America The Doomed?

You ever sit and wonder what our country is gonna be like in 20-30 years? I mean really think about it? When you look back over the past hundred or so years, the most dominant country in the world isn't hard to figure out. We held the top position in nearly every category of importance: manufacturing, military power, technology, general global influence; the entire gamut. We made planes, trains, and automobiles; we produced Coke, Nike, and PC's; we held the world on a string and didn't hesitate to let every living being on the face of the planet know it. Why am I using past tense verbs? Because if we keep on this current path, the American empire will be a past tense noun.

The disturbing part of this is that we're going to implode. We're all up in arms over terrorism or some foreign assailant trying to conquer us when the country is digging its own grave and waiting for someone else to push us into it.

The economy? Let's shift manufacturing overseas for cheap labor and to maximize profits. Never mind that the more jobs you send to some foreign land the more American people lose the ability to buy your over-priced product because they have no job. Let's , because we don't manufacture like we used to, put our investments in mortgage-backed securities because the market is booming...oops. There goes the economy. Now what do we fall back on? Manufacturing has been the back bone of successful nations since the Industrial Revolution...its not coincidence. The trade deficit is growing like a 12 year old Shaquille O'Neal because we DON'T PRODUCE ANYTHING. We can think it up, copyright it, and sell it, but at the end of the day that only helps a small percentage of the population. The rest of us are out in the cold. Everything is being shifted toward more service oriented jobs, but if no one has any money who are you gonna service? College degrees are given out like 10% off coupons these days, so going to school no longer equates to getting a good job; more and more it is equating to getting large debt. The large debt that has made it impossible for middle America to buy a home in a decent neighborhood without having to sell their soul to XYZ Corp. for a wage that doesn't keep pace with the cost of living or inflation (I know).

We're falling behind in education also. Government initiatives with fancy names that basically throw money at the problem have proven time and time again to be a waste of tax money and time. We have to change the learning environment. Our kids are being taught to regurgitate instead of think and because of this we are raising a nation of 4.0 morons. Train teachers to stop reading from the text and start challenging the pupils with concepts that make them solve problems instead of looking for the answer (there is a difference). We also need to change the cultural climate of learning in this country. We need to find a way to make students think and above and beyond that make them want to think (maybe by engaging them instead of talking at them...just an idea).

Speaking of cultural climate...our entire country needs a overhaul in that department. We're cocky, we're arrogant, we're ethnocentric...we're falling behind. This idea that America is the biggest, baddest, and always will be is starting to fall apart. Our high level of self-importance can't continue. We NEED other nations economically and politically to remain on top or at least near the top. France doesn't like our war and we'll write them off as frog-eating sissies. Another leader criticizes our policies and we brush it off as political propaganda. "Terrorists" attack us and we rush to accuse them of being jealous of our freedom and riches. C'mon. The same chest thumping complacency that has led to our decline in other aspects (education and the economy in particular) is leading us down a path to self-destruction. We don't need to change because we're on top and until someone knocks us off it's all good, right? Wrong. Asia (particularly China and Japan) are closing the gap and we may find ourselves on the outside looking in.

I think we'll get through the charade called the "War on Terror". I'm not so sure we can get out of our own way. We need to become a little more concerned not just with knowing what is going on in the world, but how the effects relate to us and what we need to do about it. We are absentee citizens waiting for the next person on tv to tell us what to do. This country will not survive, at least not as the world's strongest nation, being comfortable with the status quo. We need to think bigger, we need to think better, we need to invest in the good of the American people instead of the good in some millionaire's dream. The foundation is cracking and we're concerned with the roof.