Elephant in the room

When we lived in the USA we came to realise that there were some subjects you just couldn’t talk about with Americans - basically religion and politics.

In recent years both those two have grown in importance as the world has observed American religion and politics at first hand. When a friend of mine sent me a series of photos of a herd of elephants going through the lobby of a South African hotel, the thought that they are ‘an elephant in the room’ became very real!

There are an increasing number of problems arising and because they cannot be talked about, it feels like we are behaving like another animal... an ostrich with it’s head in the sand. Not that people outside the USA aren’t talking about these issues, it’s just there is no dialogue with citizens of the USA because it just becomes a slanging match and the Americans feel justifiably or unjustifiably attacked. ‘Why don’t they love us?’ I have heard them ask. We cannot answer that because they cannot hear.

External issues:

• Killing citizens of other countries through the use of drones
• Killing citizens of other countries through CIA  targeted killing
• Using ‘contractors’ (mercenaries) to kill citizens of other countries and making them immune from prosecution
• Kidnapping and torturing citizens of other countries through the use of ‘extraordinary renditions’
• Attacking other countries through cyber malware
• Attacking other countries through financial controls and sanctions
• Condoning international piracy on the high seas of specific ‘friends’

Not long ago most of those issues listed above would have been considered a declaration of war on the country concerned.

Internal issues:

• GM food supply, which could lead to food supply collapse
• Hormone induced growth for livestock affecting the health of the general population
• Poor health care for the population
• Unhealthy fast food cheaper than wholesome food
• An increasing vitriolic split between political ‘left’ and ‘right’

• Self-righteousness and pharisaical attitudes in the public arena (eg over ‘contractors’)
• Talk of arming for civil war post the Presidential election from the ‘Religious Right’
• Increasing Federal Debt

Now I am not saying that the external issues don’t warrant some response, nor am I saying all other countries are 100% innocent and perfect, far from it. What I am saying is that many other countries often have a more healthy view of their own problems. They can also often laugh at themselves.

Actually I didn’t realise how pervasive the problems were and how large till I put them down as a list. Then I started wondering about the rise and fall of different empires in the past: Greek, Roman, Ottoman, British and so on. Is the American Empire on the ascendency or the decline? Have we reached the peak or are we over it? Is it a decade, two decades or a century before we see it collapse? Will it indeed follow the pattern of previous empires or will it continue till the end of time?

Each of the great civilizations in the world has passed through a series of phases from its birth to its decline to its death.  At least one historian has chronicled them as 'descriptive stages' in the life of an empire:-

1. the first stage moves from bondage to self-determination and confidence;
2. the second from confidence to great courage;
3. the third from courage to liberty;
4. the fourth from liberty to abundance;
5. the fifth from abundance to selfishness;
6. the sixth from selfishness to complacency;
7. the seventh from complacency to apathy;
8. the eighth from apathy to moral decay;
9. the ninth from moral decay to dependence;
10. and the tenth and last stage moves from dependence to bondage.

(http://www.essentialism.net/EmpiresDie.htm)

I'm not sure I actually agree with the 10th step. But is America at the end of its empire days? If not, where in the life of the empire has it got to?