IMHO it began with Reagan when he said something like ‘If we really believe in conservatism then we should act on it’.
Not sure if it’s a positive or negative (for our relations with the U.S.) that our next P.M. is going to be a Trump-emulating, shrink-the-state, culture warrior. I genuinely have no idea how things are going to play out here, if he’s going to try and placate the U.S. by acquiescing to all the demands (and if we cave on tariffs, you know there’ll be a new list).
Brexit was a symptom of the malaise for sure. Trying to do something to change things, even if that something is balls-out stupid. Electing and reelecting Trump, same thing.
The Great Recession was an utter failure of the system that basically fucked the Millennials’ (and others’) economic prospects in the aggregate. It took the malaise to a higher level in a way that even the “recovery” couldn’t fix. So I don’t think its importance to our current moment should be understated.
If you want to go back further, we had a good run after WWII; the US was especially poised to succeed. The lug nuts started loosening in the 1970s with the oil shocks, stagflation, etc. President Carter makes his famous “malaise speech.”
The thing is–and this was true even during the Depression–there was still a lot of positivity in the culture and the polity. The Civil Rights Movement had made immense progress, and we had just been on the moon, etc. Reagan built on that remaining positivity effectively. Say what you will about the Gipper, but he wasn’t a nation-traumatizing troll. Some of his tax cuts and whatnot seemed effective–for a while.
Keep in mind as well that, during this whole period, the Soviet Union was the Big Bad, showing us how well their alternate economic system, communism, could work. Which was absolutely not well at all.* So that was a wonderful advertisement encouraging us to do exactly what we were doing economically, and nothing else. (If their system totally sucks, then our own must be perfect–right?!)
The 1990s brought more good news. We had a competent Republican president (Clinton–get it?), low inflation, and even a budget surplus! There was talk about the end of economic cycles. Meanwhile, however, our manufacturing base was being shipped off to China. The race to the bottom was on, but we didn’t know it.
After 9/11, the wheels were off the bus and sparks were flying. The positivity that came from cultural inertia was running out. Today, there is no sign now of how anything can get better over the long run. People are pissed, depressed, and hopeless. People in rich countries are experiencing economic stagnation, while those from poorer countries are scrambling to get in (legally or otherwise), further raising the cost of housing, etc., for everyone. And yet aging societies need this immigrant labor to survive. It’s a completely fucked combination.
There is no country exemplifying best practices, either. No obvious successes. And I watch these videos on YouTube: “Why I’m leaving Canada/the UK/Australia/etc.” There truly is a global cost of living crisis. I just saw a video that had a chart of relative rates of retirement for different age groups across time. The rate of retirement in 2007 for 60-64 was 41%; now it’s 32%. I think that is an incredibly damning statistic.
I would distinguish the social progress (which has been good) from economic progress (or lack thereof). Also, while Dubya had many fuckups, I’m not sure he was any more to blame for the Great Recession than the presidents before him, including Clinton. By its very nature, capitalism causes bubbles like the housing bubble that set off the Great Recession; one could go so far as to say that such bubbles are in some ways required for it to function (viz, the current AI bubble), since the system depends on constant growth to balance its books.
Not sure what that was, but in theory it could still be implemented. I don’t think anything’s really going to be done, however.
Obama was working under the old template, and his failure to engender any major change (other than Obamacare) or punish the companies and oligarchs that helped fuck things up has been a key factor in the cynicism of our times, IMHO. Which is not to say that voting in idiots like Trump or doing things like Brexit is anything other than completely counterproductive. But had Obama been president this whole time, I doubt things would be much different than they are. Probably a lot fewer people would have died from the pandemic (which means that, yeah, I wish Obama had been president this whole time, even though he doesn’t excite me much as a leader).
Presumably a few countries have succeeded in successively maintaining such leaders, and how have they turned out?** That’s what I mean by “no best practices.” The same criticism can be leveled at the right: there are no conservative or libertarian utopias either.
See, I think the psychology at work here is self-comfort via blame. While it’s true that morons everywhere have made things much worse than they needed to be, it is not true that they thereby deprived of an obvious solution to our social and economic ills. While I think a solution to the social ills is absolutely possible (take better care of people and don’t be dicks), I think the economic solution is as yet unknown.
*To be fair, communism as practiced by the USSR and China was extremely successful in building up the industrial base of those countries. They radically failed thereafter, however, in matching the level of freedom and wealth found in the West.
**The pat answer to questions like this tends to be, “Scandinavia is great!” without addressing such problems as staggering household debt, etc.
I’m sorry, but this is ridiculous.
I’ve disagreed with you before about the path the US is taking, but even if we take for granted that you’re right about what the US will try to do…
If the US ever did act the way you think it will, it will destroy everything that makes it a successful, prosperous, and powerful country. A US that wants to “genocide most of the world population including its own” is not a superpower capable of taking on the rest of the world and winning; it’s a failed rump state.
I think we will survive Trump. Our reputation will not.
The problem was optimizing a single system. The ideal is to oscillate around the moderate left and right. The 1930s Nazi approach was interesting. Companies (please avoid a demographic hijack) were responsible to be positive at the gross operating profit line. The state took revenue above that line and funded R&D and expansion. Of course any system will work with benign management.
Just like Russia; but that hasn’t stopped Russia from being highly aggressive. And a large nuclear arsenal means the US doesn’t need anything else in order to kill billions. I’m not thinking of conquering armies, I’m thinking of genocidal fascists carrying out a new “Final Solution” with death squads at home and ICBMs abroad.
Maybe they’ll have figured out why anybody would stand for hours to hear this guy blather. Hours of stream of unconsciousness bullshit, only to be told all these fragments of delirium can be explained as “doing a weave”. He should just come out and admit he has syphilis, but that it’s under complete control. He would thereby give himself a big coating of teflon.
Haven’t we kind of done that in the US over the past 20 years? It hasn’t seemed to succeed. Sometimes a generic “system” can’t solve specific problems. That’s why I think the debate around right versus left has become counterproductive. I think the solution will be solutions. You could call them “modules.” The health care module that works will be neither liberal nor conservative (though there could be multiple solutions possible, and perhaps they can be labeled thus based on their relationship to the other possibilities).
Yes, and it worked quite well.
No? America has slid steadily to the Right for decades, ever since Reagan. With occasional pauses as the Democrats slowed it down. Not stopped, not reversed; just slowed. It’s a ratchet not a pendulum.
Trump is about as far “left” a President as we’ll ever see again, because that’s how the modern US works.
Yes, prior to Reagan we were working between the middle of moderate right and left. Reagan pushed us out of that oscillation.
More “moderate right and extreme right”. The left hasn’t been a real factor since the 1960s.
Prior to the Reagan tax reforms corporations and the tax system were more paternal. Individuals could average incomes over time like corporations. Medical coverage was an employee benefit. Uncovered medical costs were a deduction.
Which isn’t very “left” at all.
Not sure of your referent. My right wing friends consider any cooperation far left. Like the trained dragon movies - strictly commie.
The US has worked quite well as a country for the past 20 years?!
Gotta disagree on that one, compadre.
Because they are far right. “Do everything through corporate paternalism” is at best moderate right, not left.
Your argument is just demonstrating how far to the Right the US has slid, where even right wing policies get described as left wing.
Agreed. Someone like AOC would be a center-left politician in most countries.
Perhaps so, but we did work to integrate the military, rest rooms, schools and the work place. Strong unions provided or influenced compensation mobility. I am non-degreed and managed to double my salary every ten years for my 50 year career. Voting access was constantly expanded.
What is your referent?