Reading this Slashdot story’s comments inspired me, but feel free to take any non-NSA related angle on this that you like (political, economic, what have you).
If you could pack up and emigrate tomorrow, would you? Or do you think that the U.S. will drag everyone else down with them? Do you think you’ll live to see fascism (however you define that line) as the de facto rule of this country? Or do you think it’s just paranoia? Or somewhere in between (as Slashdot commentary tends to be self-selecting and… non-mainstream — whether that’s good or bad is up to you, of course)?
If I could emigrate I would, but in between the language barrier, trouble finding a job and missing some members of my family it would be hard.
It isn’t just the NSA spying. Our government has been wholly captured by plutocrats (it has been called a slow motion coup), and I don’t see that changing. Our health care is unsustainable, our economic system will probably continue its current trajectory of permatemp and part time no benefits jobs. Our politics is dysfunctional and I think the more the US sinks behind other countries, the more people will hide behind mindless nationalism. I seriously doubt the US becomes fascist anytime soon though. We will just be a reasonably dysfunctional wealthy country that doesn’t care much about its citizens.
I am moderately pessimistic about our short and medium term future. However long term (30+ years) I think we will be ok assuming this generation coming of age gets sick of all the culture wars, distractions and other bullshit and just promotes pragmatic solutions to serious problems (environmental problems, economic injustice, failed health care system, dysfunctional politics, etc). If so, once that generation comes of age and all the ideological boomers and silent generation types are dead, the country could change for the better.
I am extremely optimistic about the future of the U.S. I’m not sure that we’ll continue to dominate the world economically and culturally as we have over the past 100 years or so, but I think that the country will continue to be a great place to live. We are going through a very mild rough patch right now, because of political divisiveness and a recently bad economy, but those things are cyclical. I think we’re due for a period of peace and prosperity. I’m thrilled that we elected a black president, and that gay rights have progressed at a mind-boggling pace over the past few years. Is technology enabling the government to encroach a bit more on our lives? Yes, but I think the benefits of that technology are far outstripping the negatives. I’m not saying we shouldn’t be concerned about government overreach, just that we will find ways to deal with it.
I’m mildly optimistic about the country. We’ll get by, somehow. We’ll make do, or do without. We’ll pare down our military, and spend the money more intelligently. We won’t withdraw into isolation, but we’ll back off a bit.
Syria and Egypt show us how very little we can actually do to help out in foreign crises. Meanwhile, we spent a couple of trillion dollars to defeat Iraq…and what did we get for it? We could have left Saddam in power, and things there would probably look a whole lot like they do now.
We will advance as the well-frog: three steps forward…and two back. It’s our way.
for those who feel it’s all good let me quote this
Regardless of race, class, education level, and even healthy eating and exercise habits, Americans have a shorter life expectancy than their peers in other affluent nations.
This one thing is due to our lack of a compressive universal healthcare system. Correct that and we’re on our way. Take environmental issues seriously and we’re there. Oh, and we work way too hard. As Americans we take fewer vacations and work mor e hours than any of the richer countries.
I’d like to live in a place like Grand Turk with my current income, but availability of the level of healthcare I need would preclude living anywhere outside of a major metropolitan area in the US or another major industrialized country.
I wonder how much this perception of pessimism is due to competing 24-hr news outlets.
To really understand America’s poor health standing globally, epidemiologists like Bezruchka posit, we need to look at those social and economic realities that define our daily lives, what scientists call “the social determinants of health.”
And none of these determinants matter more, these researchers contend, than economic inequality, the divide between the affluent and everyone else. Over 170 studies worldwide have so far linked income inequality to health outcomes. The more unequal a modern society, the studies show, the more unhealthy most everyone in it — and not the poor alone.
I can pack up and leave any time I want, but I won’t - at least for the time being. I can’t think of a place that I would rather live right now. I’ll go almost anywhere for a few weeks or months just to travel, but at the end of it I’m glad that I can come home to the US.
Then again, those short periods of travel don’t allow one to know what it’s really like to live there full time. So I’d like to ask if any Americans on this board have lived in another country and found it to be enough superior to the US (in some dimension) that they have moved or would consider moving there. If so, what was the deciding factor?
I’m moderately pessimistic short-term: the GOP remains as obstructionist as ever despite 2012 and it looks like the Democrats won’t be able to regain control of the House anytime soon. The budget battles and resultant cuts will continue to retard the recovery of the economy and hurt the people who need help the most. Meanwhile genuine reform such as building dozens of nuclear power plants or converting the United States into an ordoliberal/social market economy is not even on the discussion table. On a societal level, the disintegration of the American family and rise in bastardry while Protestantism in the United States seems doomed (I believe the rates of youth who identify themselves as Protestant is half that of the elderly even while other groups such as Catholics hold steady).
I’m distinctly more optimistic long-term. Inevitable demographic trends will either force the Republicans to moderate (and at least accept Obamacare) or give the Democrats a permanent majority with the Millennials much as the Greatest Generation voted Democrat all their lives. Due to this I hope we will continue to expand on Obamacare while we build a national high speed rail system and new nuclear power plants as the only feasible alternatives to fossil fuels. Meanwhile I think the younger generation will better realize the superiority of the German model of capitalism and help us transition towards a more European-ized America (economically speaking). In addition increasing globalization I hope will bring about a Union of Democracies which will function as a super-EU and lay the foundations for a true world government. I’m somewhat more worried regarding moral and religious issues but I hope at least that continued Asiatic and Hispanic immigration will continue to strengthen the Protestant churches in America (ideally East Asiatic Protestants will play the same leavening element that the Yankee/New England Protestant population did until the middle of the last century, that is a highly educated population with high moral standards and religiously orthodox) and by God’s good grace plant the seeds of a new Great Awakening.
Because of the baby boomers retiring, many Western nations will have a long depression that’s just started. It could easily be as long as the bad economic spell between 1873 and 1896. But the US is probably going to do a bit better than average due to a close-to-replacement birth rate, and lots of oil and gas.
We will lose our basic freedoms, such as the ability to say we are losing our basic freedoms on a board like this? I doubt it.
Will we lose some of our coastline due to rising oceans? Probably.
The biggie that could send us sailing back to the middle ages remains thermonuclear war. I’m generally optimistic that we will avoid it, and life fifty years from now will be significantly improved.
There’s also a decent chance that mostly American immunological research is going to cure cancer in the next decade or two. That would be something to be proud of as an American.
We probably won’t have a Church Committee this time around, but at the end of the day the spying stuff doesn’t really matter to most people.
The country was founded by plutocrats. It was ever thus. It’s not like it’s very different in other countries, either. That’s the golden rule. One could argue that the ones in other countries treat their servants better, though.
For what it’s worth, I recently immigrated to the US from Japan. That is, I’ve been living in the US for many years now and recently (earlier this year) became a US citizen.
I think the future of the US is about as bright and certain as any other country. There are many problems, but what country doesn’t? And unlike some countries coughRussia* the US seems to be moving in the right direction in many respects such as civil rights.
I did emigrate. I’m not going back. I have single payer healthcare, mandated vacation and sick time, and I make a living wage. I have done better here in 10 years than I ever did in 33 in the US, and I haven’t really changed much about the way I live. I have more opportunities. I have a better overall quality of life.
Yes, but UHC would eliminate a lot of that. People wouldn’t be one serious illness away from homelessness. Delivering a baby with no complications wouldn’t cost a year’s wages. Qui, IIRC Gleena lives in Australia.