On the very day that a Chinese corporation has invested a cool $5 billion into capitalist icon, Morgan Stanley - effectively "saving" the merchant bank - Newsweek looks at the upcoming year and how the US will need to stand back as Asia gains prominence:
"There's a curious paradox in America's relations with the rest of the planet these days. The United States has done more than any other country to make the world a better place. Asia especially has benefited: when Europe dominated the globe, Asia was subjugated, but when the United States took charge after World War II, Asia was liberated. The U.S.-inspired rules-based global order that has emerged since has enabled Asian economies to thrive. American universities have trained hundreds of thousands of Asian policymakers, who have in turn used U.S. best practices to transform their societies. Given this historical backdrop, the United States should be reaping a global harvest of good will.
Instead, the country's reputation today stands at a record low, and U.S.-trained elites in Asia are among the country's fiercest critics. They find Washington's current incompetence stunning and are puzzled by its complacency. The U.S. intelligentsia seems to believe that global anti-Americanism will pass when George W. Bush leaves the scene. In fact, the problem is far more serious. The world has changed and the United States has not. The nation's relative power is declining: according to the World Bank, for example, the U.S. share of world GNI dropped from 31 percent in 2001 to 28 percent in 2006.
To make matters worse, Washington's foreign policy has become incompetent. Take the Iraq War, one of the most disastrous American adventures in history. U.S. elites behave as if the war was the fault of Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and former Defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld alone. Yet the reality is Congress authorized the conflict, and few American voices opposed it. Warnings, including those from the U.N. Security Council and numerous friendly governments, were roundly ignored."
"There's a curious paradox in America's relations with the rest of the planet these days. The United States has done more than any other country to make the world a better place. Asia especially has benefited: when Europe dominated the globe, Asia was subjugated, but when the United States took charge after World War II, Asia was liberated. The U.S.-inspired rules-based global order that has emerged since has enabled Asian economies to thrive. American universities have trained hundreds of thousands of Asian policymakers, who have in turn used U.S. best practices to transform their societies. Given this historical backdrop, the United States should be reaping a global harvest of good will.
Instead, the country's reputation today stands at a record low, and U.S.-trained elites in Asia are among the country's fiercest critics. They find Washington's current incompetence stunning and are puzzled by its complacency. The U.S. intelligentsia seems to believe that global anti-Americanism will pass when George W. Bush leaves the scene. In fact, the problem is far more serious. The world has changed and the United States has not. The nation's relative power is declining: according to the World Bank, for example, the U.S. share of world GNI dropped from 31 percent in 2001 to 28 percent in 2006.
To make matters worse, Washington's foreign policy has become incompetent. Take the Iraq War, one of the most disastrous American adventures in history. U.S. elites behave as if the war was the fault of Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and former Defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld alone. Yet the reality is Congress authorized the conflict, and few American voices opposed it. Warnings, including those from the U.N. Security Council and numerous friendly governments, were roundly ignored."
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