For many years America has been the sole power on the world stage but all that is about to change - an old factory window finally falling from its frame to shatter on the earth below! As this article is written Mr George Bush Junior sits in the White House, a lame duck President who has nothing to give and who quite possibly has completely ruined the American image abroad for the next generation at least!
This year may be called "Americas fall from Grace"!
In 2020 when scholars and experts look back it will be easy to see how and why China reached No1! But here and now as the American population entwine themselves in the complexities of voting for a new president they cannot see what they are doing and why economic crisis looms, why oil prices are so high and why nobody abroad really likes them very much at all!
Taiwan says they sort of like them for the protectionist stance they give as does Israel and a heap of other smaller countries that need America's military prowess and muscle! China is going to build aircraft carriers boys! Nobody else appreciates the brashness, the loud-mouthed bullying instinct that American politicians have spread to the four corners of the globe.
A few years ago when America was right at the top, when Japan was faltering, when Europe couldn't get its act together and when China was a mere third world country with a bit of loose change in the pocket, life looked good! America took advantage of the cheap labour in China, they threw bags of money into the country, and they introduced all that was bad from McDonald's to Gucci handbags! They started the ball rolling by introducing cheap capitalism and now the beast has taken control! So much money invested in another country yet now the control has been taken over! Too late to back out, too late to realise that it is not all about cheap clothes and toys, doesn't society have enough of them anyway?
It has always been (despite the fact that Americans have only ever won one war and then only half of them won that one) the American way to act first before devising the plan - without a plan B to fall back upon! Brashness over common sense, arrogance over practicality! Another link in the current economic crisis is Oil, the fact that billions were spent invading Iraq and Afghanistan, supposedly in the name of "humanitarian aid" but as everybody knows for Oil! Yet, common sense prevails, change lifestyles, sell the SUV and buy a small car - introduce mass-public transport (subsidize it if necessary) or get people to walk! Reduce the dependency on Oil and with that will come a lower dependency on what somebody else owns!
Stuck in the castle and under siege its does not make sense to have the well outside! This current crisis has shown clearly that America cannot raise the drawbridge, they cannot withdraw into themselves and wait the situation out - they can only play to the whims of oil prices and keep the moat empty!
Now, as the American Population look towards the polls as a way out matters can only get worse! The choice: Hilary Clinton, the plastic-faced evil temptress in a mask rashly talks about obliterating Iran; Barack Obama, his links to the loud mouthed Anti-American Preacher still debated about and who talks nicely but spends most of his time trying to knock down Hilary with smart remarks; and the old guy - is he really up to the scratch or the fall-back guy in-case the other two don't pan out?
What is missing amongst the candidates is somebody whose sole aim is to improve life at home, not by rashly promising to reduce taxes or increase health care but by going back to the basics to state that America and its people need serious help and to do this they need to go back a few steps when America was at the fore-font of innovation and in charge of affairs at home. Life has to change for the Americans if they are to remain as a force on the world stage, attitudes and lifestyles have to be modified to reduce their dependency on other countries and equally so to reduce the hatred and dislike that many countries have of American "brashness", these things must become a thing of the past!
If Americans were to become self-sufficient, if an enviable rail transport system was built, if people actually lived in communities instead of requiring large gas-guzzling monster trucks to go to the corner shop, if people tucked-into civilised sized portions of food instead of a meal for six, if they kept their mouths shut tourists might actually want to come and visit, if poverty was tackled, if guns were banned, if the president could actually talk sense, if, if, if……
From abroad America resembles a crumbling monstrosity bumbling along day by day whilst the rest of the world creates, thinks and acts - the sea-saw is coming down with fat America scraping the dirt. The world still listens to America as so much is tied into the dollar from previous years but as soon as the dependency on the dollar finally ceases then with it will be the power that America once had on the world stage!
This year is called "Americas Fall from Grace"!
