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Hope "stupidest" and "smartest" are real words.

Anyway, lots of rants and raves by the muslim and jews about this and that. But explain it to me: the United States a country that has no official religion is the only "super power" left an the country is only 230 years old. How did that happen. There seem to be grudges in the islamic/jewish world longer that that...???????????

The biggest "grudge" happened with the formation of the state of Israel on Palestinian Arab land. And Truman was the first person to acknolwedge this illegal state. That was the begining of long years of American bias

I dont think i answered your question, or even understand it .. but hey i had to get that out of the way hehe

And how many 'illegal' states have there and will be across the globe, it's a dead argument.

America? Who knows!

MaaaD wrote:The biggest "grudge" happened with the formation of the state of Israel on Palestinian Arab land. And Truman was the first person to acknolwedge this illegal state. That was the begining of long years of American bias

I dont think i answered your question, or even understand it .. but hey i had to get that out of the way hehe

My question is: why is america so 'powerful' when it is only 230 years old?

Chocoholic wrote:And how many 'illegal' states have there and will be across the globe, it's a dead argument.

America? Who knows!

There is a first for everything. You lost me there

Concord wrote:
My question is: why is america so 'powerful' when it is only 230 years old?

because it revolutionized the concept of a nation. Not based on a race or religion anymore, just a group of the creme de la creme of the world in one place.

I know alot of US haters will not like this, but you gotta give credit to the "American Dream".

BTW, i am seeing this dream turn into a nightmare and thus the begining of the end....

It was in reply to Maaad's comment.

And I don't know why America is so powerful.

I think the answer is contained in part of Maad's post "because it revolutionized the concept of a nation. Not based on a race or religion anymore"

Period.

Why is America powerful? Money.

Here is my take on it, and I'll try to be brief and I'm most probably wrong in my analysis... but here goes.

The rise to world power has been the fastest in history - due to the pace of technological progress post the Industrial Revolution. The US has only risen to world power status in the 20th century. I do not see it as being a super power in 50 years time - which will make it also the shortest 'Empire' the world has known, and I believe we are seeing the decline of US hegemony.

America has vast natural resources and attracted immigrants hungry to make a better life for themselves - i.e. the development of the 'American Dream'.

The basis of the super power of the US is it's historical economic power. This was down to it's manufacturing base, agriculture, oil etc. The British Empire was great because it controlled the means of production world-wide and had strong manufacturing (adding value to raw goods) in the UK and elsewhere.

The crucial point in the ascendancy of the US, in my view, was the parallel development of the banking, stock exchange, finance sectors - i.e. Capitalism - alongside the technological progress that was being made in the 20th Century.

The US is strong because it now has a hold on the financial world via the Dollar. Ironically, the Dollar may be the US' Achilles heel. It owes so much that something will give eventually and a true balance will need to be restored.

The fatal flaw with Capitalism is that so much depends on market sentiments that bad news spawns even more bad news etc - leading to cycles of booms and busts. Eventually though chickens come home to roost and debts have to be repaid. The mechanism of the financial implosion of the US economy is another story - and one that's too late for me to go into now.

Suffice to say that US power, in my mind, is more to do with the failures in other systems (Russian Communism, Physical Colonialism - as opposed to economic colonialism) than with the merits of the 'American Way'. I fear the adage - the bigger they are, the harder they fall - will apply to the US. Capitalism just outlasted these, but we may return to a world order with those who control the real means of production calling the shots (China and India in a few decades will be the ones producing the goods and services that the world will want to buy).

(As an aside to my Muslim friends - read the Hadith about the Dajjal and you may conclude as I do that the US and allies is the Dajjal prophecised. Note particularly the descriptions of how Dajjal will subjugate nations, harness technology and most graphic of all, the descriptions of his donkey!)


Cheers,
Shafique

shafique wrote:Why is America powerful? Money.

Interesting post shaf .. but i have a question. Saudia Arabia has _alot_ of money yet i would consider it a backwards country. Dont you think just saying Money is why its so powerful is not true ?

Maad - money was my short cut to economic power. At the end of the day any government can print as much money as it wants.. just look at Zimbabwe, but that money is just a means of legal tender - people must value the notes and willingly exchange it for goods and services.

Saudi Arabia has a lot of dollars, so does Kuwait and other countries. In many ways, I would argue that these countries are economic colonies of the US - they rely on US support and the US has a strangle-hold on their economies.

This is analogous to African states and India under British rule. These territories generated vast amounts of wealth, but only a few 'rulers' saw this wealth and the bulk of it went back to the 'owners' - Britain.

Another interesting case study is Japan, which grew from isolation to the 2nd biggest economy in the world within 50 years. They did this from adding real value to manufactured goods - but the growth was also helped by finance and banking systems that exagerated the growth and ultimately caused a massive and on-going recession. Japan has outsourced many manufacturing plants but has not been allowed to extend political influence beyond its borders. The comparison with the US is interesting.

My view is that the excesses of capitalism (where wealth is seemingly created out of nothing) will result in another Great Depression when reality sinks in - think dot-com bubble, but applied to global finance. This will happen, I think, when a fair value is placed on the US economy - when people look beyond oil prices and work out what the dollar is really worth (i.e. how much are people willing to pay for US goods, services and assets).


Cheers,
Shafique

One other point Maad - having money or great economic power does not necessarily equate to being advanced or backwards in all aspects.

For many centuries, the greatest military, economic and intellectual nation on earth was China. It was feudal in governance, but also the source of global technological innovation, trade and finance.

I believe in fundamentals - wealth is created out of real things - be they services we want to buy or goods we are willing to pay for. The economic powerbase is ebbing away from the US and towards China and India.

Think about it, what really does America now produce that we can't get from China and India? Very little - even innovation of technology is moving towards these countries, so they are even now no longer just cheap places to manufacture. In the arts too they are emerging forces - the cinema is as good as hollywood now and more widely watched.

Interestingly the arms industry and armed forces in the US is helping prop up the economy - take that away and the US economy will suffer.

Take away the borrowing of money from the rest of the world at artificially low rates (i.e. strength of the dollar) and suddenly the US is a much smaller economic force.

Fighting wars and spending the military, perversely, helps the US economy in a number of ways.

Cheers,
Shafique

shafique wrote:One other point Maad - having money or great economic power does not necessarily equate to being advanced or backwards in all aspects.

For many centuries, the greatest military, economic and intellectual nation on earth was China. It was feudal in governance, but also the source of global technological innovation, trade and finance.

I believe in fundamentals - wealth is created out of real things - be they services we want to buy or goods we are willing to pay for. The economic powerbase is ebbing away from the US and towards China and India.

Think about it, what really does America now produce that we can't get from China and India? Very little - even innovation of technology is moving towards these countries, so they are even now no longer just cheap places to manufacture. In the arts too they are emerging forces - the cinema is as good as hollywood now and more widely watched.

Interestingly the arms industry and armed forces in the US is helping prop up the economy - take that away and the US economy will suffer.

Take away the borrowing of money from the rest of the world at artificially low rates (i.e. strength of the dollar) and suddenly the US is a much smaller economic force.

Fighting wars and spending the military, perversely, helps the US economy in a number of ways.

Cheers,
Shafique

true

Life and nature are all about balance, and anyone living in a country that is doing too well for too long should be a bit nervous. There is always an undoing... Great civilisations fall. If the US falls, then maybe China and India will rise (sorry, don't see the Middle East becoming the next superpower) next, but in time they will fall too (maybe Middle East will rise eventually). We'll all be dead by then though, so who knows. I don't think I'll be dead before the US falls though - very scary!

Thanks for taking the time to reply.

So even if China and India are rising economies what will stop them from going the same path that Japan did ? Dont you think the only way to dominate economically is to dominate miltarly too ? Which is why the US gets away with borrowing ridiclous amounts of money at low rates and control the world resources ?

What i am trying to get to is will we see an armed conflict between China/India and the US to see a change of economic power ?

World War 3 will start out with Middle East vs. West, and then China and India will become involved and align themselves in a strategic way. Actually, I wasn't really thinking that India would be too interested in fighting for any dominance yet - more likely China would align with the Middle East to take the US down. Russia, however, will align with the US. With the amount of nukes between the two, the world should be very afraid, and particularly those fighting the US and Russia. This is just my guess as to how things will play out.

Concord wrote:Hope "stupidest" and "smartest" are real words.

Anyway, lots of rants and raves by the muslim and jews about this and that. But explain it to me: the United States a country that has no official religion is the only "super power" left an the country is only 230 years old. How did that happen. There seem to be grudges in the islamic/jewish world longer that that...???????????

Ever heard of the spear of Christ ?

This is the spear that actually killed Jesus Christ when the soldier tried to check if he was still alive, he struck Christ in the side and blood flowed right out of His body. Whichever nation bears the spear will be invincible.

Some say US have this locked and secured in an unknown museum in a very small town but is guarded by more than a 100 US soldiers!

Yep this might be exxagerated and again unverified information..but whoever knows something more about this, please.....

zam PLEASE tell me you dont beleive this bull ?

zam - the legend of the spear started during the first (or second, I forget) crusade, and was instrumental in a particular battle during that crusade.

The relic that was found and called 'the spear' was soon afterwards lost in another battle in the crusade.

It's all a legend, and in any case if it did have any power - why did it not work in Vietnam, Cuba, Afghanistan and Iraq??

I think you're pulling our leg - tell me you don't believe this.

Cheers,
Shafique

It will never happen Maad.

there are other factors like shaf has mentioned that contribute to the super power staus besides the countries "overall wealth".

No one has mentioned this so i will.

A lot of this has to do with "acceptance". Whether you agree or not indeed eith like or not, countries like the US and UK have and will always have a higher "level of acceptance" than say India/China or Saudi etc.

I think they do have acceptance, but it could slip. With all the anti-Islam propaganda there could be a heck of a lot less acceptance of Muslims in those countries. But of course, not all of it is propaganda, there are Muslims tarnishing the religion badly.

K

I was really referring to acceptance by the general populous globally.

Lets take India for example. Please people i mean no offense here.

However much money/wealth/resources India has /likely to have, there will never be a day where India could ever been seen as any threat to up its stake into the "super power game".

A countries wealth has much more to it than the obvious. It is how a country survives on how it distributes its wealth. Lets take for example healthcare and state benefits.

In this respect there is already a huge divide between the US and UK and to some extent Canada and Aus. Now if we compare/transfer this to say India, the drain on the Indian national coffers would be huge. It is a false ideology to assume anything other than a like for like.

I havent even touched on "per capita income" mortality tables etc etc etc.

This is one reason why i say countries like India

I guess I have no clue what you are talking about then

the original post was about wealth and power

Maybe I need a nap

that didnt make any sense to me either ..

arniegang wrote:K

I was really referring to acceptance by the general populous globally.

Lets take India for example. Please people i mean no offense here.

However much money/wealth/resources India has /likely to have, there will never be a day where India could ever been seen as any threat to up its stake into the "super power game".

A countries wealth has much more to it than the obvious. It is how a country survives on how it distributes its wealth. Lets take for example healthcare and state benefits.

In this respect there is already a huge divide between the US and UK and to some extent Canada and Aus. Now if we compare/transfer this to say India, the drain on the Indian national coffers would be huge. It is a false ideology to assume anything other than a like for like.

I havent even touched on "per capita income" mortality tables etc etc etc.

This is one reason why i say countries like India

Interesting points Arnie.

However, looking back at history - relative global strength has a habit of moving from continent to continent, peoples to peoples.

Looking at Europe and the near East, at one point the Greeks were the most powerful nation, then the Italians, now they both just local powers. Similarly Portugal, Spain and more recently the UK.

Go back only 200 years and look at the status of the US at that time. Lawlessness, un-tapped resources, rudimentary dwellings etc. Then look at who was the wealthiest nations around the world.

Go back 30 years and you could apply your arguments above about India to China. The place was economically defunct and 'made in China' was a derogatory term. People were defecting from China to the West. Now Western companies are clamouring to get into China and it is Chinese tourists that are visiting New York etc (ok, there is still economic migration.. but I am making a point of how quickly economic power can change).

India has the great advantage of intellectual strength - it is churning out engineers, doctors etc at a record pace. The wealth is not just 'trickling' back anymore, but being generated in the country in greater volumes- there is now a growing middle class there.

My despair, though, is for Africa and South America - there seems little prospects at the moment. Venezuela is making a good effort of breaking free from US imperialism, but it remains to be seen whether the reforms can improve the lot of the ordinary citizens.

Anyway - a great theoretical debate which I look forward to coming back to after Ramadan. I'm going to try and concentrate on the spiritual in the up coming month - see if I can break my addiction to this forum

Cheers,
Shafique

MaaaD wrote:

shafique wrote:Why is America powerful? Money.

Interesting post shaf .. but i have a question. Saudia Arabia has _alot_ of money yet i would consider it a backwards country. Dont you think just saying Money is why its so powerful is not true ?

As if the Saudis can change their underwears without requesting a permission...

Its the power of free markets - the US was the first to harness capitalism properly and it got a massive head start. Look at the economies around the world and the ones with the least restrictions are the strongest.

Don't think manufacturing is going to help China that much more - they are pretty close to their ecological limit as far as how many factories they can support and they are light years behind in the service industries (banking, finance, law, education) which is where the real money is made nowadays.

India if anything has a head start on China because of their use of English. But they are so terribly bureaucratic that there is no such thing as free markets in India which is what is holding them back.