NationStates Jolt Archive

If the usa should fall and be reduced to insignificance, what will the fall be like? Bang or a Whimper? (to cite that poet dude?)

What makes you think the US will fall? Once we get some sane people back in office and restore a sensible economic policy we should be OK. Besides, if the US does "fall" it won't fall far. If anything it will become like the UK. Still economically, politically and militarily powerfull, just no longer able to impose it's will with impunity.

Whimper. It'd be funny cos Americans to everything bigger and louder and with more star spangled crap.

What makes you think the US will fall? Once we get some sane people back in office and restore a sensible economic policy we should be OK. Besides, if the US does "fall" it won't fall far. If anything it will become like the UK. Still economically, politically and militarily powerfull, just no longer able to impose it's will with impunity.

Reason for fall: Broke, economically, ideologically and morally

Loosing the power to impose its will with impunity is quite a fall, IMO. I'd say that is a best case scenario.

A little of both, like some monumental bowel movement.

What's this all about? It was mentioned in a comic I read ages ago, I never understood it.

The damage is done. You have all been tainted by western culture and you are all incurably 'americanized'. All hope is gone. :)

What makes you think the US will fall?

ROMA AETERNA, eh?

What makes you think the US will fall?

induction?

It'll be a slow decline, we'll wake up one day and realize we aren't the most powerful economy on earth anymore, and then there will be no stopping it. Once the rest of the world realizes they can get by without us, we'll just fade away.

ROMA AETERNA, eh?
:) I say it's fallen already, or at least is in the process.

Europa Aeterna ^^

I believe we've already "fallen" if you will, though not in the sense that the poll expresses - with the end of the Cold War and the need for a superpower to oppose the Soviets, our influence has been declining over the past 16-17 years. Every now and then you may see the US try to regain that influence (possibly thru the Iraqi War? But I'm not a big conspiracy theorist) but it just won't stick in the same way it did during the Cold War.

Fall from country #1? It already did.

FALL fall? if it did happen, it would be with a bang, or a few of them in different states. And I agree with bodies without organs, the Roman empire is now give or take 20 different countries today, and they were damn sure they would last forever. The barbarian invasions from the north... watch out for Canada! (well they came from the south too, but the people who will destroy america from the south are americans...)

the worlds too peaceful and stable for a giant to fall especially one that will take half the globe down with it but I will say a sudden ping will be the end as the world steadily becomes more and more of a confederacy due to increased U.N power and globalisation.

Not to mention the fact that the west and a large amount of far eastern nations want America too be the top dog world power so as soon as America gets in trouble we will bail you out (part of us paying the bill for over 60 years of security)

:) I say it's fallen already, or at least is in the process.

Europa Aeterna ^^

Ozymandias?

the worlds too peaceful and stable for a giant to fall especially one that will take half the globe down with it but I will say a sudden ping will be the end as the world steadily becomes more and more of a confederacy due to increased U.N power and globalisation.

whimper it is then...guess you're right on the confederacy part.

Ozymandias?

Look upon my works yeah mighty and dispair. (This actually isn't a declaration of my opinion simply my favorite line to Shelly's Poem)

Actually the division between the "red" and the "blue" states will continue until the blues give up and either join Canada or Mexico.
The religious conservative states will stagnate under the theistic rulings and laws enacted. Scientific discoveries and innovation will bypass them as none of the science degrees earned in these states will be recognised by any other country due to "intelligent design" being mandatory in the classroom, and anything that contradicts the bible will be supressed. the population of these states will sky-rocket as both birth control and abortion will be illegal. Once oil supplies run out and there is no longer any access to cheap fertiliser, the states will have trouble feeding their ever expanding population. They may try genetically modified crops, because that is the answer to all of the problems, once of course they convince the theocrats that it not against god's will. This is assuming that the farmers can actually afford the seed.
Mortality rates will rise as the states have trouble educating and keeping any one in the medical profession and new drugs and research are no longer a viable option and anyone interested in scientific research will have already migrated to Canada. They will be reduced to a neo feudal system living at a subsistance level, unless they decide to invade one of the neighbouring countries for the resources, having a large standing army due to the fact that this is the only way the many people can actually get an income.
It will be declared a rogue state and there will be calls for it to disarm due to it's instbility and the very real fear that one of the religiously motivated leaders tries to bring about "the end times" by Nuclear War.

The states that left by this time bring great prosperity to the countries they join and eventually there will be a tide of refugees wanting to join them.

Or they get a leader that will unify the country, tell the fundamentalists to pull there head in, and there will be choclate cookies for all.

I think it will go like this:

:: fizzle. ::


The whole world will look at eachother, and ask "Did you hear something too?" Then they will nod and carry on with daily business.

The US is not going to be dominated militarily, so if (when) it falls from power it will be economically; it will end up as just another Banana Republic in the Americas.

That is without considering the posibility of civil war within the next hundred years.....

It'll slowly be absorbed in to a larger trading bloc like any other nation, eventually becoming part of a world economy rather than an independent nation state. Perhaps it'll be a province of the world government or something like that, but it's not going to fall in the classical sense. It will always be an important part of the world economy.

Sometime around 2150, when the Pax Americana will be over.

(disappears back into Tardis)

Mid-21st century. Kinda tricky to have global military reach when you have no oil and gas, LOL.

Whimper, with a couple of loud bangs along the way but nothing too serious.

Sometime around 2150, when the Pax Americana will be over.

(disappears back into Tardis)

Pax Americana...:p

When will the pax begin?

Pax Americana...:p

When will the pax begin?

Since roughly 1945.
If you compare the world since then, it's been a LOT less bloody than even WW1. The British lost more men in 3 days on the Somme than the US did in 10 years in the 'Nam.
Likewise, the civilian dead in all the wars *since* WW2 pales by comparison against WW2, WW1, or the decimation of the North and South American Indians or the African Continent by colonialism. To say nothing of Rome or the Mongols.

As predicted by McNamara in the Kennedy Administration, the then future (read: post WW2), the planet has seen the gradual REDUCTION of war.

This is a good write up of it: http://www.humansecurityreport.info/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=193

...now I'm not saying it's perfect. But it's here. Even Rome had to destroy Masada. And it's not a steady decrease, of course. Just like the stock market isn't a steady increase -- it fluctuates.

hrmpf...o.k.

Well put.

It's falling already, and whether it goes out with a bang or a whimper will depend entirely on the ability of other nations to adapt and overcome the loss of a giant.

It looks like the US will go down the same way the USSR went down. Total economic collapse. Too many costly wars in too many areas. Not enough educated employees. Too few with money, the wealth concentrated on the few families that no longer have imagination. Wealth exported rather than invested. Reaganomics, VooDoo economics may take 50 years to stop the inertia of the US economy, but it is already evident that it is slowing things and offering opportunity to others.

when the prophecy is completed and hillary Clinton becomes president the united states will go out with a huge BOOM and take the rest of the world with it, it is our duty to not let the prophecy be completed;)


edit: the same boom was what some refer to as the big bang in the big bang theory, it was so massive that it caused an instant replay on the universe

If the U.S.A. weakens maybe we'll see states go out of the union - gradually disintegrating the U.S.

Don't have a clue who'll be first though.

Actually the division between the "red" and the "blue" states will continue until the blues give up and either join Canada or Mexico.

I think it would be far more likely for the blue states (or red states, depending on who is in power) to create their own union or become a series of independent republics. I really couldn't see any of the states joining either Canada or Mexico.

What makes you think the US will fall? Once we get some sane people back in office and restore a sensible economic policy we should be OK. .

There's the problem. What are the chances of that?

There's the problem. What are the chances of that?
18.3 - 19.7%

OMG look what I found!

OMG look what I found!

Gravedigger :p
You really should leave the dead alone.

Gravedigger :p
You really should leave the dead alone.

It wasn't dead, just sitting all alone on the cemetary fence....I leave it to others to bugger the dead, I'm married...