[jstarfish]

One does not gain strength through fragmentation.

Russia has been making land grabs. China is dancing around the same. Both countries have roughly similar and institutionalized culture/doctrine.

Meanwhile, the west is repeatedly encouraged to consider taking steps that reduces our global footprint and leads us away from unity. Hmm...

[dsfyu404ed]

>Meanwhile, the west is repeatedly encouraged to consider taking steps that reduces our global footprint and leads us away from unity. Hmm...

Freedom isn't free. God forbid Wall Street have to sell off a few banana republics to the Russians or Chinese.

A lot of us are sick of playing world police and world janitor. We're sick of pissing money and lives into far-off quagmires that are only tangentially related to us. Regardless of what's going on domestically there are many who want nothing to do with foreign entanglements and many more who would be fine accepting more Russian and Chinese influence overseas if it meant getting rid of a lot of their political problems at home. It's not like the US is incapable of existing as anything other than the sole superpower. We were fine the first 200yr.

[vineyardmike]

To be fair, we had a much worse quality of life pre-superpower.

America was a rough agrarian nation compared to much of Europe, then we had a civil war, then a very tumultuous period of expansion, WWI, then a major depression, WWII, then super power time…

I am personally much happier as a super power. My 401k goes upwards much more with the US economy pushed outwards, and our jobs pay better and are much more impactful. Everything is much cheaper -especially our car centric culture- due to our shadow influence over oil nations. We’re safer with a control over the globe as opposed to being dependent on another military and that nations whims.

I don’t know what you’re thinking of, but I suspect our primacy in the globe is the main distraction keeping us from tearing ourselves apart. Nations tend to go through upheaval when their quality of life plateaus or gets worse. I like America as it is and don’t want to see further upheaval.

[ElfinTrousers]

One gains strength through fragmentation if one loses dead weight in the process.