SOCIETY AND POWER - 24/09/2022John Adams, Americas second president, 1797–1801, famous wrote to his wife Abigail in the year 1780: “I must study politics and war, that my sons may have the liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. . . in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, and music. . .”
So that their children can major in gender studies and waste their lives on Tik Tok (if we add one more generation adapted for present conditions).
The quote accurately sums up the natural decline of an empire. When enough time passes, a dominant superpower begins to lose the cultural traits that made it great to begin with. Instead of being energetic, ambitious, and hungry, the population becomes complacent.
Meanwhile, hard-working rivals become wealthier by the day… rising, ascending, and eventually eclipsing the declining superpower. History has been witness to this natural cycle over and over again, from the ancient Greek conflicts between Athens and Sparta, to the decline of France and rise of Great Britain in the 1700s.
The United States is the modern superpower now in obvious decline, or as expressed by the former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers “There is surely something odd about the world’s greatest power being the world’s greatest debtor.”
For the past several decades, the US was the undisputed global superpower. Meanwhile US decreased production and increased consumption and leisure, so many countries - China, India, Russia, etc. were getting rich selling their products and resources to the United States. Those countries are stronger than they used to be. The US is much weaker. The power dynamics have been disrupted… and the mood of inner peace and prosperity is being displaced by chaos and conflict.
We see chaos and conflict all over the world now… much of it due to the decline of the US, much of it due to bonehead incompetence from the supposed ‘experts’ who run the show. And this new era of chaos and conflict has some implications. It makes a lot of sense to align yourself with the new trajectory of the world. Those countries in West who continue vassals of US will sure sink more in decadence together with their master. As always, independence and self-sufficiency is the best guarantee for freedom. But for small nations, the option of alliance and business has moved eastwards.
