We're Number ... 2? Are Americans in Denial About the Country's Decline?

[xchrom]

http://www.alternet.org/visions/155237/we%27re_number_..._2_are_americans_in_denial_about_the_country%27s_decline/


Politicians in the United States must ritualistically assert that the United States is and always will be the world's leading economic, military and political power. This chant may help win elections in a country where respectable people deny global warming and evolution, but it has nothing to do with the real world.

Those familiar with the data know that China is rapidly gaining on the United States as the world’s leading economic power. According to data from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), China’s economy is currently about 80 percent of the size of the U.S. economy. It is projected to pass the United States by 2016.

However, there is a considerable degree of uncertainty about these numbers. It is difficult to accurately compare the output of countries with very different economies. By many measures China is already well ahead of the United States.

[rfranklin]

1. Not to mention lagging behind in health care, education, and numerous areas...

American exceptionalism seems to be another way of describing "delusional."

[idwiyo]

2. Don't know about US but it sure applies to UK.

[groundloop]

3. How DARE you talk bad of the USA you COMMIES!!!!!!!

(of course)

Lately I've been seeing Exxon ads admitting that our (USA) students rank 17th in science and 25th in math worldwide, so at least someone is admitting we have problems - that's at least a small first step. They're tooting their own horn for giving some money to a foundation that promotes science and math teachers - that's fine and dandy but I think a far far bigger problem is that repub lawmakers are balancing budgets and giving away large corporate tax cuts at the expense of our schools. For instance, Georgia just handed large corporations over $195 Million in tax breaks but my daughter's high school can't afford to buy science and math textbooks for each student.

[Bosso 63]

4. RE: Exxon ad

Finland thinks its so smart, I say we kick its ass. USA! USA!


Also sarcasm

[JDPriestly]

6. The best thing that Exxon could do to promote science education in the US

is to admit that climate change is real and caused in big part by their products. That would encourage a lot of people to become interested in understanding science so that they could understand climate change.

[raccoon]

5. A cheering thought: "One area in which China’s policy can have an enormous impact is intellectual

property. The rules on patents and copyrights that the United States has sought to impose on the rest of the world are incredibly wasteful. This is most apparent in prescription drugs, where patent monopolies allow companies to charge hundreds or even thousands of dollars for drugs that would sell for $5-$10 in a free market."


Maybe China's policy could help put some brakes on those vampires (the legal drug companies).

[Javaman]

7. As long as the powers that be keep wallpapering and painting the scenery...

the mouth breathers of this nation will continue to think that America can do no wrong.

one day, the paint will run out and the wallpaper paste will dry out. I fear for that day.

[FailureToCommunicate]

8. "USA!" "USA!" "We're 37th!" "We're 37th!"

Deplorable.
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp0910064

[KurtNYC]

9. Article seems to be mostly paranoia about China

The author says nothing about a US decline. Nothing. The whole article is on the size of China as a market for goods and then a confused discussion of IP rights and patent medicine.

China is very poor country, now heavily polluted, plagued with government corruption and inefficiencies left over from the Communist era. It is rapidly topping out.

China did not force the US to abandon education standards, invade Afghanistan, dump trillions in Iraq, deny health care to sick Americans or declare that Corporations are people so no amount of China bashing is going to fix our issues.

[zeemike]

10. It don't matter....we are global.

And the globalist could care less about this country...after all they have houses in all the world and if the shit hits the fan here they just jet away to a nicer place....like George Carlin said..."it's a big club and you ain't in it"
So that is why they play us off against the world...make us compete with cheep labor in other countries and suck the life out of the middle class and gobble up all the good property...they would love to create an America that was a third world country where they were the landlords collecting the rent...

[4th law of robotics]

11. I'm not too worried about China

They have some major problems coming up that they've been ignoring so far but can't ignore forever.

For starters: massive gender imbalance, a rapidly aging population (makes concerns here over the boomers seem laughable), an environmental record that is destroying their farmland and making their people very unhealthy and of course a construction bubble that is about to burst.

This stories are reminiscent of the 80s when we were all sure that Japan would end up taking over the world.