America's Relative Decline

"For most of the history of the American empire, government has been a tool for preserving and furthering the power and might of white male corporate elites." ~ Cornel West

"We better rethink the position of the United States in the world and whether we want to be an empire. Being an empire puts all of us in jeopardy. The American Empire, while it was just wreaking havoc on other nations, didn't bother us." ~ Howard Zinn

"The American empire should be destroyed." ~ Aleksandr Dugin

"The American empire is hovering between life and death." ~ Mohsen Rezaee

Power is never permanent. America is still the most powerful nation on earth, but its grip on power is slipping.

The first sign of decline is always financial. Wealth and resources are what fuel power, but if they are squandered, the foundations crack. The American national debt has passed $34 trillion, a sum so staggering that it cannot be understood.

With each year, the burden grows heavier, a silent noose wrapped around the country's future. The gap between the poor and the rich grows, with a shrinking middle class to separate, creating a splintered society where the riches are in the hands of the few oligarchs and the masses struggle to hang on to the facade of stability.

At this level of disparity, unrest grows, unity is lost, and the fabric of power begins to rust.

Infrastructure such as roads, bridges, clean water, sanitation, ports, and power grids, deteriorate due to diverted taxes to fund the military industrial complex. Capital investment, in infrastructure, has been long delayed, prone to disruption.

For 30 years during the post-cold war era, America dominated global order, now new powers are emerging. China, has become a serious challenger. Its economy continues to grow with no slowdown in sight, its military keeps developing, becoming increasingly technologically advanced and its influence stretches into Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Russia, and Latin America. The American dominance is fading away; the world is evolving toward becoming multipolar. Countries such as India, Russia, Brazil, and the European Union do their own thing without feeling like they must model themselves after America.

The Iraqi war, the drawn-out Afghan war, and the countless military invasions or attacks directly or indirectly with proxy wars have drained American resources, weakened NATO, and eroded trust. America, once seen as a democratic force, is now suspicious even in the eyes of its closest friends.

Political polarization in America continues to grow, paralyzing the country's ability to act as a democracy. Social unrest deepens, propelled by deepening racial tensions, economic hardship, and a sense of increasing feeling that the American project is crooked against the many for the few oligarchs. In the eyes of many, the American experiment is an illiberal democracy.

Even though America is still a Goliath, its dominance is no longer absolute. China, which was merely a rising power, now is nearly as strong economically as America. It already has surpassed America by some accounts, and its ambitions have no intention of stopping.

The battle for technological dominance, economic power, and military supremacy will only intensify. The question is whether America will accept the reality of its declining hegemony or resist the inevitable, clinging to the past while the future sweeps it aside.

America is at a fork in the road.

Will America alter, or will it share the fate of all past great empires, stuck in its own arrogance, blind to the fact that its time of unchallenged hegemony is over?