“The tallest building in the world is now in Dubai, the biggest factory in the world is in China, the largest oil refinery is in India, the largest investment fund in the world is in Abu Dhabi, the largest Ferris wheel in the world is in Singapore,” notes Fareed Zakaria. “And … more troublingly, [the United States is] also losing [its] key grip on indices such as patent creation, scientific creations and things like that — which are really harbingers of future economic growth.”

Thirty years ago, the United States dominated the world politically, economically and scientifically. But today? Fareed Zakaria: What Does A ‘Post-American World’ Look Like? - NPR

joshsternberg:

One of the great things about America is that just about everyone, at some point in their familial line, has an amazing and compelling immigration story. We often forget this, as we spit venom towards those who cross our borders, a tactic that has been replayed again and again over the generations.

We’re a nation of nomads, of frontiersmen and women, of expansionists. Our nation’s culture is tied up in and around cultures who are hundreds and thousands of years older than ours. While we certainly have created an American culture over the past 235+ years, we are still the sum of every culture that has passed through the nation’s doors. As Eric Weiner puts it in “The Geography of Bliss” (yes, I know, been quoting this book frequently recently. I have no shame in that!):

We are shaped not only by our current geography but by our ancestral one as well. Americans, for instance, retain a frontier spirit even though the only frontier that remains is the vast open space between SUV and strip mall. We are our past.

That frontier spirit is a collective one, where we long for the ethereal ‘freedom.’ An American present and future that denies others that most inalienable right is a nation we will not recognize. We need to tap into our collective unconscious, as Jung would say, and tell those harrowing and joyous immigration stories of our past; of our parents, grandparents, all down the line. We need to remind our elected officials how previous generations of immigrants were the backbone to “the American Dream” they love so much.

We say something along the lines of, “those who forget history are doomed to repeat it,” yet it often seems like we have selective amnesia when we try to reform. Not just on immigration, but on issues like those absolute and unassailable rights only some of us are lucky enough to have. Hopefully, as we enter the Campaign 2012 election cycle, we can have intellectually honest discussions, discourse and debate. Let the invisible hand of the marketplace of ideas become a visible and vocal reality.

High-res BRITAIN’S special relationship with the US — forged by Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt in the second world war — no longer exists, says a committee of influential MPs. Instead, America’s relationship with Britain is no more special than with its other main allies, according to a report by the Commons foreign affairs committee published today. The report also warns that the perception of the UK after the Iraq war as America’s “subservient poodle” has been highly damaging to Britain’s reputation and interests around the world. continue reading…. timesonline  

BRITAIN’S special relationship with the US — forged by Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt in the second world war — no longer exists, says a committee of influential MPs.

Instead, America’s relationship with Britain is no more special than with its other main allies, according to a report by the Commons foreign affairs committee published today.

The report also warns that the perception of the UK after the Iraq war as America’s “subservient poodle” has been highly damaging to Britain’s reputation and interests around the world.

continue reading…. timesonline  


T.R. Reid; “The Healing Of America”

“…anybody out there who has an artificial hip or artificial knee or artificial shoulder, that’s French technology. They invented that. Deep brain stimulation, the first thing they’ve come up with that deals with Alzheimer’s, that’s Canadian, Insulin is Canadian. X-Ray’s are German.”

“…a lot of the drugs that we see advertised on American TV come from Swiss labs or British labs or German labs, including Viva Viva Viagra, that’s a British invention.”

this dude is on cspan with brian lamb right now and he is blowing my fuckin’ mind.