David Seaton's picture

    Grace is a slippin' and a slidin'

    By David Seaton on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 2:55am |

    The bigger they come the harder they fall. The United States has a systemic problem: America's loss of power is the major story of our era. What is happening, what has happened, what will happen? Don't look at me, your guess is as good as mine.

    When a system gets clogged up, all the king's horses and all the kings men have difficulty getting to the root of it. The complexity of the situation is so overwhelming and there is such an accumulation of factors that even with historical perspective it is difficult to get a sure answer. They say that the lead pipes that wealthy people had in their homes brought down the Roman Empire by making the women of the senatorial caste infertile... but even after centuries to think about it, that is just speculation. Was it a meteorite that caused the extinction of dinosaurs? Go figure. Once upon a time there were hundreds of Howard Johnson's restaurants all over the USA, now there are only three left. Sic transit gloria mundi.

    Some will call me a prophet of doom, but I consider myself an optimist. America will bounce back. The United States is a great country, filled with hard working and inventive people and you can't keep a great people down for very long. Ten years ago nobody would have ever predicted that Russia would be in as good shape as it is today. That should be some consolation in times to come.

    When the USSR went down, most observers read it ideologically, that we in the west had "won". Our merit had caused it all to happen. This was probably a big mistake. Perhaps that collapse did little more than reveal that a huge, powerful, system, one that had industrialized an enormous, backward country and made it a scientific, political and military superpower that had defeated Nazi Germany almost singlehandedly in WWII, could just simply collapse mysteriously. Just up and die. Just like that.

    The United States, instead of taking a victory lap, might have been more prudent to murmur then, "there but for the grace of God go I" and gotten busy looking to its own vulnerabilities instead of crowing and preening, because it appears that ol' Grace is seeing somebody else these days.

    Cross-posted from: http://seaton-newslinks.blogspot.com

    Comments

    Russia has rebounded, but don't forget that her people have paid a terrible price. Crime bosses control everything, men are drinking themselves to death and women have stopped having enough babies to replace the population.

    I know you've read Orlov's comparison of the two superpowers, but here is a link for others. BTW, I just read that another Russian, Igor Panarin, a former KGB analyst, is predicting that the US will disintegrate this year. He sounds like a crackpot, but his map is really funny, especially the part about Mexico controlling the South. That could only happen if the cartels take over Mexico first:

    Breaking Up Is Easy To Do

     

     


    by Donal on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 8:41am

    Donal, that map is hilarious, just another piece of evidence that former KGB analysts continue to be much more clueless than our admittedly clueless CIA. My favorite is SC acquiesing to a fate tied with those noreasterners and probably joining the EU. And "Alaska will go to Russia"...riiight....only if you're resigned to reading about "the breakaway republic of Alaska," Mr. Pananin. And how about them libertarian western states hanging together with the Canada-friendly Great Lakes States? Oh and remember the Alamo, hah.


    by artappraiser on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 12:01pm

    When the market goes up, everyone is Pollyanna. When the market goes down, everyone is Cassandra.

    If you're going to be Cassandra, at least fill out the scenario and give us some evidence other than a picture of whale. How's it going to happen? Collapse of the dollar? Energy crisis? Chinese supremacy? Green goo falling from the sky?

    Surely you remember the late 1970s--stagflation, OPEC crisis, violence and drugs skyrocketing, major cities on the verge of bankruptcy, industry collapsing, and Japan buying up everything in site. It really seemed like it was all over then.


    by Michael Wolraich on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 9:02am

    My theory has always been that the Cold War damaged both systems terribly. The USSR being the weaker of the two succumbed first, leaving the USA with its military-industrial complex, rotting infrastructure, endless defense commitments etc, etc. 


    by David Seaton on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 9:20am

    There's no question that we spend way too much on defense, but how does that lead to socio-economic collapse? In the case of the USSR, the communist economy was brittle, the people were poor, and the corruption dwarfed anything we've experienced here. The defense spending was simply a contributing factor.

    If the US economy is at risk, then the defense spending could contribute to the strain. But what's the mechansim? How does it play out? And why is this recession that one that's going to do us in rather than the others that we've weathered through the decades?


    by Michael Wolraich on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 10:00am

    I don't see a sudden collapse, I see a long, ungraceful degradation to a nation with a much smaller middle class. Like Russia, the US has a lot of millionaires, but I expect that after things settle down, the elite class will shrink as well.


    by Donal on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 10:09am

    How long we got, doctor? A decade? Two?

    I'm not saying that everything's rosy, and I'm sure that someday, the U.S. will devolve or disintegrate just like every other nation in history. I just suspect that none of us has a clue about when or how that will happen. For every true prophet, there are a millions false ones who weren't so lucky.


    by Michael Wolraich on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 10:24am

    Man, that's two brilliant aphorisms in the space of three comments. I should become an aphorismizer. I've always wondered how you get to be one of those people who are known for their one-line quotes.


    by Michael Wolraich on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 10:26am

    I don't know, of course - no one does - and as I have criticized those who make too-specific predictions, I am certainly not going to do the same thing myself. A lot of things that could happen but seem unlikely, like limited nuclear war or harnessing fusion power, would change everything.

    Our economy is clearly losing jobs, and I don't see them coming back as long as it is cheaper to make stuff overseas. If oil prices rise enough to make it cheaper to hire locally, we could see a rebound in US manufacturing.

    According to most Peak Oil gurus in 2005, energy prices were supposed to have skyrocketed by now resulting in some sort of Mad Max scenario, but they haven't. Between savaging our environment to get the last bits of oil, coal and gas and the global recession, the prices have been fairly steady. That could change, but I don't know when. And eventually the costs of fracking our groundwater and filling the Gulf with crude oil are going manifest themselves on the economy somehow.


    by Donal on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 11:35am

    People were much more concerned about losing manufacturing jobs in the 70s when we were hit with the brunt of them. Frankly, there's not so much manufacturing left here, but the US has been able to diversify to handle the changes. We will have to stay nimble, for sure, but it's not clear that there's a doomsday scenario here.

    Energy shortages are much more worrisome to me because they could be rapid and traumatic. That scares me, but as you note, it's very hard to accurately predict doomsday scenarios even when it comes to natural commodities.


    by Michael Wolraich on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 12:15pm

    Right now the question would have to be, what exactly is the USA? The people? The system? The economy? Whose economy? 

    What exactly is the USA?

    This is really important in America's case, more so than in other countries, because "American" isn't an ethnic group or a religion or even a language, and people move around a lot and are not deeply rooted; and to top it off the family structure isn't very strong. So the question, "what exactly is the USA" is something every new generation of Americans has to answer... and it is getting more difficult, I believe.
     
    When, back in the 50s "Engine Charley" Wilson enunciated his famous formula: "what is good for General Motors is good for the USA and vice versa", he was probably right, or it least  the phase made sense at that time. Today, could you say something like that about General Motors or substitute any other corporation's name for GM's? Would it still make any sense? Try it with "Goldman Sachs".

    Right now, we are looking at the possibility that the economy may "recover", but that its "recovery" will not mean any jobs. So we have to go back to the original question, The people? The system? The economy? Whose economy?  What exactly is the USA?

    I think that the difficulty in answering this question, "what exactly is the USA", is what makes the situation much more worrisome today than the crisis of the 70s or even the 1930s.

    by David Seaton on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 11:47am

    Does a country need a brand name mega-industry to have a national identity? That's like dependency on single crop, e.g. potatoes. The reason that the nation didn't swoon when GM when into bankruptcy is because our economic viability and national sense of well-being is no longer pegged to GM's stock price. That's a good thing, imho.

    Problems, we have. If the jobs never come back, that will be an even bigger problem (though I note that even our current unemployment rate is, as usual, less than Europe's). But problems come and go. What you seem to be saying is that we're facing some really BIG PROBLEM--bigger than we've ever faced before--which will topple the country. But I'm still not seeing your rationale. Your vague sense that America is less defined than it once was does little to explain why our problem is so BIG this time. How are we ill-defined, how does that present big problems, and what exactly were we talking about again?


    by Michael Wolraich on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 12:09pm

    I think to really talk about this topic one has to realize (which I think everyone here does) that a nation and a state are two different things.  In the U.S. like a lot of the Western European nation-states, the nation and the state grow up together and were mixed together, so one's identity of being part of the French nation or the U.S. nation was tied to one's identity as being a citizen of France or the U.S. 

    For most of the U.S.'s history, the recognized citizens were generally from the same cultural background, and thus there was little strain in terms of these folks seeing there being "one nation."  But as the "mosque" crisis that has emerged recently, the strains in what everyone can agree upon to allow inclusion into this nation is emerging.  Can one speak Spanish only and still be an American?  All of which is running parallel to the issues of citizenship and dissatisfaction with those who govern, along with a disillusionment with the whole governing system.  One can hear all too clearly in the calls to "take back our country" which is coming from both the left and right of the political spectrum.

    Whether this will break about a collapse anytime soon, who know?  Is is just as likely that we will emerge with a new understanding about our nation, or in other words, our identity as a "people," as well as renewed engagement in the political system at the grassroots level.  All other things aside 9/11 did show that deep down there is still a very strong sense of nation in this country, for better or for worse. 


    by Elusive Trope on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 12:46pm

    For most of the U.S.'s history, the recognized citizens were generally from the same cultural background, and thus there was little strain in terms of these folks seeing there being "one nation."

    I read a book a few months ago that warned of the "immigrant flood" threatening America. The author described the newcomers as immoral, lazy, ignorant, disloyal, unpatriotic, drunk, unskilled, criminal, unsanitary, and unattractive.

    The book, titled The Old World in the New: The Significance of Past and Present Immigration, was published in 1913. The problematic immigrants were Greek, Polish, Italian, Irish, Jewish, Lithuanian, Bulgarian, Romanian, and Portuguese.

    Immigrants from foreign cultures are nothing new. Nor are xenophobes who complain about losing their country to them.


    by Michael Wolraich on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 2:16pm

    The Gangs of New York I think does a pretty good job of showing your point.  It also shows how fragile order is sometimes.  How close are we from slipping into anarchy in any given moment.  The question generally is: what do the powers to be see as in their best interest?  Usually those at the top prefer order over fragmenting chaos.  Riots in the streets are bad for business.  And as soon as real sh-- hits the fan in the streets, the average person prefers the authorities restore order.  Riots are bad for lawns and cars parked on the streets. 

    The issue, however, goes beyond immigrants, whether the dirty Irish or the dirty Mexicans, being the target.  It cuts to the definition of what it means to be an American.  There are those who would say an American born citizen, and a child of American born citizens, who is Muslim is not part of the nation.  We hear people talking about losing the country not to immigrants but to homosexuals and their gay agenda.  And so on.

    None of this new.  What does seem different than in recent past (whereas if we go back further, we do get something called the Civil War - a time when the nation did split momentarily)  is that there are those with their hands on the levers of power, whether business media or government, that seem to believe that it is in their interest to facilitate that disorder, to facilitate a fragmentation.

    I don't believe some kind of disintegration around the corner.  But we all know what happens when we play with fire.


    by Elusive Trope on Wed, 09/29/2010 - 11:24am

    I wouldn't say that America is in more trouble because it is less defined, I would say that the why it is becoming less defined is the problem. Indulging in self-quote I said:

    When a system gets clogged up, all the king's horses and all the kings men have difficulty getting to the root of it. The complexity of the situation is so overwhelming and there is such an accumulation of factors that even with historical perspective it is difficult to get a sure answer.

    I am worried about the political paralysis, the growing inequality. The decline in the capacity to actually make things that can't be digitalized anymore.  Look at Germany, they didn't invent the Internet or Windows or Facebook or Google, but they can still make the world's best capital goods using German workers... not to mention the BMWs etc... They are roaring out of the recession right now... and not just the top one percent.

    I'm also extremely worried about the incipient fascism imminent in Glen Becks tears. That this man is not laughed off the air is not a cause of anything, but it is a symptom of extreme decadence in my view.

    Again, I insist, people have been very glib in talking about the collapse of the Soviet Union, but only one person, Emmanuel Todd, ever predicted it; certainly it caught the CIA with their pants down. We are talking about the collapse of not just the Communist system but of the empire founded in the 17th century by Peter the Great. My view is that if it could happen to the USSR it can happen to anybody.


    by David Seaton on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 1:17pm

    Of course it can happen to anybody, but that says nothing about the likelihood that it will. I'm also very concerned about Glenn Beck, not to mention a number of other problems in the U.S. But I try to avoid epic prognostications for the simple reason that I've got no clue what's going to happen next and don't believe that anyone else does either.

    Short-sighted obituaries are a particularly common form of overconfident prognostication. Germany is a perfect example. Just a few years ago, Germany was the "sick man of Europe." Suddenly, in the blink of a historical eye, Germany is hot again. Who woulda thunk it? And for Japan it went the other way. Buying up properties across the globe, amassing huge surpluses, and dominating every industry on the planet...those folks were supposed to take over the world. But where are they now? Still slumped in a two-decade recession with an aging population, a dysfunctional government, a mountain of debt, and a newly powerful neighbor who is the next media-anointed heir to world domination. But far be it from me to predict the demise of Japan. Give 'em a couple of years, and they could be right back on top.


    by Michael Wolraich on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 2:37pm

    There's no question that we spend way too much on defense,

    In terms of the US. v. USSR discussion, though, we adjusted way way down, compared to what they were doing.

    Edit to add: and personally, I think that's something I think we can thank the Democratic party for doing, in creating blockage and doing the obstructionism thing against President Reagan's worst desires, even though he managed to ramp it up a lot.

    (BTW at the time, we waz all told that we would never get out of the debt mess Reagan left us from doing that, and also too that our great grandchildren were still going to be paying for the Savings & Loan Scandal. Wink)


    by artappraiser on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 2:07pm

    In the US, the Cold War was the vehicle to motivate public hatred to support a political ideology, namely anti-socialism/communism. McCarthy was the ringmaster that served the horn of plenty for those wishing to indulge. Since the demise of our adversary...USSR...the Party of McCarthy focused their hatred towards Democrats and it's all been downhill ever since. The only big change would be the merging of the military-industrial-complex with the global business sector and banking. The public has no place in government other than voting as expected. However, since the Robert's Court is giving out corporate birth certificates, soon businesses will have as much, if not more clout as the public.


    by Beetlejuice on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 7:36pm

    You think Russia is in good shape now? Based on what?


    by artappraiser on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 12:16pm

    Based on what they were like under Yeltsin.


    by David Seaton on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 12:30pm

    As good of a short summary of their last decade as I have seen. It's strings and mirrors. I'm not a natural doomsayer--have a lot of faith in evolutionary processes in human societies-- so I think chances are it will continue to hold, but it's still strings and mirrors that will eventually have to be replaced:

    The Business of Russia Is Corruption
    The Moscow Times, 20 September 2010
    By Alexei Bayer

    [...]

    In the 1920s, U.S. President Calvin Coolidge famously said, “The business of the United States is business.” To restate this expression to reflect Russia, “The business of Russia is government corruption.” For the past decade, the Russia has been producing massive corruption, successfully turning top government officials and well-connected entrepreneurs into Forbes’ A-list billionaires.

    Russia’s system of political corruption is rigid and tightly interlinked. Moreover, it is wedded to a highly inflexible and narrow political system. The system is diametrically opposed to democracy and a free market, which possess considerable flexibility to accommodate economic and political shocks. The real danger in the Luzhkov scandal is that if such an important, huge link in the corrupt chain as the city of Moscow is tinkered with, the entire state edifice might come tumbling down.

     


    by artappraiser on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 1:06pm

    It's a livingWink


    by David Seaton on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 1:14pm

    And you're arguing your classic "the U.S. is doomed/the U.S. is doom" points in the wrong market. It''s everyone else that needs more convincing than we do:

    Obama More Popular Abroad Than At Home, Global Image of U.S. Continues to Benefit

    June 10, 1010

    Overview

    As the global economy begins to rebound from the great recession, people around the world remain deeply concerned with the way things are going in their countries. Less than a third of the publics in most nations say they are satisfied with national conditions, as overwhelming numbers say their economies are in bad shape. And just about everywhere, governments are faulted for the way they are dealing with the economy.

    Yet in most countries, especially in wealthier nations, President Barack Obama gets an enthusiastic thumbs up for the way he has handled the world economic crisis. The notable exception is the United States itself, where as many disapprove of their president’s approach to the global recession as approve.

    This pattern is indicative of the broader picture of global opinion in 2010. President Barack Obama remains popular in most parts of the world, although his job approval rating in the U.S. has declined sharply since he first took office.[1]  In turn, opinions of the U.S., which improved markedly in 2009 in response to Obama’s new presidency, also have remained far more positive than they were for much of George W. Bush’s tenure.

    Ratings of America are overwhelmingly favorable in Western Europe. For example, 73% in France and 63% in Germany say they have a favorable view of the U.S. Moreover, ratings of America have improved sharply in Russia (57%), up 13 percentage points since 2009, in China (58%), up 11 points, and in Japan (66%), up 7 points. Opinions are also highly positive in other nations around the world including South Korea (79%), Poland (74%), and Brazil (62%).,,,,

    continued @

    Pew Global Attitudes Project

    http://pewglobal.org/2010/06/17/obama-more-popular-abroad-than-at-home/


    If you retort before checking out alll 9 chapters of the report on the right side menu, don't be surprised if I come back atcha with info. from them because I read the whole thing. BTW there's a chapter on environment/global warming.


    by artappraiser on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 12:39pm

    Art,

    Don't get me wrong, if the USA collapsed, a lot of people everywhere, not just in the USA would miss it, but this isn't like Peter Pan in the theater where we can save Tinkerbelle if we believe in fairies... The problem is the system itself and the difficulty in reforming it... Going back to Russia, their entire system collapsed, but they still were Russians, but if the American system collapsed, what would Americans be without the Constitution? Multicolored fat people out shopping?


    by David Seaton on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 1:11pm

    if the American system collapsed, what would Americans be without the Constitution? Multicolored fat people out shopping?

    People who still believe you don't need to be an inbred DNA-sharing tribe to form a nation. Like Canada, Australia, Venezuela, etc. Just because Rummy used new world vs. old world distinctions to nasty aims doesn't mean it's still not a real distinction. I'll place my bets on new world type folks being better able to weather a globalized world than old world type folks anytime, so apparently do the people who created the EU and those that want to get into it ( like Turkey which I think you get wrong.) I can turn that around on you and ask will happen to France if it can't continue its apparent need to ethnically and/or culturally cleanse rather than assimilate.


    by artappraiser on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 1:52pm

    Actually the Republique of France's record of assimilating foreigners is probably only rivaled, but not surpassed, by America's. Camus is a Spanish name, Levi-Strauss a Jew, Aznavour is Armenian, Yves Montand is of Italian stock... But just like the USA they have their fascists, Le Pen, Sarkozy.

    I maintain that America's tribal DNA is the Constitution, without that  I think things could break more or less on the lines of the Russian crackpot's map.


    by David Seaton on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 2:17pm

    Oil and nautral gas...they pratically have western Europe by the balls and have been squeezing hard for the past few years.


    by Beetlejuice on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 7:37pm

    I wonder how many people realize how many people were required to build those cars, thrucks, toasters, radio, TVs, lawn mowers, stereos and what not before computers, CAD/CAM CNC and robotics made their jobs oboslite. Whether they are here or off shore, there still would not be nearly as may jobs now as then for this simple reason.

     


    by cmaukonen on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 3:57pm

    That is the problem! No matter what skills one learned in their youger years and additional skill sets as time and technology progresses, you are alwyas behind the 8-ball. Business wants the new technology skill sets, but aren't willing to take the time or expense of training people. And by the time you get those necessary skill sets, they're obsolete and no longer necessary...there's a whole new set of skills needed by industry. Much of what experience I have gained over the years has put me on a path of migrating with the technology as it moves from the US, to Europe and now off to the Middle East and 3rd world nations. And it's been simplified so just about anyone can handle the minor details of daily operations...I'm only needed when things go horribly wrong and the system is just about at the point of going up in smoke. In short, industry has been quite successful at dummying down job performance and expectations.


    by Beetlejuice on Tue, 09/28/2010 - 7:51pm

    Something's got to give someday, no?


    by David Seaton on Wed, 09/29/2010 - 1:49am

    It already has. People will eventually have to migrate with the jobs as they move. You can't have a home anymore because the value-added growth as a home owner has disappeared. And personal effects and belonging have to be light and disposable because they're too expensive carry with you or to put into storage because you have no idea if you'll ever return. I know because I've lost about $25,000 in personal property since Bu$h first took office. I'm settled in Europe for now, but if my only source of income departs the area, I have to figure out a new plan of earning a living and that means moving again with even less. The global economy is slowly turning us all into wander nomads seeking employment where ever at what ever price is offered.


    by Beetlejuice on Wed, 09/29/2010 - 11:58am

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