going to take 136 years to complete.lol
Boat on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 11:33 pm
The US is ran by a German with the last of the rights supporting Republicans. Have no fear as most of the new power is led by a corporate left. Along with white women. Lol The old right EU guard is mainly old white dudes like you and Mak who are dying off, moving away or bring silienced by their own extreamism.
Boat on Mon, 6th Aug 2018 11:52 pm
Mak
You would gripe about being surrounded by food while being fat. How could you not love Netflix at $14 per month. That’s a meal and a tip.
Keep your vergina safe in your non police state lol. Your gov will shoot it.
makati1 on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 12:26 am
Boat, you don’t even make sense in your post.
My BMI is 23.7 https://www.cdc.gov/healthyweight/assessing/bmi/adult_bmi/english_bmi_calculator/bmi_calculator.html
I have no use for Netflix. Never have. Never will. My internet connection is about $20 per month. I can access more info and educational videos, that I am interested in, than I will ever have time to read/watch. I rarely watch movies.
I’m safer here than you will ever be, Boat.
Cloggie on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 12:35 am
The US is ran by a German with the last of the rights supporting Republicans. Have no fear as most of the new power is led by a corporate left. Along with white women. Lol The old right EU guard is mainly old white dudes like you and Mak who are dying off, moving away or bring silienced by their own extreamism.
First of all boat, I would agree with you that extreamism, as well as illiterasie, needs to be fought, on the beaches, in the trenches, in the classroom, everywhere, no prisoners made.
Furthermore I share your sentiment that fear regarding the future of the US is unfounded, especially from a Eurasian perspective, now that in the US the power of white men is receding and replaced by wimmin and minorities, since neither of these two “demographics” have notoriously ever invented or accomplished anything nor ever will:
https://documents1940.wordpress.com/2017/09/26/origin-scientific-accomplishments/
…although some exceptions to the rule do exist:
http://modmobilian.com/uploads/2010/10/lonnie-johnson-wide.jpg
After all, again from a Eurasian point of view, it doesn’t make sense to fight a soldier who is in the process of committing suicide, now does it?
So I share with you your upbeat feeling about the US descending…, um make that ascending from first world towards third world standards (3 > 1). I’m sure the USSR can be beaten in terms of shabbiness and incompetence. Go for it, boat!
#YesWeCan!
https://documents1940.wordpress.com/2017/10/26/the-new-america/
Anonymouse1 on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 12:39 am
What a retard. I keep thinking to myself boatietard has lowered the bar as far it can possibly go. Yet, incredibly, somehow, he keeps proving me wrong every other time he opens his retard pie-hole when he decides to share his mental diarrhea(aka his thought), with the world.
Or, this little corner of it anyhow.
Boatretard, I dont know how it is, that you have enough neural actively upstairs to even breath without the help of a machine to do it for you.
Boat on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 12:51 am
Clog
If you believe anlyitics the Asian immigrant is the over performer. They will eventually rule. No need to invent anything as they are very good at copy and improve. The US Asian base causes few problems while supplying much of US brain power. Time for an Asian prez.
Davy on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 1:31 am
“Come on millimind, gives us again one of your obsolete, moldy 2010 links admitting that Americans have become third-world level incompetent”
Wow, that is an exaggeration. The US has always had 3rd world elements and 1st world elements. Keep that in perspective please.
Davy on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 1:33 am
“I’m safer here than you will ever be, Boat.”
Don’t get mistaken for a drug dealer…
Davy on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 1:37 am
“After all, again from a Eurasian point of view, it doesn’t make sense to fight a soldier who is in the process of committing suicide, now does it?”
The US has an army and the Eurotards less so. Without the Americans the Euro’s can barely project power. They can’t even protect themselves from themselves.
“So I share with you your upbeat feeling about the US descending…”
I fail to see the ascending out of the Eurotards??
Davy on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 1:41 am
“Anonymouse1 on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 12:39 am”
More trolling from the board troll expert. Here is the last comment from Asperger that was a real comment with the rest being distasteful trolling:
“Anonymouse1 on Sat, 28th Jul 2018 2:02 pm”
before that:
“Anonymouse1 on Tue, 24th Jul 2018 7:57 pm”
What a fine example of the Canadian youth in action.
Cloggie on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 2:06 am
“The US has an army and the Eurotards less so. Without the Americans the Euro’s can barely project power. They can’t even protect themselves from themselves”
Countries who get their asses kicked by the likes of North-Vietnam, Eyeraq, Afghanistan or Syria individually, should not pretend to be a superpower, heck they should even doubt they have an army at all.
Davy on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 2:11 am
“Countries who get their asses kicked by the likes of North-Vietnam, Eyeraq, Afghanistan or Syria individually, should not pretend to be a superpower, heck they should even doubt they have an army at all.”
There were no retreats on the battlefields in any of these places neder. The truth is the US can fight wars and the Eurotards can’t without American help. The Euros hang out in Euroland eating cheese and drinking wine living the good life while the Americans provide protection.
Cloggie on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 2:19 am
“If you believe anlyitics the Asian immigrant is the over performer. They will eventually rule. No need to invent anything as they are very good at copy and improve. The US Asian base causes few problems while supplying much of US brain power. ”
Sure, one big happy family, the US is.
https://mobile.twitter.com/wierdduk/status/1025194461188354048
Scroll down for anti-white hate tweets, by some of your “brainy Asians”. Note, despite that she is a (((NYT))) senior.
For years now you are routinely humiliated here by some two-bit Canadian African. And neverthess you and similar idiots like Davy and Sissifuss keep dreaming of a multiracial US utopia?
Fools.
Davy on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 2:29 am
“Scroll down for anti-white hate tweets, by some of your “brainy Asians”. Note, despite that she is a (((NYT))) senior.”
cherry picking
“And neverthess you and similar idiots like Davy and Sissifuss keep dreaming of a multiracial US utopia?”
I never said that?? My aim is to moderate your extremism. You are one constant anti-American Trumpet. It gets disgusting after a while. A Dutch guy that obsessively talk about the US. Don’t you have other things to talk about.
MASTERMIND on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 6:02 am
Clogg
You can argue all the straw mans about my links as you want..You are still going to die in a few years..
Dredd on Tue, 7th Aug 2018 3:10 pm
How To Identify The Despotic Minority
Cloggie on Wed, 8th Aug 2018 1:08 am
The truth is the US can fight wars and the Eurotards can’t without American help. The Euros hang out in Euroland eating cheese and drinking wine living the good life while the Americans provide protection.
Yeah sure, just like the Soviets offered “protection” to Eastern Europe. That empire of yours was build on intentional mass murder and a giant pack of lies, a behavior that is going on now for a century. There is a good reason why you never want to discuss history, because you know you have no foot to stand on.
We don’t need your stinking “protection”. We want to see your marxist asses to return to the prairie, where you belong, so you can drown demographically into the third world, never to be heard of again.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bO1agIlLlhg
Again, the US CANNOT fight wars, they always lose of the tiniest of countries. Reason: no morale, no real nation. The US empire mainly exist through the US piggy-backing on the USSR in 1945 and is now about to disintegrate, thank God.
Go home, yankee, time is up.