Joe Nye is one of the smartest people I know. He is also a mentor, from my graduate school days at Harvard. So I was worried when I saw that he disagreed with my Time cover. But then I read his article in Foreign Policy today and discovered that we don’t really disagree that much at all.
We both recognize that there is data that suggests that the United States is on top and other data that shows it’s slipping. The future remains one of multiple possibilities and my hope, with the article, was to push us in the right direction. He agrees with me that worrying about decline actually helps prevent it.
That said, I think the problems we face are big and simply saying we’ve come through difficulties before is not enough.
Since the 1980s, the U.S. has faced a significant set of challenges. We avoided them largely by taking on debt – individuals, local and state governments, and the federal government took on huge debt. We expanded credit and consumption and got a few booms out of it, the last one being housing-related (2000-2007). But this is not sustainable. We have to create the conditions for long-term growth and productivity.
Joe and I probably disagree most clearly on politics. I really think that American government has become totally dysfunctional. I don’t pine for Chinese-style authoritarianism. I pine for the politics that made it possible to build the interstate highway system, fund science, create great state universities, build NASA, create the internet, open the borders to talented immigrants, and do it all while maintaining fiscal balance.
On every one of these issues, the political system is now paralyzed or moving in the wrong direction. Happy talk about the genius of the founding fathers is not going to get us out of this jam.
(Joe Nye is taking your questions online here. )
 |
Post by: |
© 2012 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
| Advertising practices | Advertise with us | About us | Work for us | Help
Fareed, I usually agree with your viewpoints. Not this time. The government is no more or less dysfunctional than it has ever been. In the past year we've seen a health care bill passed, a new treaty with Russia, a stimulus package, the rescue of GM, extended tax cuts, repealed DADT, etc. Arguing that these are the wrong policies is a legitimate approach if one so wishes, but arguing that government is dysfunctional seems to fly in the face of the many changes that have occurred.
That said, I applaud the Time article because we need to wake up as a nation. Worrying about an issue (and blowing it out of proportion) has always been the American first step toward finding a solution.
What have any of those bills done to help you or me? Nothing. The government passes that crap so they can they can claim to be accomplishing something. Fareed is right. Our government is broken. And thats going to become more and more evident as the years go by.
We need to help ourselves, these Harvard educated people who believe they can fix the world only cause more problems and waste more money. I don't want the government to do anything for me, I want them to leave me the heck alone so that I can enjoy my life and make a living.
I disagree, our government has become dysfunctional since the 1980s and perhaps prior to that! President Reagan and his wife nancy consulted Astrologists (Taro Csrd readers) for advice on how to handle the nations problems, President Bush (both Sr and Jr) were part of Skull and Bones ( An occult group) of which many of our former preseidents have been involved. President Clinton lowered our nations moral standards and ethical values to almost below zero with his White House scandals and lies. Secretary of Defense Cheney and many other Senators, Congressman and White House staffers wrote bad checks using the White House bank and were all but excused from what should have been Grand Larceny and jail time. President Obama is selling our country down the drain in a hand basket with his government takeover schemes being supported by both the House and Senate (Republican and Democrats aliike). Basically even if you think all of what I have written is not valid, just look at our country and the truth will hit you in the face! That is unless you have had it buried in yor proverbial behind for the past 20 some years. We have no morals, no ethics and just plain no class representation in our government fro a long time. The standard bar has been lowered so low, that we shouldn't even be discussing this at all. We have failed our children and once great nation under God for which it stands! Abraham Lincoln once said as he quoted from the bible, " A house divided cannot stand" I say we have lost our foundation which our founding fathers gave us and have been rebuilding with straw and bricks every since.
I think that cuts in our budget is needed. which ones? I believe it is time that Congress comes together, and worry about America period. Not just one particular group such as the tea party. The constitution says Gov of the people for the people,by the people. We are not a country built on the influence of one particular group. They are suppose to be looking after America, not trying to be a group dictatorship.,which is what we will be if tea parties control the Government.
Other words a Group dictatorship, which will leave us to be possibility conquered. We are one nation under god, with liberty and justice for all!
You and Roger Moore have no idea how much $$$ 14 Trillion dollars is, or how hard it's going to be to pay it off, or how perilous to our standard of living it is. This President is blissfully overseeing our financial ruin via the most outrageous deficits in history (HE HAS DONE NOTHING TO STOP THIS, THE BUSH DEFICITS PALE IN COMPARISON TO OBAMA'S). Unfortunatly WHAT you pass and what you choose to ignore matters!
With an estimated world population plateau of around 9.5 billion in 2050, resource crises which we expect to get worse over time, it is disheartening that there are those that still talk about growth based economies as if they are ordained by god. Unconstrained growth is not the solution, it is the problem. We need to manage what we have, ensure the quality of life of all peoples and find a way to live sustainably on this small island of life. Let's learn from the extinct inhabitants of Easter Island rather than repeat their mistakes. Let's not sell our children's futures to greedy men who can't think past the current fiscal period.
Human beings are not the problem. Human greed and politics are the problem. We need to love people and work together for a better world. More abortions and eugenics are not the answer.
I agree, but I honestly do not see enough of a change happening and people just aren't "waking up" enough. I was saying this even when the mortgage bubble burst and everyone went on a tangent on the economy. Two years later can we really say that significant progress has been made in terms of becoming more fiscally responsible.
The reason I don't think banking on past recession experience will not work is because this meltdown has a global component to it. The only criticism I hear about China is that their authoritative but regardless of whether that is true or not they are a threat to American businesses and the counter to the Chinese movement cannot be an attack of their social and ethical foundation.
The media in this case can help by providing information on what people can do to make small changes. I think most people are overwhelmed by the significance and complexity of the issue and hence don't make the necessary changes .
http://globalchatter.wordpress.com
I'm assuming you meant "authoritarian" not "authoritative." If that's the case, sure they are, but that is a plus if you're trying to move policy forward, not a minus. If you view them as "a threat to American business" it must be as either A. A threat to the monolpy on world trade, in which only the U.S. has the right to compete. OR B. A threat to the poor little U.S. businesses who cannot compete on a playing field that they have created. Perhaps you feel we are threatened by some other means. It's my hope that we continue to be the country of ideas who will make the changes in production techniques, items/ideas we do produce (better than most countries, most of the time) and education which will make all of this possible. The theat is not external, it is internal when we try to destroy the very institutions that make us great. Which institutions? Public education for one. How did we manage to get into space and to the moon? were all of thoses NASA guys privately educated? Russia did it too. China is doing it now. Perhaps there is more than one way to be successful.
Fareed, I agree with you in as much as I've heard from you, both in your CNN special, as well as the Time piece. America's government, our very way of doing politics, does indeed (IMHO) need a radical change. America today is quite different than America 100 years ago, and is light years from what it was 235 years ago. This two-party system, with all the bureaucracy that comes along with it, is keeping us deadlocked. The infrastructure that you refer to is so desperately needed, but to many it sounds like the dreaded socialism (gasp gasp). In fact, there is much different between the European model that has worked so well and the socialist model (whether its the classical socialist model, or the communist brand).
The arena of politics today is much more about short-term, sound-byte ideas than substantive, long-term, nuanced solutions. Everyone is so polarized, and so concerned with winning politically, that nothing is able to get done.
What worries me most, though, is that there are such different dreams and ideas for America's future co-existing currently in the minds of Americans that I'm not sure, as long as the public has such a large role to play in politics, that it's possible. Your suggestions, that I think happen to be spot-on, will unfortunately be rejected by a vast number of Americans. Therein lies the problem, to me, inherent in American politics. Americans are different. We have different social locations, different religious beliefs and perspectives, and different ideas of what exactly America is and/or needs to become. How can we expect, with the flowering of differences only continuing to bloom, that Americans are going to come to the table and agree on the complex, nuanced solutions necessary? Call me cynical, but this to me is the unfortunate reality I see every time I turn on the news. A plan and set of ideas that sound good to one person, sounds perfectly awful to another. Now, it's easy for me to dismiss many who disagree with myself, or others whom I hold in esteem, as uneducated. It's clear to me now, however, that this is not necessarily the case. Experts on subjects disagree. I am in the academy of biblical studies, where PhDs get together to duke it out of interpretations of ancient passages. You and your friend/mentor Joe Nye (both Harvard men) are certainly educated, yet there seems to be a good deal of disagreement about how to carry out America's reforms.
How does America go forward, united in a plan of action, when it seems that Americans (both educated and not-so-educated) cannot agree to any real depth on how to move forward?
I totally agree. We have so many simply voting for their own benifit – voting to promote their own set of benifits from the government. And everything is terribly politicized, we can't cut anything witout someone's social and moral agenda being shattered. Oh and anyone who even tries to think like a moderate is taken out back and shot ... yea, I share your pessemisim ... I think we are in a much more dangerous time than people realize.
This country has been moving in the wrong direction since WW2. We need to stop spending so much on the military and foreign aid and to quit producing weapons that we'll never need. Above all,we need to stop going around the world looking for trouble! As long as we keep electing these Conservative fanatics to public office,this government will grow ever more dysfunctional.
Onesmallvoice you wrote that we need to "quit producing weapons that we'll never need." but what if we do that and one day wake up to find that we're invaded by a rival power and those weapons could have said millions of lives, yes I understand that if this were to take place (really big if) this would have to be some years down the road but still think about it.
However I do agree with you one most of your other points we do spend more then what is needed on defense and we hand out foreign aid money like candy on Halloween, but i think the point America started down this path was not after the end of WW2 because after the war we built the interstate and our industrial sector was the best we've seen it so far. I think we started down this path by trying to bribe every country that even started talking about communism like it was a good thing and with the infamous the Iran contra fiasco
Fareed,
Please keep up the great work. I enjoy listening to and reading your insightful opinions. Americans have never been able to cope with hearing or addressing the ugly truth although it is necessary for all of us to discuss it. Phillip makes an excellent point about the many different views being a significant obstacle to needed change...which is evidenced by Joe's comment. Bottom line is those who have enough to eat tonight do not want to recognize the vast majority is starving, our world is poisoned and dying, and America is running on fumes with three flat tires. Instead, they continue to delude themselves and pretend to believe the lies they are fed by our elected officials.
We need to educate the population, take away the potato chips and Twinkies, and put their fat asses on a treadmill. Ignorance, gluttony and laziness are and will always be the detriment of this country. We need strong leaders who are intelligent and capable of implementing structural changes to correct the many fatal flaws with the way this country has been managed, the way we interact with the world (with bombs) and the deep “corruption” in our political system, at every level. The human beings in DC are no different than those in any other country – corrupt right down to the bone. I ask the average American to call your US senator and ask for an appointment to discuss a gripe you have with government. After your request for an appointment is denied then make another call and tell them you want to make an appointment to deliver $100,000 of donations you collected for their re-election campaign…then tell us which call got you the meeting with the senator! Same game at every level – corruption.
I don't know about dysfunctional. They seem to excel at implementing a whole lot of really awful policies. They're very productive in a horrendous sort of way. Name one other country that can carry on this many insane wars simultaneously, make so many millions of poor and middle class people poorer, so many rich people richer, the environment so much worse, unemployment so much higher, all while cutting away at the foundations of freedom and democracy at home and abroad.
I agree. Increasingly dysfunctional over the last 20 years or so.I fear the problems are very deep- historical trends and all. We could use a few dozen Mark Warners in the Senate. We don't have them.
The bargain made with our form of capitalism, where a rising tide used to lift most boats, increasingly does not work in this globalized economy with resulting sharp social/class/political divisions.
It seems to me that a large measure of trust has been lost in all institutions, esp government. That trust was part of the social contract between individuals and their company -now in tatters with lost pensions and lost jobs. And then, of course, the derivatives disaster.And the contract for public employees stands threatened as well. The sense of community and common weal has been eroded. Vested legacy interests hold our reps and the people hostage to economic activities less suited for the changed world.
There is little agreement on the problems, their priority, their causes, and even less agreement on how to solve them.
The population and educational institutions have begged off civic engagement, where fewer possibilities exist. Our media distract and entertain more than inform the citizenry. We have fools or devils in the Supreme Court, and a congress that refuses to stand up for our liberties.We have a bloated military in a misguided war. We have congressmen trying to shutdown US participation with other countries on global warming. We have no discernible energy policy, unless drift and hope is a policy. We have regions of this country economically devastated by globalization and the policies of our government. I could go on. I find it hard to be optimistic. But, who knows ?
I am encouraged by the thoughtful tone of the posts here. I am a nurse, 58, currently in graduate school. I worry about hte world my grandchildren will inherit.
The first question for me is, what can I as an individual do to help our countrymen communicate more effectively? I avoid the "entertainment" news, which is unfortunately most of it, and seek venues where we can talk with seriousness about the issues others have posted about so well. I agree that some basic ways we reason together have eroded in our country. I feel we have been too easily manipulated by powerful interests into opposing camps. How is this being avoided in other countries who are doing a better job? Is it the nature of the American character that hurts us, or something else? Our media? Our leadership? What can I do to help change it? I want to know.
I blame our leadership.......and the American public. I wish the American public wouldn't believe everything they hear from our politicians, they need to do more research on their own and start electing people that are for the American worker and not the corrupt banks, corporations and wall street.
It is a fact that we, by our very diverse nature are dysfunctional. We have no method for cutting out the controversy, which takes so much time and energy, and focusing on the issues we ALL agree on. By our nature we, with our commerce driven media, bloated corporate super-conglomerated military \-inductrial complex, and populace driven by greed and laziness are goaded into the most contrasting viewpoints possible. Why? Media feeds not on truth, but on viewership. Military industrial complex feeds not on peace, but on war. Auto companies feed not on beneficial environmental controls, but on easy-status-quo non-alternatives. The populace lets it happen because, they believe that it's part of their right, as a free society, to disagree as a matter of course. It's way easier to disagree, than to find solutions, or areas of agreement. To call China an adversary may feed the media's need for viewership, but they are doing a good job in promoting their goals with their system of hybrid command and market driven economy. The "sour grapes" attitude of some people doesn't address the fact that China is doing something right...and evidently we aren't. We seem not to want any other parties into our system because that would be too much to handle. The big 2 elected dictatorship parties wouldn't let Nader into the 2000 election debate. We get what we let the government get away with. Soon, the redneck red-staters will realize, it's not the dems vs. republicans. It's the middle-lower against the rich. I'm for a 1 party system. The American party...party on
I am disgusted that CNN is not covering the protests in Wisconsin. Once again we are failed by our corporate owned media. Americans are extremely uneducated uninformed and deceived about the reasons why our country is in this financial mess. WE are convinced to cut teachers salaries instead of making Bank of America pay its fair share of taxes. The hoax is over. We are awake!!!!
This article accurately depicts WHY I moved out of the USA permanently back in 2007. I now live and thrive in New Zealand happily as a New Zealand Permanent Resident going for my NZ citizenship soon.
Best of luck to all of you fighting the corrupt corporate-owed, greed-filled 100% dysfunctional US Government...
My thoughts of hope are with you everyday.
Cheers from New Zealand
Understood, I think. Easier to fight the good fight from the outside? or easier to escape the vitriolic rhetoric? NZ congress just isn't that load, or are they all on the same page?
I am not flighting the US Govt from outside. I gave up. I escaped the "regime" called the US Government.
NZ does not have a "congress" like the US Govt. We have a Parliamentary Democracy here. It's not perfect, but it's 100x better than how the US Govt works...
Bryan, my husband and I agree with you, in fact my whole family does, my mother, my 3 grown childdren.....fighting the corrupt corporate-owed, greed-filled 100% dysfunctional US Government, IS totally dysfunctional. Our country is slipping in many areas, education, jobs, health care, etc.......We are falling behind everyone. I moved to Norway last year with my husband after he was laid off from his job and he was unable to find work anywhere in the country, in his field of work. He got work within 2 weeks in Norway. There are thousands of Americans living in Norway that lost their jobs in the states and are waiting for things to improve to come back.......that includes our dysfunctional government, that is owned by wall street and corporations. I know there are thousands more living in other countries as well. I won't however, do as you did and give up my citizenship. I am American until my last breath.
Hi Cheryl,
Norway is nice I hear. Good job on the move!
However the USA I was born in during the 1970s is long gone. It will take a miracle and then some to get it back to it's 'normalcy' as the word means.
As long as
- the "privately" owned US Federal Reserve owns the money creating system,
- as long as large US Corporations like "Haliburton" are allowed to be awarded billion dollar NO-BID contracts because their EX-CEO was the VP of the United States
- as long as Presidents like Obama will take away money from Educational grants (Pell grants) to lower the debt cause by the illegal wars in Afghanistan and Iraq
...the country will be helpless to help itself. Most US Corporations are reporting an INCREASE in profits this last year, but there's been no increase in USA job creation really. At the same time, these wealthy $700B bailout babies are being rewarded with tax incentives and pay hardly any Federal Income tax as compared the average Jon Doe on Main Street.
The country we grew up in (assuming you're 35 yrs old or older) is long gone. Enjoy your Norway-based life as I am enjoying my life here in NZ. Cherish the freedoms and life where you are now an MOVE ON from the unfixable mess the USA is now.
Cheers...
B
Cheryl,
I had an exchange student from Norway, a lovely girl, but she was very puzzled about how a great country like the USA, which she loved, had these poor people begging on the streets eveywhere. She said they don't have that at home-they care for the homelss and the mentally ill there. They have health care and college education as a birthright there. For everybody. And I have to say, I had no answer for her. Your letter just reinforces what she told me. And makes me wonder who we are becoming.
Bryan,
How does the parlament work in NZ? How are big issue's settled differently than here?
Fareed You are a clear voice for sanity! Thank you for Your contribution to the American dialog!
Washington D.C. booms while the rest of the country falls into forclosure etc.
Big banks get bail outs and pay their buddies huge bonuses
Glen Beck's and Sarah Palin's rant and stir up fear, hatred and ignorance in order to sell books and get speaking gigs
Still we are privileged to live in this great country- of Lincoln, MLK, national parks, space exploration, universities etc
One benefit to the pain many of us small businesses(myself) have been living through is a dose of humility + honesty
So we are no doubt more open to innovation now more then ever, but I'm not sure all of us see the urgency yet!
A day may come with an event or simply a tipping point where that urgency sparks the American dream to it's past great ablity to expand and improve the way things are done on this every shrinking planet! I do think it's in our "dna"
I look forward to that day and for now I'll keep myself in a learning mode and be watching "your take" –thanks.
give this a watch everyone..
cheers,
B
Dysfunctional ? Far from it. However, rife with hubris and hypocrisy, and dominated by a gullible "white" majority is ,more trenchantly accurate. Our corporate media inoculates us by prefixing "corrupt" when mentioning several foreign nations. Then rationalizes the obscenity of rising gasoline prices. "White" America touts our "democracy" and the founding by "revolution." Those founding fathers enshrined the slavery which, for free, provided the foundation for our economic primacy on the international scene. We have allocated multiple trillions of dollars to ensure our security by creating NATO and the infrastructure of the UN. Yet isolated an entire continent, Africa, making it the only one without veto power. The second largest with about 2 billion people. Here at home, the prevalence of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, living in "inner cities" where apathy and despair dominate. And whose fellow citizens have a life span, significantly shorter than the average citizen in Cuba, a poor country. In addition, the overall baby mortality rate there per thousand is lower than it is in the US. We ended slavery, but tolerated segregation and discrimination which denied equal opportunity for multiple millions of fellow citizens. WE continue to use the racist descriptor "Indain" originated by ignorant Europeans. The Canadians, are, at least attempting to recognize that impropriety by substituting The First Nations peoples. We have lots of work to do in our own back yard, rather than all those far away places, filled with people, about whom, we have absolutely no clue whatsoever.
Fareed,
On your program you yourself have acknowledged that the world of the 1950s has changed. The US Govt's balance sheet has gone from being a net creditor to a net debtor. It's competitiveness has eroded in the export market and its share in the percentage of global production has fallen. It can simply not do all 'stimulus' and investing that you propose without drastic cuts in social spending and defence.
I think if you have to start anywhere, I would suggest before asking for government investments in x, y or z, ask yourself which tax break are you willing to give up.
Yep those that control your government with all the money use debt to enslave american system to fight wars how else is america going to repay its debt to china. I think they want to start a world war with north korea and china. democracy in america is a myth. The people with all the money hate real democracy. but love to control with debt. Like they control Australia for its resources and thats all it will ever be. But what do they get the americans to do wait and see I guess because just about impossible to pay off the debt? Right or Wrong
Fareed,
Thank you for your thoughtful and insightful commentary on American as well as on world news, specifically your take on the changes that are sweeping through the Middle East. Also, thank you for this space you have provided for comments. I've enjoyed reading the comments of others & feel I've benefitted from the many points of view found here.
My own two cents about the dysfuntionality of American government and ultimately America runs like this. 1. We have become so increasingly materialistic as a people, reducing every undertaking to a material profit, that we no longer seem able to see, for example, that public education is not a business, it's a service, a public good. Of course, it must function effectively, but it must do more than turn out worker bees & solipsistic young people who are trapped inside their technological bubbles. Yes, schools need to be able to contribute to innovation & economic progress, but first they must be able to train strudents to think clearly & ask hard questions as well as to understand & to cherish the treasure of the past. 2. Mentioning the past leads me to another aspect of America's increasing dysfunctionality which is the devaluing of & the loss of the past. Several decades ago I gave a poetry reading at the German/American House in Heidelberg. I ended the reading with a series of poems based on my childhood growing up in a small American town on the East coast in the 40's. Afterwards, there was time for comments & questions. What was wonderful were the glimpses into the past that the audience members shared of their childhoods. Finally the director drew this part of the evening to an end by holding up both hands as if he were pulling on a string, saying that at every point in history families, communities & societies have been & are subject to a variety of stresses & eventually what happens is that this thread of our existence breaks. I did not say at that time but thought then & have thought in the many years since that there are ways to strengthen that thread, renew it. Looking at my country now in the 21st century, I am not sure if the American thread of existence, that grows out of our past, may not be irretrievably fraying apart & that this great experiment called democracy we've been working on may fail. 3. Finally, thinking about what many people have said in their comments about American individuality, has led me to think about how this quality is making it hard for us to agree on public policies. The problem I think is not our individuality but our increasing reluctance to hear each other out & to respect other individuals whose points of view we see as opposed to our own. Tracy, the 58 year old nurse in graduate school puts her finger on this problem when she writes that "basic ways we reason together have eroded in this country." Could one reason be that we have stopped valuing others, those we sling emotive words at like mud, that we do not value them as we wish to be, need to be valued, as individuals, each one of us possessing an intrinsic worth? I toss this out as one who is no longer a church goer nor a formal believer in any religion but as someone who continues to be moved by the experience of the Christmas Eve Candlelight service when, as the lights in the church are darkened, the candle each person holds is lit, the flame being passed on person by person until everyone raises a burning candle to make a great golden glow in the dark.
Fareed- thanks again for this space.
Being on top of the trash heap and/or aspiring to stay there doesn't amount to much in my book. Situationism!
This review of our government is mostly accurate. However, there is one area that I would to take issue with. Fareed does not mention that beyond being inefficient, the present form of our democratic government is unfair. Much of that unfairness is caused by the inequality of resources available to our constituents. The rich and powerful can afford to "buy" politicians to make themselves even more rich and powerful, regardless of the welfare of the larger community. It has reached the point where the richest 400 (Forbes) people in the US control more wealth than the bottom 50% of the population. Do we really want an Aristocracy? The people of our country have come to accept that "Greed is Good" and people are entitled to anything they can get away with.
" The people of our country have come to accept that "Greed is Good" and people are entitled to anything they can get away with." .... you nailed it Vernon.
Washington is dysfunctional and than I think about the words of President Reagan: Government is not the solution to the problem, government is the problem. Another reason being is beside politics is incomptence. Large bureaucratic institutions like governments have become too big to be managed as a result nothing happens.
The tremendous increase of bureaucrates under the Obama administration is caused by the democratic roots and that is socialization including the recent health care reform. Incompetence at the top is causing a larger organization, longer decision canals and ultimately no decisions whatsoever.
Since President Obama lacks any decision making or risk taking experience – as is presently seen in connection with the turmults in the Middle East and especially Libya – no decions in the White House are made. Showing again how dysfunctional Washington has become. President Reagan – as Commander in Chief – would already had ordered bombs being dropped on 'Mad Dog' Qadaffi' s hometown Surt and saving thousands of lives.
There is no question of disfunctionality. It is the clear strategy of the Republicans and Tea Party extremists to undermine the effectiveness of the President. The reasons are many – they cannot win any actual policy arguments, for instance. But sad to say, the resentment and even hatred of the fact that there is an African American president is a very significant contributing factor. How shameful!
The root cause of this problem arises from an altered global environment. Before the globalization fever caught on, most businesses were homebound. At that time the government regulated the businesses and the businesses largely kept out of messing with legislation. Even if they did, it did not cause much problems because money TRICKLED DOWN to the the middle class here in America. When globalization came along, the businesses needed to silence the government because they needed to take jobs abroad and they wanted to sell cheaply manufactured products in the US. Their lobbyists went to work – and today we have a government that can be bought and sold like a flock of cattle. Everything has a price now.
I have laid out this root reason of our nation's misery in an allegorical / satirical short story. Please check out
http://centerfiremedia.blogspot.com/2011/02/usakee-legend-of-chief-promising-change.html
The US has been destroyed by the lack of leadership at the top. Both, the WH, and the Congress, have spent most of their time looking out for big business, and themselves, as the wealthy and powerful, and not the citizens.
Now, we have no jobs, the government wants to import skilled workers, and leave Americans out of work, and all of our manufacturing has been sent off shore, mostly to China.
The country is deeply in debt, and there is absolutely no way to pay it off, while the WH continues to expand the debt, daily, with runaway spending.
Illegal immigration has destroyed our economy, and nothing is being done about it. Just this week, we learned that California has become the first state to now have a Hispanic majority......because of illegal immigration. All of the border states will reach that point, in the next few years. Meanwhile our states cannot fund the schools, because most of the kids in our public schools are illegal immigrants, who pay no real estate taxes.
That situation is exacerbated by the drugs being brought into the US by the Mexican and other Central and SA drug cartels. Drugs have killed our society, and we do little about it. All of our large cities have hundreds of drug cartel agents in them, which law enforcement knows about, but our laws won't allow law enforcement to do anything to stop it. Our legal system not only protects the criminals, it encourages crime.
The country has no where to go, but downward. Plain and simple. I think America is beyond saving, and indeed, I would recommend to any young person today, that they learn languages, and expect to have to leave the US to get a job. Any kind of a job.
I agree that the US government is totally dysfunctional. We need to change into a parliamentary democracy. Ever wonder why there are so many "undecided" voters or "blue dog democrats"? It's because there are not enough political parties with real ideologies and platforms. One can also argue that the USA is too large and should be divided into 4 or 5 smaller countries, Personally, I think New York state and New England should secede from the USA and ask to become part of Canada. Then at least I could sleep better at night.
The US government is dysfunctional BECAUSE it is 100% corrupt right down to the bone.
Our politicians are highly EDUCATED and very INTELLIGENT…it would be a grave mistake to think otherwise. The problem is not that they are ignorant or lack leadership skills….the problem is they are willing to sell us out for a buck EVERY TIME because they know the vast majority of the public will eat the garbage excuses they feed us such as “illegal immigrants”, the “Chinese” and “drugs” are the reasons why American’s can’t afford a home, food or health care - but the US can spend $1.5 billion per day for 9-years, bombing the crap out of Iraq and Afghanistan. Better yet, we can give billions of dollars (in aid) to other countries (Israel, Pakistan, Columbia, etc) while we chop billions from our education and health care budgets
Rick McDaniel's comment is at the core of "why" politicians continue to be corrupt…because the ignorant public would prefer to blame “illegal immigrants (Mexicans)”, the “Chinese” and “drugs” for the problems with America and its leaders. Certainly, the problem is not – the idiots that voted for the corrupt politicians! The problem is the laborers that work 16 hours a day in the blazing heat, handling produce covered in carcinogens and getting paid $3 an hour BEFORE TAXES…yes, they pay taxes!!! I live in CA and have never seen a white man (who wasn’t driving a tractor) work in a farm field to harvest the food we eat or mow the grass or scrub toilets. The Chinese do the same – they work harder for less money. GET OVER IT…American’s do not have an entitlement to the highest standard of living simply because we were born here!
Kinda’ makes it hard to be a proud American when we’re surrounded by so many idiots. This is why we’re the laughing stock of the world. If it wasn’t for our military, we would not get an ounce of respect from anyone in the global community. Just take a look around and you will see the majority of Americans are fat, lazy and ignorant people with no values other than watching the garbage on TV everyday…why would anyone respect that…why should anyone respect that? Our politicians DON’T!!!
the United States should stay out of other countrys business. We can't even take care of our own country with all this debt. The U.S. will fail as a country, the only reason why other countrys haven't collected their money yet is because the U.S. will threaten them with war. The government has not right to bother other country's, Like the Native Indians (The Soiux and other Tribes all over) were cheated. The United States is a Bully country, we bully other countrys into giving us oila dn letting us build bases in their country. the United States cheats other countrys like they have the Native Tribes of north America. The U.S. government will fail and I sure hope it does.
I agree with Fareed. However, we often as Americans make our greatest progress from the depths of discontent. out of the chaos and dysfunction perhaps there will emerge another movement to combat the dysfunction – perhaps a moderate movement – a mild mannered new age of reason? Or are we only attracted to extremes? Still our dynamic political culture will cause some equilibrium – I am an optimist
we have for years been lost in a failed experiment of economics. supply side economics with free and unregulated world trade has done nothing but move jobs out of this country to cheaper labor or to workers with a lower living standard. the balance of trade is always going to the benifit of the importers because country like china controls the value of their currency to keep their prices artificially low. trickle down was a pronise that if people on the top had more money it would trickle down to other americans. the proof that it failed is the average wage for an american worker per year in 1985 was $33,400 a year in 2008 that average was $33,000. when the party that pushed this experiment onto this country admit it has failed nothing in washington is going to get done that doesn't support this distuctive ideological . the republican presidents are the ones who borrowed most of the social sucerity surpluses to pay for the tax cuts for the rich to aid trickle down ideology that still has not worked. the total amount owed to social sucerity is now at $2.5 trillion dollars. they still want to hang on to this failed ideology so they have some got the american people to believe that social sucerity is a cause of the deficit. the baby boomers paid the surplus for retirement of $2.5 trillion to help with their retirement and the republicans gave a large amount of our retirement money to the rich. ran paul said that this is the first year we have had to borrow money to support social sucerity and thats why we have to cut the program. this baby boomer looks at it like a payment on the loan thats was taken out in the amount of $2.5 trillion from this account. the only reason that republicans want social sucerity gone is so they don't have to pay the mony back and it would also be a big tax break for business who now pays a matching amount of what an employee pays to social sucerity. even a conservitive must see that raeganomics has failed this country and only made a small number of people rich. i wonder how many more years of this failed ideology it will take before americas streets look like the streets of the high unemployment and the very low paying middle eastern countries who are revolting because of these problems. i am 60 years old and hope i don't live long enough to see it but i do feel bad for my grandchildern future of being trickled down on for life unless we get of this track of economic distruction!
Your post kinda assumes that the Dems has all sorts of alternative ideas and views ... I'm sorry, but they voted for the vast majority of wars and financial programs that consist of the mess we have now. There have been plenty of Dems in the white house and congress the past 20 years. It's foolish to not give them some blame too. You and I are both old enough to remember those halicon days of the 70's when the unions drove the US auto industry almost into total destruction, or the glorious life and times of Jimmy Carter. The best we have had it is when we had a Republican congress and Clinton as a president .... and a tech boom (not created by ANYONE in washington).
I've been encountering quite a few Americans who are emigrating (or planning to emigrate soon), especially those with families who don't want their kids to grow up in the kind of dysfunction that Fareed is bringing up. It's nothing partisan, it's just that educated and hard-working Americans of all stripes can see that the US system is collapsing into the same kind of gridlock. corruption and crony capitalism that has paralyzed Banana Republics in both hemispheres.
Emigration is easy in part because nations in Europe and Asia make it easy for their overseas Diasporas to return home, provided that they attempt to learn the language, avoid crime and work. And whatever a person's political persuasion, countries like the ones in Scandinavia, Holland, Germany, Belgium, Finland and eastern Asia are just better-run than the United States and Britain these days. Even Americans of Irish, Greek or Italian descent, from countries struggling more with debt and mismanagement, have the option of going anywhere in the EU once they return to their ancestral lands. Those are much better places to raise and educate kids, with better infrastructure, not to mention that educational, health care and housing costs aren't totally ridiculous like they are in the US. So Americans of European and East Asian descent in particular, are emigrating in droves. (Many older Americans are moving to sites in Central and South America too, but that's more a matter of retiring in a sunny climate.)
This mass emigration of native-born Americans is an indication of "voting with their feet." And while the pull factors of well-run Asian and European countries are a factor, the push factors of US dysfunction, as Fareed points here, are increasingly important as well.
Yea, a pretty sad commentary on 'the American dream'. We have become so divided and hateful towards each other, I just doubt if the breaches can be brought back together. We have half of the country wanting/needing to live off of the government, the other half wanting to support the relentless greed and rape of what's left of the middle class. We are indeed a mess right now. We overcame every external threat, but can we survive the threat we pose to each other?
Why do people blame governments? How are commoners better than their government? In democratic societies, governments are better than commoners. Usually.
I would agree with Fareed that the American government is dysfunctional. I don't agree,however, with his reasons why it is dysfunctional. The American government works well when both parties work together for the benefit of the common good. This assumes in our government system that the representaitives of the major parties represent the views, the values, and the thinking of mainstream America on major issues and problems facing the country. This was the case for most of the last century, but is sadly not the case today.Today both parties are focused more on dividing Americans rather than uniting them. Both parties are controlled by and play to special interests. The Democratic and Republican parties have been hijacked by people with extreme views both on the left and on the right. Both have lost their respect and civility for each other. This has resulted in a toxic political environment where no serious progress or results can be achieved.It is one of the main reasons why the government cannot agree on anything and has difficulty making decisions that are based on the common good. What we really have here is a government where there is a daily culture war going on between two parties. Is there any question in your mind, Fareed, why this government is anything but dysfunctional? Could it also be, Fareed, that it lacks Presidential leadership? Where is the President and how has he brought the parties together for the common good?Is not the President and his leadership style a critical piece of the equation that has b een missing and makes for a functional government? I submit, Fareed, it is crucial and is sorely lacking in our government today.
Fareed, it's really great to be able to comment on your site. I have the utmost respect for your considered and coherent opinions. Regarding the dysfunction of government, I can't help but think that a lot of our problems would just vanish if public campaign financing replaced the current campaign cesspit. The way our system is geared at present rewards wrongdoers and very handsomely too. It's getting worse, more billions being spent each election cycle, and the average person has less and less voice especially since the Supreme Court seems to be "in on it" with their inane decisions. It doesn't matter who we put in office, while they are funded by big money, they will just go the same way. The voice of the ordinary citizen is being drowned out more each time. I believe we can change this system if we envision it and push it. Taking on Goliath can be done. We could give it all we've got. Success may not come the first time round but we should be resolute. Imagine every candidate getting equal airtime and hear their policies clearly and in depth? Imagine not having to be affronted by the constant and puerile advertising that so pervasively dominates the campaign scene. We just do not demand enough of our leaders. They should submit a kind of business plan and be accountable by a loss of some sort if they don't adhere to their plan. No WMD after going into Iraq was virtually met with a blase response such as "oh well we acted from Intelligence findings, let's move on now". What caliber of person are we hiring when the only qualification seems to be a big cache of funds in their coffers? The US is filled with bright intelligent and creative people. Having only the wealthy able to run for office means we all lose out. There is a bill that pops up every now and then called the Fair Elections Now Act which would bring in public funding, and allow ordinary citizens a chance at running for office. As a citizen it is ridiculous the amount of work it takes to keep an eye on the perpetual trickery of Congress. They don't govern, they campaign full time. We need to bring in fresh, intelligent and inspiring candidates instead of recycling the same old wealthy blockheads. Till we do, the dysfunction is sure to continue and cause our woes to spiral evermore out of control.
Yes there should realize the opportunity to RSS commentary, quite simply, CMS is another on the blog.