The "Slow" Decline of the United States of America

The “Slow” Decline of the United States of America

Heartbroken in the Heartland… and Everywhere Else

Yes, there is a new world order. Yes, the United States is still the major world power, both economically and militarily. But no, the old gray mare ain’t what she used to be and continues to erode, rely heavily on the bulwark of success of prior generations, create false assumptions and stubbornly cling to them and foster the goals and values of special interests above those of most Americans. It is a toxic brew. Add to that the devastation of climate change, the resulting migration of desperate peoples seeking simply to live and just be, and the rise of autocracy in so many places. The massive penetration of private gun ownership in the US cannot help. As Iran supplied both strategy and munitions to Hamas, applying Hitler/Putin terrorism to ordinary Israeli civilians, you might want to ask yourself what role our policies and overall decline played in this horrific attack. Let’s start with how minds have been manipulated in the modern world.

The era of consumer advertising to convince consumers to buy stuff they didn’t need or want and turn their children in to the “Mommy, I want” generation began in the 1950s: “[Wonder Bread] sponsored [the children’s TV show] Howdy Doody, with host Buffalo Bob Smith telling the audience, ‘Wonder Bread builds strong bodies 8 ways’ referring to the number of added nutrients.” Wikipedia. Media driven consumer marketing amped up to a whole new level.

By the second decade of the 21st century, the ability to advertise exploded into the manipulative political arena, selling and convincing people to back weird-idea candidates and believe toxic conspiracy theories, aided and abetted by judicial decisions (e.g., the 2010 Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United vs FEC), that eroded the “United” in our nation’s name. See also my October 2nd So How Did We Get Here? – Polarized, Uncompromising Politicians Running America blog.

Indeed, the fracturing of America became a reality as special interests, fueled by mega-rich individuals and their corporations, literally created two parallel constituencies long before the red-blue divide. Two economic and legal systems that effectively terminated that notion of America as “the land of opportunity” into the “land of opportunists.” Upward mobility was relegated to the history books, essential education in a complex world became increasingly unaffordable and housing off-the-charts expensive. We incurred deficits in defiance of the “guns or butter” economic paradigm under the completely false narrative that by keeping taxes for the rich low, “a rising tide floats all boats.” It doesn’t, never has and never will.

We are the richest country on earth but have disproportionately the highest governmental deficits on the planet. Because we do not tax wealth except at death or on transfer (as still preferred tax rates), the rich can borrow against their assets, deduct interest and revel in the reality that we do not tax loan proceeds. The deficit that results has become a debt shared by all Americans to benefit the top 1%. Income inequality and massive change has fueled a populist movement, here and all over the planet, that is oddly self-destructive. A recent RSS feed (October 9th) from the New York Times by David Leonhardt is an excellent summary of that decline:

Why has American power receded? Some of the change is unavoidable. Dominant countries don’t remain dominant forever. But the U.S. has also made strategic mistakes that are accelerating the arrival of a multipolar world.

Among those mistakes: Presidents of both parties naïvely believed that a richer China would inevitably be a friendlier China — and failed to recognize that the U.S. was building up its own rival through lenient trade policies, as the political scientist John Mearsheimer has argued. In Afghanistan and Iraq, the U.S. spent much of the early 21st century fighting costly wars. The Iraq war was especially damaging because it was an unprovoked war that George W. Bush chose to start. And the humiliating retreat from Afghanistan, overseen by President Biden, made the U.S. look weaker still.

Perhaps the biggest damage to American prestige has come from Donald Trump, who has rejected the very idea that the U.S. should lead the world. Trump withdrew from international agreements and disdained successful alliances like NATO. He has signaled that, if he reclaims the presidency in 2025, he may abandon Ukraine.

In the case of Israel, Trump encouraged Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, to show little concern for Palestinian interests and instead seek a maximal Israeli victory. Netanyahu, of course, did not start this new war. Hamas did, potentially with support from Iran, the group’s longtime backer, and Hamas committed shocking human rights violations this past weekend, captured on video.

But Netanyahu’s extremism has contributed to the turmoil between Israel and Palestinian groups like Hamas. An editorial in Haaretz, an Israeli newspaper, yesterday argued, “The prime minister, who has prided himself on his vast political experience and irreplaceable wisdom in security matters, completely failed to identify the dangers he was consciously leading Israel into when establishing a government of annexation and dispossession.” Netanyahu, Haaretz added, adopted “a foreign policy that openly ignored the existence and rights of Palestinians.” For decades following the establishment of the Iranian theocracy, US policymakers perpetually believed that this autocracy would simply implode. 44 years later, Iran is more dangerous than ever.

So here we are. As the above Pew Research chart proves, for the most part Americans don’t even believe in our own future. It’s an “open” secret. Dictators the world over are counting on our polarized self-destruction, aided by their own use of social media access inside the US herself. Our government, and indeed our people, are polarized into seemingly irreparable gridlock, fueled by inane conspiracy theories. The 2024 election is as much a choice between autocracy and democracy as it may appear to be a choice among issues. How many Americans know that?

I’m Peter Dekom, and I have to wonder if and when the American electorate will stop indulging in the toxic polarization that will move the United States from mere decline into a total unraveling.