Americas decline pretty real

Tony Miselli

   There are plenty of folks who think America is doing fine and will continue to be a world leader. Josef Joffe points out the various cycles of predictions of Americas decline and that there has always been a country that America feared and thought was going to surpass them from Russia to Japan to current day and china's dramatic rise on the international stage. In his book "The Myth Of Americas Decline" this writer wants to assure that America is by far the top country and will always remain so. What Joffe fails to recall how these other empires have fallen in recent centuries and indeed this process is possible for every country including the United States.He  fact that thirteen terrorists flying our own planes were able to cause so much death and destruction is proof enough this country has declined to such a point that only a dweeb with some neo-liberal agenda would refuse to see this and this is what I am sure is the case with Joffe.

   Joffe shows many graphs and charts throughout this book and the total ranking in many categories where America remains well above the rest. Part of this country's power rests in its ability to spend so much on military and to be able to use that power in acquiring economic allies around the world. This author seems to have n criticism of the only manufacturing g base we have allowed to remain in this country with the industrial military complex as this is an industry that cannot be outsourced. This nitwit writer says little with the prison and security surveillance state and sees nothing wrong with the direction this country has taken in the past few decades. He refuses to see global outreach and the cost of maintaining these military colonies as an economic threat to well being and quick decline of America. His assurance seems based on the fact that the Soviet empire fell and that Japan didn't eclipse us when everyone thought they would easily surpass us in the eighties. He dismisses the power of state owned enterprises in other countries and the fact that America was often built with state backing of industry and certain monopolies that really is not much different than a modern day Chinese state owned enterprise. The growth of wages in China only bodes well for the Chinese as they are producing an internal market that will dwarf Americas yet this writer Joffe thinks it will spell doom and slow growth in the near future for China. The fact that an authoritarian country like China has risen so fast should be an alarmist to all of those who do seriously take issues with Americas decline and an internal examination of the problem is really what is necessary instead of a bullshit book like this one that wants to tell people everything is fine. E United States doesn't even invest in education of building up the infrastructure while what was once third world China has a great system producing engineers left Nd right and a more extra gent train and new urban areas that make America look like Africa. Josef Joffe needs to visit China