Is the US about to lose it's "SUPER-POWER" status to the EU?

[Intelsucks]

Sometime this year, the EU will gain another ~10 nations and 150 million people. What will that mean for the dollar and the euro?

*Please correct my numbers if any of them are incorrect.

US today = 300 million people

EU today = 300 million people

EU 2004 = 450 million people


Should we all start investing our money in Europe and the Euro?

I'm somewhat surprised that there isn't more discussion about this. The EU's plans for expansion are not limited to the ~10 countries that will be joining this year. They are ongoing.

[coloradodem2005]

1. If we don't oust shrub...

...we will be a third rate power.

[sallyseven]

3. The EU will soon be the

super power and will be a force to be reckoned with. bush caused it to happen. We have gone from leader to goat of the free world. They thought that they could bully their way through and have now run into a stone wall.

[Laughing Mirror]

6. Except for military we are already a third-rate power in debt to our ears

And we see what being a militarized country has led us to.

Good-bye Empire. It was great fun, but just one of those things.

[Selwynn]

22. That's probably the best thing that could happen to us....

The bulk of our problems have to do with our "power."

[mouse7]

2. Do you believe in Dog, protector of dyslexics? n/t

[INTELBYTES]

10. Isn't he also the Dog, protector of the evian?

[seabeyond]

4. we deserve to

we need to no longer be superpower. so we can regroup shift heal and start again

[charlie]

5. We will if we continue

this Soviet style first-class funding for military might and state-protected monopolies, and fourth-class funding for research, innovation, and social infrastructure.

[drumwolf]

8. good analogy

The neoconservatives really have turned out to be our counterpart to the Soviet-era Communist Party -- and they have their own propaganda machine that would put Pravda to shame.

:grr:

[truthseeker1]

7. OPEC considering switching to the Euro

Isn't this one of the little-talked about underlying reasons for the US invasion of Iraq? To gain a stronghold in the Middle East so as to have more leverage with OPEC? Wasn't OPEC talking about switching from the dollar to the Euro?

[Tomas]

13. Maybe they will

Considering that OPEC uses dollars for oil trade and that dollar has dropped some 30% in a short period of time, oil producers aren't happy. Thanks to reckless loaning & speding by US goverment, dollar is likely to drop even more. Dollar's value loss is directly away from oil sales, not a good thing for nations that base their economy on selling oil.

OPEC moving to Euro would wreck US economy and at that point having military bases in Middle-East wouldnt matter. War is expensive.

[Snoggera]

9. Maybe not

The EU is composed of many various countries with many unique languages and traditions that impede true development of a single purpose; that being the economic domination of the planet. One of the reasons the US is slowly decending the ladder of economic domination is outsourcing to India and other countries (not parts of the EU). These countries will rise in economic status due to the incredibly low wages of the workers and resulting increase in the ability of their rulers to use the inflow of wealth to perpetuate and increase their power. The few at the top of the US corporations will continue to make obcene amounts of money, but it won't truly benefit the citizens of the US because the money will not be reinvested in the US.

The US is rapidly becoming segmented. There are greater divisions in economic equality. There are divisions that are becoming increasingly important regarding one's chosen religion or lack of. There are increasing language barriers. The educational system is collapsing.

Look into the crystal ball, and a possible future is the economic dominance of a communist society - China, followed by India.

Months ago, there was much speculation that ME countries would change over to euros, and this may happen, for a time at least, but the future does not necessarily belong to Europeans. That is a difficult concept for people to sometimes grasp. It seems the Europeans and their western hemisphere decendants have ALWAYS ruled the world, but that is not the case, and has a good probability of not being the case in the next number of years.

[aneerkoinos]

19. China is not communist

It's Confucean/Fascist or something.

[Kitsune]

11. I certainly hope so.

Although I don't think any nation should have superpower status, at the present time the EU is waaaay better than ANYONE the US could have at the helm.

[mulethree]

12. India - 1,000 Million

China - about 1,300 Million?
Japan 130 Million

It's not the #people

Look at the $$, should be pretty close and switzerlands is not in EU

Could also look at the Guns, we spend more on military than EU + China + India + Russia + (insert 50 more country names here)

[ConcernedCanuk]

14. Heck, it already has!! Russia's army's in Russia, China's in China

.
.
.

The USA has them spread out all over the globe like a thin piece of paper.

The USA has already ASKED Putin to help him out,(Thursday, he basically turned Junior down flat) now is asking India of all places ( I have nothing against India, but the US hasn't exactly been "friendly")

I'm not sure how strong that "alliance" is with Pakistan.

See what I mean?

A SuperPower wouldn't have to ask.

The US blew it the minute they went ahead without the UN.

The UN believed there was not enough evidence to justify this war. It appears the United Nations were right.

So bomb away, shoot and kill, every death pushes the US further down the ladder as they create more enemies in Iraq, and around the Globe.

Expect the US tourist trade to take a superdive this year.

And Gawwd knows what else.

[leesa]

15. The US has already lost it's super-power status. We have no crediblity

and our treasury has been looted. Our military is a disaster, despite spending twice as much on our military as all of the nearest competitors combined. We are going the way of the USSR for the same reasons the USSR went there.

[Deja Q]

16. My sig line has a very apropos graphic...

If the UN becomes a superpower, how will they deal with the US - which is right now acting as quite the rogue nation, as much as the other countries * wants to blow up, if not far more so because it, unlike those other countries, has the means!! :scared:

:tinfoilhat:

[jimshoes]

17. Seems the EU could easily put the squeeze

on the US and if they really wanted to confront us as an adversary. That unhappy scenario has no good endings.

[JohnLocke]

18. No. If any country is becoming a superpower it's China (nt).

[Atlanticist]

20. No, at least not because some dirt-poor ex Eastern Bloc

countries are just about to accede to the EU. It means more people, but a lowering of the average GDP and also there are bound to be some economic shocks like those suffered by Germany when unification took place. The EU is currently drifting with no purpose at present and has been since Prodi took over as EU Commissioner a few years ago. the EU will never be a cohesive unit in the same way as Florida and Montana form part of a whole.

I really don't think the EU wants to be a superpower (outside a few true believers from Benelux and France) - the US has always seen itself as more than a country - almost as some kind of "purpose". In Europe, we see countries as blocs of people who speak the same language and follow the same rules - in the US, you see your country as having some kind of "higher purpose" and it's this which has driven your leaders to want to be top dog throughout your history from the Founding Fathers to today.

What will do for you, if anything will, is your huge debt burden.

[loudsue]

21. Maybe so, Atlanticist, but the U.S. is practically on the verge of civil

war....civil unrest is already growing.

But unlike the FIRST civil war, there is no geographical boundary... enemies are ideological enemies, and are living among one another.

The truly wealthy among us have already set themselves up nicely for when our country falls. Americans will be slave-laborers, or we will once again unify as citizens, revolt against our government, and try to rebuild our country.

We'd vote in new leaders, but we have lost the voting machines to the corporations who are swinging elections around the country, and leaving people scratching their heads in dismay and disbelief. Our entire government is run by corporate mobsters.

It's going to be a long haul.

:kick:

[Atlanticist]

24. As a close follower of events in the US,

I agree with you on your first point - the poison (on both sides) which passes for polite political debate now is truly baffling to most Brits. I'm a British Tory (probably equivalent to a moderate Democrat in your currency!!), but I still find alot in our ruling Labour party to admire, like the Welfare State, progressive taxes and the like. Your politics appears riven by ideology, almost all of it right-wing. It was faintly amusing in the 90's tuning in to an impotent Rush Limbaugh raging incoherently about gays in the military and such-like, but now that these cretins appear to be setting the agenda, I aint smirking no mo.

I'll pass on your second view - I don't think economically it's quite as simple as you make out. I agree though, that the foxes (corporate mobsters) are lose in the henhouse and that without serious campaign finance reforms, your political system is in dire trouble. The production of your Energy bill (fortunately stalled by Congress) was scandalous - I thought government was there to serve "the people" ?

[Intelsucks]

23. It does seem as though there is much discourse within the EU

I don't follow it too closely, but on occasion, I go to this website for an overview.

http://www.euobserver.com/

[dogman]

25. We're not likely to loose "super-power" status

but less likely to be a leader without leadership change at home. The world has had more than one "super-power" before and is likely to again, especially since we have been sold-out to China.