Ahead of Independence Day, US President George W. Bush greeted his fellow-Americans on their country’s biggest official holiday. In his presidential message, he said, in particular, that Americans “pay special tribute to the men and women of our Armed Forces, both past and present, who have answered freedom’s call and defended the values that make America the greatest country on earth”.
This year’s presidential message on Independence Day said, “More than two centuries ago, bold and courageous visionaries pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honour in signing the Declaration of Independence. Guided by ancient and eternal truths, our forefathers proclaimed to the world that liberty was the natural right of all mankind and in doing so began one of the greatest chapters in human history. On the Fourth of July, our country commemorates the great achievements of these heroes and reaffirms its unwavering confidence in the power of freedom”.
Just a few days earlier, the New York Times conveyed a more critical message in an article by Times columnist Thomas Friedman. “My fellow Americans, we are a country in debt and in decline, not terminal, not irreversible, but, in decline. Our political system seems incapable of producing long-range answers to big problems or big opportunities. We are the ones who need a better-functioning democracy, more than the Iraqis and Afghans. We are the ones in need of nation-building. It’s our political system that is not working”.
This week’s gathering of America’s elites in Aspen, Colorado reportedly gave a feeling of unease in the topics and tone of the panel discussions. According to one distinguished panellist, “The economy is virtually unfathomable”. Jamie Dimon, who runs J.P Morgan Chase, noted sombrely, “I hope we have hit bottom, but, I can’t really say”. Mr Dimon believes that the crisis America faces now is the result of a “lack of political will”. Even Carlos Gutierrez, the Bush administration’s normally optimistic and affable Secretary of Commerce, admitted that the mood in Washington is sombre. The reason, he said, is that “everything is stalled” in Washington. “No one there seems to be able to deal with, or reach an agreement on, the myriad problems we face, from energy to immigration to the future of tax policy. This situation can’t last, if we are to move forward as a country”, he said.
Thomas Friedman in his piece this week recalled the old saying, “as General Motors goes, so goes America”. If that’s still true, he argued, America is in “a lot of trouble”, because General Motors’ stock market value now stands at just 6.47 billion dollars (152.051 billion roubles. 4.118 billion euros. 3.261 billion UK pounds), compared with Toyota’s 162.6 billion dollars (3.821 trillion roubles. 103.495 billion euros. 81.95 billion UK pounds). On top of it, GM shares sank to a 34-year low last month. The Times columnist concludes: “We’re at a 34-year low. And digging out of this hole is what the next election has to be all about”.
4 July 2008
Yuri Reshetnikov
Voice of Russia World Service
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=29256&cid=87&p=04.07.2008 (in English)
Editor’s Note:
No America-bashing here. All of the above is all too true. Our country does have to decide what to do about some of these problems, or, it shall lose power and credibility in the world. We should spend less time meddling in affairs not our own and concentrate a bit on our country. We should have the same love of motherland as the Russians do; we should not think that the world is ours for the taking. If America and Russia were to stay in their respective spheres, there would be peace, true peace, not merely a lack of war. Baltic, Ukrainian, and Albanian fanatics are not worth the blood of a single American soldier. Let no American family be forced to shed tears over a lost son because of such amoral monsters. Let there be peace.
