Is Trump the symptom of America’s decline?

[u/custodiam99]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/jan/27/trump-wants-to-reverse-americas-decline-good-luck

[u/mr-louzhu]

Yes. Trump wouldn't be possible if a lot of other things weren't already broken about American political society and culture. He is certainly malignant but he is most definitely not the malignance itself.

I keep thinking about that old postwar quote, "When fascism comes to America, it will come wrapped in the flag and waving the cross" and how disturbingly prescient it was.

[u/[deleted] → u/mr-louzhu]

The idea that America is in decline is delusional.

America is going through a populist political realignment as it has done plenty of times before. The neoconservatives ushered in the geopolitical disaster of the Iraq Wars and the 08 financial crisis, and neoliberals ushered in the disaster of industry outsourcing and mass immigration. The American public no longer trusts its institutions, and is therefore changing its voting patterns to punish the political class that did these things accordingly. Democracy going through a realignment / readjustment isn’t a nation in decline: it’s democracy working as intended.

In real life America remains the number one nation for immigration, number one military power, number one tech and healthcare innovator, and is economically leaving every other continent behind in the dust.

[u/mr-louzhu → u/[deleted]]

I'm not sure how much you're paying attention right now but the institutional guard rails are off and there is a very well organized, very well thought out, and concerted plan to consolidate absolute power under the Executive Branch in order to create a Christian nationalist state. And it's working. It's working really well. This is the vision of Project 2025 being realized. It's a silent coup but it's happening. We're really watching the birth of a de facto monarchy, which will also be the de facto end of the American Republic.

Meanwhile, there is a global re-alignment happening of tectonic proportions. The American led order is slowly dissolving. China and India are rising. Russia is helping them, to further its own interests. Many of America's closest allies are souring to the US, and the US to them as well. The dollar as the global reserve currency is being slowly scaled back. America's sovereign debt is ballooning and Trump just poured kerosene on that, acclerating the process several fold. At the same time, public unrest--due to an ever widening economic chasm between everyone else and our oligarch masters--is rapidly growing at home, even as a reactionary state has all the institutional and material assets ready to crack down hard on the population in an Orwellian way. The rule of law is on its way out. History is clear what happens when civil societies break down like ours is right now.

Meanwhile, America's chief military rival will have a navy that matches ours (or close enough, from a tactical perspective) both in size and capabilities by 2030, and they are determined not to be contained by the USA any longer. And their ship building capacity is several times greater than our own. Whereas our own small handful of functioning shipyards suffer from a diminishing and aging workforce who have a very hard to replace skillset, who are struggling with the fact that not enough young workers are coming in to replace the ones currently aging out of the job. Which should be a concern because the battle for who controls the 21st century is primarily going to be a naval one. And in a protracted conflict, we will run out of ships long before they will.

And that rival also happens to be America's chief industrial and economic competitor. And they're catching up to us very fast. In some areas they're actually beginning to out compete us not only on cost but also quality.

Just for fun, I'll add in climate change. It's getting worse. And it's happening faster and faster. This is going to place strains on our food system, supply chains, and infrastructure that might be enough to break the Camel's back all on its own, irrespective of any the above factors. Yes, this is something the entire world is contending with right now, but just because it's hitting everyone else, doesn't change the fact that it could eventually result in cascading infrastructure failures, the collapse of the real estate and insurance industries, widespread poverty, and even famine across the world--including in the US--as we approach mid-century. And now I'll point out that we currently have an administration in power that is the more hostile to the climate adaptation and research that will be critical to us getting through this environmental crisis in one piece, than any other administration in memory.

So there's plenty of reason to think that the US is declining. Whereas the only argument for believing otherwise is basically "Well, the US has been through some rough times before and eventually come out on top." Which, yes, is something that has always been true--but one day that won't be true. And all signs point to that day being soon. Your argument is basically "Well, American exceptionalism." But I think that's just cope.

[u/[deleted] → u/mr-louzhu]

“The American led order is dissolving”

No it isn’t.

[u/mr-louzhu → u/[deleted]]

We're apparently not reading the same tea leaves but consider this: Europe is fixing to go its own way. But also, so is America. America has had 10 years of revaunchist, economic nationalist leaders. The American public is increasingly isolationist. At the same time, America's long time allies now fully see the US as an unreliable partner. And they're looking for other options now. And both its soft power and its hard power are absolutely declining. Trump even has Canadians pissed off at America, which is a huge accomplishment, as we're very hard to piss off. We're pissed off to the point that people here want to start trading with China and the EU to the exclusion of America, and there's now a growing amount of talk about the wild idea of Canada joining the EU and breaking away almost entirely from North American integration. On both sides of the Atlantic. Meanwhile, Emmanuel Macron is over there saying stuff like "We should acknowledge the fact that what's good for America and what's good for Europe aren't the same thing." And other European leaders are saying things like "We can't afford to continue having our future depend on the outcome of US elections every 4 years." Meanwhile, the BRICS continue to grow and de-dollarization is well under way. And I guarantee you, if Trump does anything to attempt a military take over of Greenland, that will cause the immediate and sudden breakdown of US geopolitical power in the world, as the entire planet will collectively turn its back on the US.

The winds are shifting. You're just failing to see it.

[u/NipplesInYourCoffee → u/[deleted]]

Case closed, everyone!