Imperial Pretensions Buckle Under Borrowing
By Aziz HuqDo empires end with a bang, a whimper, or the sibilant hiss of financial deflation?
We may be about to find out. Right now, in the midst of the financial whirlwind, it's been hard in the United States to see much past the moment. Yet the ongoing economic meltdown has raised a range of non-financial issues of great importance for our future. Uncertainty and anxiety about the prospects for global financial markets -- given the present liquidity crunch -- have left little space for serious consideration of issues of American global power and influence.
So let's start with the economic meltdown at hand -- but not end there -- and try to offer a modest initial assessment of how the crumbling U.S. economy might change America's global stance.
7 comments:
Zactly!
History has proven that empires are not sustainable. Military expenditures cause implosion.
vigilante,
this guy (who I'm not familiar with) really laid it down well.
bro tim,
empires did pretty well when they exacted tribute from their satellites, not too much, not too little, so it's debatable. What's less debatable is when they don't rely on tribute, but on loans.
Shortly after the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in 1918, the world changed about 24 years later. I am not even beginning to suggest that the United States would select a leader as radical as did Germany but I do suggest it will make a huge change in the current paradigm. Unlike what happened in Europe this will be change for the better. A President Obama will bring hope and relief to this embattled nation.
Definitely hope; hopefully relief.
Not sure what he'll do domestically, but he's tipped his hand a couple of times. He said, for example, that he read all of Kevin Phillips' books (The Wealth of Democracy, American Theocracy, the new one about financial implosion). If so, I think he's got a Green Deal up his sleeve; and yes, to an extent that does mean Energy Socialism.
Foreign policy-wise, I don't take his statements about Afghanistan and expanding GWOT very seriously; they're just an oriental screen to maintain some dignity over a retreat. Indeed, the Obama Doctrine is said to be about granting other nations and peoples, even if they have been adversarial in the past, a modicum or starting point of dignity.
nice post. thanks for sharing.
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