http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,799242,00.htmlThe visitor to America was impressed by what he found. In the "magic garden of the United States," wrote the German banker Ludwig Max Goldberger in a 1903 book describing his travels through the US, he had seen an "absolutely tremendous level of activity by purposeful men who took pleasure in their work." One had to admit that the US and its self-confident population have an "amazing grandeur," he added. America, he wrote, coining a famous phrase which also formed the title of the book, was "the country of unlimited possibilities."
In his book, written for his compatriots back home in Germany, Goldberger described the rise of an economic superpower. But more than 100 years later, his description no longer seems fitting. Indeed, it reads today more like a caricature than a travelogue.
The economy of the "magic garden" is struggling, a massive debt crisis is threatening the prosperity of Americans and the unemployment rate remains stuck around the 9 percent mark. There is political gridlock in Washington. Books about the decline of America can be seen in bookstore windows, promising to explain how and why the US lost its way. It's been a long time since US President Barack Obama was seen as offering hope.
Abysmal Approval Ratings
The fact that nothing works in Washington was evident once again on Monday evening, when a special US congressional deficit "supercommittee" officially announced that the panel had failed to reach an agreement. "After months of hard work and intense deliberations, we have come to the conclusion today that it will not be possible to make any bipartisan agreement available to the public before the committee's deadline," said the committee, made up of six Democrats and six Republicans from the House of Representatives and the Senate, in a statement.
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