Rise and fall of the USA

In my twenties, I was trying to make a way in live events and concert production. It was a fun life. The thing I really wanted to do was move to the USA. Everything there was bigger and better, particularly concerts. That being my aim, I managed to get a company in Manhattan interested enough to offer me an interview – but they were not offering to pay my expenses and I was not exactly flush.

Enter Freddie Laker and Skytrain. Tickets to New York for £59. All the major airlines decided to compete and introduced “standby fares”. I flew with TWA for £69. My first time on a jumbo jet, my first long haul flight. To say I was naïve is a vast understatement.

A few hours into the flight I left my seat and a kindly flight attendant asked if I was “looking for the bathroom”. I was unused to American manners of speech, so I did immediately think that maybe there really were baths on this behemoth of technology. Realisation dawned eventually. I was Alice down a very big rabbit hole.

Before the flight at Heathrow, I met a neighbour from my childhood. I never knew his name; we called him “the Major” and he was almost permanently cross about something. Whilst we had hardly spoken before, he recognised me and sought me out. He took the time to talk to me in the airport, buy me a beer and ask after my parents. I believe he had seen action in France during the First World War. In that conversation I discovered he was mostly cross that the Empire had disappeared, which he regarded as a great – and personal – injustice. He agreed with me that America was where the future lay: they were the new world power. I thought no more about him and went off on my great adventure.

I didn’t get the job. My love affair with the USA continued. I never moved to the States as I’d planned, but did eventually work in over 20 of the American states – and many other locations worldwide. It was a good life. I enjoyed the travel enormously.

As I get older the romance of travel has faded, partly due to over-exposure, but also the way the experience has been degraded as budget airlines try to make a profit. The bigger fall in my eyes is the gradual degradation of my adulation of the USA. The recent election brought it all into focus, though for me the rot started a long time ago.

But they just won’t stop. The GDP of the EU used to be equal to the USA, but now the USA is nearly double that of the EU. Despite disastrous Middle East policy decisions, the USA is still seen as the world’s policeman. Despite rival claims, the USA remains the cradle of tech innovation and the companies of Silicon Valley really do run our lives.

I can point to an emotional barrenness which caused my lack of interest, or maybe I was just growing up. Subsequent shady political leaders put me off, but honestly – who are the Brits to talk? My attention switched East. I was much more enamoured of South East Asia as a destination. The repeat Trump victory sealed the deal.

Thinking back to the long gone Major, I imagine his sorrow was directed at the loss of the Empire. As a military man, this was a defining feature of his upbringing and career. But at the time neither he nor anyone else noticed that the British Empire had actually passed its peak long before he was born.

My upbringing — probably sixty years later — was defined by the importance of the USA culturally, economically, and militarily. I would suggest that the American “Empire” has already passed its peak by several decades.

Trump is a symptom, not a cause.

Sit back and watch the further decline.

A Message from TheArticle

We are the only publication that’s committed to covering every angle. We have an important contribution to make, one that’s needed now more than ever, and we need your help to continue publishing throughout these hard economic times. So please, make a donation.