Oh it's worse than that.
April 08, 2026 - 16:39 UTC
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What if the Suez Crisis but also Iran-Contra but also the Agadir Crisis but also the Tanker War but also the Barbary Pirates but also the Teapot Dome Scandal but also Watergate but somehow also the 1938 Munich Agreement?
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Part of me knows that and part of me desperately wants to hope that we can, in some way, recover from this.
Rome, after all, had crises and blunders from which it emerged stronger, in the end. I suppose I have to hope we still have that in us. Against all evidence.
Rome, after all, had crises and blunders from which it emerged stronger, in the end. I suppose I have to hope we still have that in us. Against all evidence.
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I think you are seeing the systematic destruction of the pillars of US power:
1) extensive network of allies
2) deep reservoirs of good will
3) technological and scientific dominance
4) cultural dominance
5) feared military
6) deepest, best run capital markets
7) rule of law
1) extensive network of allies
2) deep reservoirs of good will
3) technological and scientific dominance
4) cultural dominance
5) feared military
6) deepest, best run capital markets
7) rule of law
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Trump is the answer to the rarely asked question, “what would it have been like if Sulla and Caligula were the same person”
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Romans (as I think you yourself have reminded us) started to complain about their decline and impending fall as soon as they learnt to write. Americans are more optimistic, even to a degree that many Europeans find faintly ridiculous. And the USA has huge political and economic strength left. 1/2
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God, this pretentious "we're modern day Rome" shit is so dumb and annoying.
You don't have ANY claim to roman or greek heritage, neither by blood, geography, culture or language.
You're just a barbarian nation that got lucky. You do RAID the romans, plunder their cities, but you're not romans.
You don't have ANY claim to roman or greek heritage, neither by blood, geography, culture or language.
You're just a barbarian nation that got lucky. You do RAID the romans, plunder their cities, but you're not romans.
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even if this marks our apex in historical hindsight, the decline can be rather slow in practice
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Maybe potent messaging from intelligent (and gorgeous) leaders in Europe will help sway what’s left of the American polity back to center over the long run.
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My unpopular opinion on this is that the only way back is probably a massive (decades long) build out of naval (and general military) capacity...and a simultaneous rebuilding of state capacity, which certainly means more taxes, not just billionaire taxes but across the board. Now try selling that.
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Like Rome and unlike 1950s Britain, the U.S. has a critical mass of population, manpower, and gross GDP so that this won’t cripple our influence the way Suez did for the UK. It makes us less self-reflective, but on the flip side it also means that we can usually recover from self-inflicted crises.
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I really don't think losing the strait is worse than Suez. Suez was the finale to the collapse of an empire that started in 1947.
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