America and the World

2007

2007-12-29-Hadar

Balance of Power Is Continuing to Shift From the US
by Leon Hadar
Antiwar.com, 2007-12-29

2008

2008-01-25-Raimondo

America – A Bankrupt Empire
by Justin Raimondo
Antiwar.com, 2008-01-25

Financial instability rooted in economic 'blowback'
from our disastrous foreign policy

2008

2008-Schrayer-USGLC

A Web page about Liz Schrayer and the “U.S. Global Leadership Campaign”

[Some may wonder who is behind
the intense desire of the American ruling elite
to keep the U.S. embroiled in all the problems of the world.
This web page, the contents of which are below, gives one example.
Emphasis is added.]


Liz Schrayer, Campaign Director

Liz Schrayer is the Campaign Director and one of the founders of
the U.S. Global Leadership Campaign,
a broad-based coalition of 400 businesses and non-governmental organizations
that support
continued global engagement and
a robust U.S. International Affairs Budget.

Additionally, Ms. Schrayer is President of Schrayer & Associates, Inc.,
a political consulting firm based in Washington, D.C.
Started in 1994, Schrayer & Associates, Inc. specializes in
grassroots organizing and political strategies
for non-profit organizations, trade associations and businesses.
Schrayer & Associates, Inc. works extensively
in the international, health care, and child advocacy fields.

[Note: child advocacy, not family advocacy.]

Prior to starting her own firm,
Ms. Schrayer served as National Political Director
for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC)
from 1983 to 1994.
Described as
one of the “architects and builders”
of the pro-Israel community’s grassroots movement,
Liz has played a significant role in creating and leading
the Jewish community’s national political operation.
She has worked on Capitol Hill and in state government.
She has also traveled to nearly every state in the country
helping to organize activists in all 435 congressional districts.

Originally from Chicago,
Ms. Schrayer graduated from the University of Michigan
with a double major in Political Science and American Studies.

[See also the
Center for U.S. Global Engagement.]

2008-09-22-Raimondo

The American Empire: Too Big to Fail?
by Justin Raimondo
Antiwar.com, 2008-09-22

Who gets bailed out – and who doesn't

2008-09-24-NYT-Muslim

Report Seeks Engagement With Muslims by Diplomacy
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
New York Times, 2008-09-24 (this article appeared on page A-25)

[An excerpt; emphasis is added.]

After 18 months spent examining
the deteriorating relations between the United States and the Muslim world
during the Bush administration,
a diverse group of American leaders
[U.S.-Muslim Engagement Project]
will release a report in Washington on Wednesday calling for
an overhaul of American strategy to reverse the spread of terrorism and extremism.

The report recommends more diplomatic engagement,
even with Iran and other adversaries,
and a major investment in economic development in Muslim countries
to create jobs for alienated youth.
It calls on the next president
to use his Inaugural Address to signal a shift in approach,
to immediately renounce the use of torture, and
to appoint a special envoy within the first three months
to jump-start negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.

The report,
“Changing Course: A New Direction for U.S. Relations with the Muslim World,”
was produced by 34 leaders drawn from
religious, business, military, foreign policy,
academic, foundation and nonprofit circles.

...

As the group pored over polls of people in various Muslim countries,
they concluded that

the negative perceptions
were generated more by American policies
than by Muslim religious or cultural beliefs.

If policies shift, perceptions are likely to change, too, the report says.

[What should happen, but no doubt will not happen,
is that the American media/political elite will pick up on this report,
give it the play in the national debate it deserves,
and then actually act on its recommendations.
Think that will happen?]

2008-10-12-NYT-Leonhardt-debt

A Power That May Not Stay So Super
By DAVID LEONHARDT
New York Times Week in Review, 2008-10-12

[Its beginning; emphasis is added.]

[1]
AT the turn of the 20th century, toward the end of
a brutal and surprisingly difficult victory in the Second Boer War,
the people of Britain began to contemplate
the possibility that theirs was a nation in decline.
They worried that London’s big financial sector
was draining resources from the industrial economy
and wondered whether Britain’s schools were inadequate.
In 1905, a new book — a fictional history, set in the year 2005 —
appeared under the title, “The Decline and Fall of the British Empire.”

[2]
The crisis of confidence led to a sharp political reaction.
In the 1906 election, the Liberals ousted the Conservatives
in a landslide and ushered in an era of reform.
But it did not stave off a slide from economic or political prominence.
Within four decades, a much larger country, across an ocean to the west,
would clearly supplant Britain as the world’s dominant power.

[3]
The United States of today and Britain of 1905
are certainly more different than they are similar.
Yet the financial shocks of the past several weeks —
coming on top of an already weak economy and an unpopular war —
have created their own crisis of national confidence.

...

[6]
At the heart of the troubles, both short term and long term, is debt.
Debt helped create the housing bubble and
has now left almost one of every six homeowners
with a mortgage larger than the value of their home.
Debt built up, and then laid low, modern Wall Street,
where firms borrowed $30 for every $1 they owned.
And in the coming years, debt will constrain the United States government,
as it copes with the combined deficits created by
the Bush administration’s policies,
the ever-more expensive financial rescue and
the biggest item of all, Medicare for the baby boomers.

[7]
In essence,
households, banks and the government have already spent
some of their future earnings.
...

2008-10-14-Buchanan

Liquidating the Empire
by Patrick J. Buchanan
Antiwar.com, 2008-10-14

2010

2010-02-23-Buchanan

Liquidating the Empire
by Patrick J. Buchanan
Antiwar.com, 2010-02-23

2010-05-13-Walt-The-end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it

The end of the world as we know it?
By Stephen M. Walt
walt.foreignpolicy.com, 2010-05-13

...

I don't want to go all Spenglerian on you (or even Kennedy-esque) --
but I'm beginning to think this era is essentially over, and that
we are on the cusp of a major shift in the landscape of world power.

...