The End of America, part 2. Continuing decline

Is America in decline?

America has only recently become a 'superpower'. Right before WW2, both the japanese & the germans had little respect for the hodge podge nation of immigrants & castoffs, & europe mostly saw america as a place to dump undesirables. It was not really until after the big war that the us became a world superpower, & since the breakup of the ussr, the main one, as well.

Many people have seen parallels between the roman empire & the united states. Here is a list of 8 that a left leaning writer found. These target capitalistic greed, but obviously, socialistic fiscal policy is a major part as well.

Many of these points are valid, imo, in addition to the ones i made in the first thread. The primary reason i see an imminent fall is fiscal policy. The republic cannot stand with the current spending rates, nor can it tax enough to pay for our excesses.

The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance. ~Marcus Tullius Cicero

It is a process. It is not like the world trade tower collapse, but a gradual decline.. until the dilapidated nation falls from disrepair & detachment from the values that built it. But the reign of the us was fairly short, in historical timelines, & almost does not deserve a comparison to rome.

 

GDP: Government Deception Propaganda?

In the previous thread, the subject of the gdp came up. I think it has limited value as an indicator, and mostly in trends. Why? It has become a political tool for govt propagandists. It does not accurately measure true production in a country.

GDP is supposed to be 'gross domestic product'. Here is the wiki definition:

Gross domestic product (GDP) is the market value of all officially recognized final goods and services produced within a country in a given period of time. GDP per capita is often considered an indicator of a country's standard of living; GDP per capita is not a measure of personal income (See Standard of living and GDP). Under economic theory, GDP per capita exactly equals the gross domestic income (GDI) per capita (See Gross domestic income).

Now the problems. What else is in the gdp numbers?

1. Disaster relief. All the spending on katrina & sandy in the us, & the tsunami in Japan are included in a nation's gdp. Even borrowed money is used to indicate a growing or positive gdp, when in fact the opposite may be happening.. REAL production can be decreasing, but borrowing & spending makes it look like the economy is growing.

2. Govt employees payroll is included. Even though the govt does not produce anything, & their salaries are from taxes on the productive workers in the nation, their numbers are included in the official gdp. Police, firemen, prisons, & many other things that are necessary are included in the gdp, yet they are not 'productive'. You can have a massive prison building program, & spend billions on incarcerating criminals, & the govt will call that 'production'.

3. Wars. War is not productive, & is a drain on the resources of a nation. Yet either income or expenditures from wars are included in the nation's gdp.

Another thing about gdp is the different ways it can be presented, depending on the desired effect or point being made. It can be calculated by 'expenditures' or by 'income'. Both are pretty meaningless, as both have plenty of room for political maneuvering.

The bottom line is that gdp numbers can indicate trends, if compared over years, but have little immediate value, unless you subtract the deficit spending & artificial manipulation of the numbers to make it look good. But politicians & their economists are proficient at juggling numbers to deceive, & this is what they do with the gdp.

Politicians & shady economists are able to use phony gdp numbers to make it appear that we are growing in productivity, when the exact reverse is true. The us is strong in food production, & some areas of manufacturing, like tractors, but is declining in almost all other categories of production. Massive govt spending, borrowed from future generations, hides this fact, & provides an illusion of continued prosperity, but it is only delaying the inevitable. We have too much dependency & not enough production. This will lead to our collapse.

 

Here are two major sources of the decline, tho perhaps one has to be outside of the USA, and particularly outside of the fundamentalist christian cults to see it.

One is the endless military spending, far exceeding that of any country.

That, and the endless imperialist adventures.

Another is the cult of ignorance and superstition.

Tens of millions of people in the USA believe in ancient superstitions, and reject all of science in preference for their "bible" stories of flood, 6 day creation, etc.

All those obese ignorant americans with their self assured arrogant smugness may as well be T day turkeys strutting about.

Harsh words, but you guys really need to wake up. You guys are deeply outnumbered by a lot of very smart, hard working ambitious and hungry people who are going to run right over you. There wont be an angel with a flaming sword to protect your trailer parks.

Well, I'm out of there now, its your deal. Good luck.

 

The biggest problem of all is the lack of a work ethic. In the past Americans had a strong work ethic. Americans were a self reliant people with a strong protestant work ethic, pioneer spirit and yankee ingenuity. They would rather cut off their left arm than take a hand out.

Compare them to Americans today. The values of Occupy Wall Street. People want free housing, free daycare, free healthcare, free college education, free free free and to top it all off, occupy Wall Street wants a living wage regardless whether they work or not.

Like Benjamin Franklyn said, democracy ends when people realize that they can vote themselves money from the treasury. America will go the way of Greece and California. They will keep voting themselves government programs until the system crashes.

 

As for strong protestant work ethic, pioneer spirit and yankee ingenuity.
none of those are characteristic of the far east,. but the work ethic is so different from that of modern USA, its like Asians and Americans are different species.

I wish a few more Americans would go see what is going on outside their borders and maybe WAKE UP!

 

Good talking points. Have you read the book Are We Rome? Interesting parallel

However, if you are talking about the fall of the Roman Republic, which several of you points elude to, you need to talk about the end of political parties in Rome and the rise of dictators, aka Julius Caesar

Cue Cicero

 

Ok, you said 2, but gave 3. I can handle it.

1. +1 I agree that there is too much military spending. The outside risks do not justify taking this much from the taxpayers to defend them from aggression. Our military is used for business purposes, to prop up corrupt regimes, crony political favors, & in general, anti american activities. It is unconstitutional, illegal, and immoral. All americans should unite with one voice & demand a stop to the military madness. We can secure our borders, & defend ourselves from attacks, but the meddling all over the world is wasteful, both in tax dollars & especially american lives.

2. Imperialistic ventures? If only it were so. If only we were exploiting other countries, plundering their resources, & taxing them. Then our deficits would be non existent. It would pay for our military. But no. We pay other countries after we bomb them. We give 'foreign aid' like we have a printing press for money (hey! We actually do!).

3. I don't think americans have a monopoly on 'cults & superstition'. That is a human condition, not uniquely american. Your criticism of us here is that we are human. Guilty as charged.

You seem really obsessed with american christians, the bible, & religion. Certainly, they have brought their own issues to the table, but mostly, they are hard working, tax paying, responsible people. I see socialist redistribution as being a lot more of a problem than 'religious people'. Were you molested by a priest in your youth? Why this hostility toward 'religious people?'

+1 I fear the gravy train mentality has killed the 'work ethic' in america. Entitlement & redistribution are the new methods for the coming generations. Why work if you can just take from someone else? The socialist thuggery mentality of taking from the successful for income equality & social justice is killing motivation, entrepreneurial ventures, & individual responsibility.

+1 I'll agree with you again, here. If we would look at greece, portugal, italy, & much of the eu, we could learn a lot about fiscal responsibility & not spending more than you have coming in. It seems this is a very rare concept in modern national management.

 

The only way the USA will survive is if Freedom and Liberty expand outside our borders. There is nothing Imperialist about Freedom and Liberty. It is the natural state all humans prefer.

 

Are the Rightwingers on this thread agreeing with this bullet point???

"8 — Loss of the Spirit of Compromise"

 

It is interesting to me that so many people see the parallels, & have talked about the similarities for years. The above points are from a leftist, who compiled them after reading Anthony Everitt’s 'Rise of Rome'. I though his points were pretty solid, but the similarities do not stop there. Here are his central points:

1 — Staggering Increase in the Cost of Elections, with Dubious Campaign Funding Sources:
2 — Politics as the Road to Personal Wealth:
3 — Continuous War:
4 — Foreign Powers Lavish Money/Attention on the Republic’s Leaders:
5 — Profits Made Overseas Shape the Republic’s Internal Policies:
6 — Collapse of the Middle Class:
7 — Gerrymandering:
8 — Loss of the Spirit of Compromise:

All of his points were carefully cherry picked to show a wall street correlation, & blame for the republicans. But this decline has been going on for a long time, & includes a lot of other factors. I probably only agree with #2 & 3 above as major factors in the decline of rome & paralleled with the us. I would add,
1. moral decay.
2. Increase of dependency & govt entitlements.
3. deficit spending/fiat currency.
4. growth of corruption in the government sector.
5. plundering the public treasury.

These are typical symptoms of decline of successful nations. They build, grow, & prosper, then slowly decay from within. We are taking the same path, just doing it faster than rome.

 

The Roman Empire lasted for about 500 years so considering that they were not living in the globalized world and subject to attacks by hordes of germans and islamists its safe to assume that America can at least double that figure. We are closing in on around 300 years so I think we are ok.

 

Wow, this is amazing, I have found even more evidence that America will soon fall unless we take action!

1. Roman's love interesting hat-wear...American's also love hats

2. Roman's ate meat between bread, American's also love this so called Hamburger

3. Rome has an 'R' in it AmeRica also an 'R' are there no ends to the coincidences ?!

4. By taking the word Roman, you can make Amrn only add e i a and c and you have America!

5. The letters 'i' and 'e' which are holding America from failing like Rome, are both in tErrorIsm

6.The remaining 'C' is communism and 'A' atheism all of the enemies bringing down America

It's amazing how God has given us the freedom to see this clear evidence, now we just need to act!

 

America won't fall but we will degrade in importance. Our principles and sense of pride are too great to vanish entirely but our ability to be a superpower is eroding. In 100 years we will simply be another country but we won't be running the world anymore.

 

I tend to disagree. America did fine when most of the world was dominated by kings & monarchies. Statism was the norm, & america was the poor exception. But since we've.. ahem.. ..grown up, & now are the dominant military power, the old regimes & monarchies no longer see us as hillbilly cousins. America did start the wheels rolling for individual rights & freedom in other nations, but most of them are merely granted by the state.. they are not seen as inherent rights that the people have, but as concessions.. benevolent gestures by the ruling elite to bestow upon their pitiful subjects.

America COULD stay this beacon of freedom & liberty, but statism is growing stronger here, & the lie of statism is being swallowed by the majority. That lie? The state can take care of you. It can feed you, protect you, give you housing, healthcare, & a free cell phone & cable!

I see it more of a leftist talking point. The quote in question was from a left winger, trying to force his talking points into roman history. I don't know if that was true in rome or not, & i certainly don't see it in the US. We have compromised the country away.. selling our values & birthrights for a mess of pottage.

 

"Work ethic" is the biggest problem? People wanting a decent wage for a day's work is a problem now? Oh yeah....that interferes with today's mega profit corporate types. I almost forgot. Stupid Americans...they simply won't work for free....

 

I most strongly urge a trip to east asia.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_on_Fire

Its a bit on the academic side, kind of dense reading but very worth while

you wont see the world in the same way you did before

promise!

 

If we assume for a moment that 80% of federal income taxes are paid by the wealthy, then this says 20% are paid by all others...right? 42% of federal revenue is income tax. If federal revenue is about $2.2 trillion, then 42% is $924 billion, and 20% of this is $185 billion. So...everyone except the wealthy are paying about $185 billion in federal income taxes.

First, it's really staggering to realize that a super-majority of Americans are only paying about $185 billion per year in income taxes!

Now...Obama seems to believe that if the Obama tax cuts are reversed, that the lower and middle classes are going to suffer and the economy will tank...therefore, except for a handful of so-called wealthy, all other Americans must be protected from paying their way today. BUT, if they can't pay their way today, then when can they? The answer to this is NEVER! What possible changes to our economy can we expect that are going to increase the wages/income of all lower and middle-class Americans by more than 2-3% per year? Even if ALL lower and middle-class Americans gave every dime of their wage increases to Uncle Obama, we're talking about a whopping $4.6 billion per year in additional tax revenue. Well...Obama for fiscal 2013 has deficit spending at the rate of $1.7 trillion. So even if Obama asked a majority of Americans to fork over their pay increases, the federal deficit would still be $1.54 trillion...and when the entire net worth of the wealthiest Americans is around $1.7 trillion, Obama and those 'others' can confiscate their entire wealth and will manage to balance the budget for ONE YEAR only. Of course the following year the wealthy won't have a dime to pay in taxes, or any businesses to hire people, and won't be consumers of anything.

Bottom line that will exacerbate The End of America as we once knew it; excessive and out of control government spending*, refusal to ask all Americans to pay for the government which they demand, continued deficit spending, and truly insurmountable debt.

* I listened to Obama this morning proclaim that we cannot reduce government spending without crashing the economy and without cuts to Social Security and Medicare and Education and other 'fear mongering' words that frighten the political sheep. It is simply unbelievable that Obama is spending >$3.5 trillion per year and according to him no more cuts can be made. Well...stalemate America!! No more tax increases, no more spending cuts, continued trillion$ deficits...hecka of a plan...

 

That where outsourcing pioneers are "practicing up" these days?

 

Of course!

People that work for a living, and want a living wage, are entitled.

People that wear suits for a living, "work hard".

Get it?

 

Yeah...that's what I figured.
The higher priced the suit, the harder it is you work must be the premise. Someone please pass the Grey Poupon..Lovely! Lovely! Have you seen Teddy?

 

Well, i think there is a a difference. For most of the time period between 1930 & 1960, american military spending was defensive.. used to fight against aggression from other nations. Many of the other examples you cite are questionable.. some are 'police actions' to keep world peace (whoever gets to decide what that is), & some are just propaganda distortions, with no basis in reality.

Wow.. that is quite a collection of 'imperialistic ventures'. This looks like something from some left wing propaganda site.. revising history to create a boogey man for people to hate & fear. The left has been pretty successful at that, i must admit. But if you discount all those before 1920, which is most of them, you still have pretty lame examples of us 'imperialism'. There are more & better examples in the last century from many other nations in the world, including China, Japan, Russia, Germany, Britain, & more. The examples in Puerto Rico are really lame. That is like calling the action in Waco, tx against a cult group a 'us imperialistic venture'.

I'm not sure where you get your information.. you seem to be focused on some left wing strawman caricatures. I seriously doubt that half of the us population has any strong convictions about the age of the earth.. very few people in the us are young earth creationists, if that's what you're getting at.. probably less than 10%. The us is more theistic than most european countries. According to wiki, the us has about 4% atheists, compared to about 32% in france. But i don't see you railing against france for their past imperialism, nor their current problems with racism, budget, or other major policy issues.

I'm sure that much of the world 'laughs at the USA' for many reasons. They also weep for the USA for many more. Like it or not, the us is the world hegemony. But that is changing, & China is moving into the world superpower scene very rapidly. They are spending more & more every year on the military, their economy is growing, their fiscal policies are much more sound & responsible, & soon they will surpass the us in just about every area. We are in decline, they are growing, much as the us did in the last century, when the traditional european superpowers were in decline, & we moved into dominance.

How will China manage their new found position of world superpowership? Will they be a force for peace? Will they use their power to bully & exploit other nations, like most hegemonies throughout history?

Well now, that is a good question. Whose 'superstition' do we infuse the kids with? Why not just present unbiased facts & teach critical thinking? But no, most 'education' is thinly disguised propaganda, with an ideological agenda.

I'm not sure what 'fundamentalists' you've had contact with, but i've known many, & don't see them as the evil, scary people that you seem to see. I suspect you've been a victim of anti christian propaganda, rather than real experience with religious people. Were those that invited you to church vile, hateful, & hypocritical manipulators? They were probably sincere, honest people who held genuine, personal beliefs, & were not trying to force you into anything.

I'm sure we'd get along fine as neighbors, too, & even have spirited discussions about philosophy & politics!

I think you should rethink WHY & WHERE you get your information about american 'fundamentalists'. Sure, there are many extremists, from every political spectrum in the US.. that is the nature of freedom. Our wackos roam the streets freely, spouting their madness without restraint. We have anarchists, fundamentalists, communists, islamists, & extremists from any & every philosophical ideal that can be imagined. But they are a tiny minority, even when combined. The great majority of americans are sensible, responsible people, who are just being deceived by the politicians & taxed to death.

 

IMO, the criticisms you address about the wealthy are valid, & are another indicator of american decline. Most of the 'wealth' created today is by money shufflers, not actual producers of anything. Our politicians have created an environment where speculators & gamblers make huge profits without doing anything. While business struggle to compete in the markets, & people deal with a shrinking job market & reduced income, the politicians & their corporate cronies are skimming from the public treasury, passing around huge sums of fiat money, & each taking a percentage to fatten themselves. They increase their wealth by public policy & financial decisions.. bailouts, grants, loans, juicy czar appointments, etc. Instead of re-electing these clowns, we should be oiling up the guillotines. They are destroying the middle class, the currency, & the basic structure of the american economy with their misguided social engineering agendas. They are redistributing, but most is going to political hacks, not the poor they claim to agonize over.