A Little Bit of Fun....
George Friedman is an influential American foreign policy consultant. He is utterly unconvinced of any notion of American decline; he has not noticed that the American Navy certainly doesn't control the Indian Ocean, and he has, as far as I can see, not paid too much attention to India and China.
However, he has attempted at least to project forwards in foreign affairs. He suggests, in the series of videos of which the one below is the first, that the twenty first century will see the rise of Turkey and Mexico.
He also thinks that radical destructive capitalism, which he at least acknowledges is not a conservative force, will integrate the world with North American domination of the Pacific and Atlantic. He suggests that solar power in space will create advantages for the United States, that war is progressive, and that Europe and Japan will decline into demographic collapse and a failure to assimilate immigrants.
I think that it is possible to take issue with Dr Friedman's points, but it is Sunday, and I thought that I would suggest to people interested in this sort of armchair thing to have a look.
From my own point of view, I think that oil is running down, that big, statist organisations in western governments are angering and antagonising western citizens, that we are over-taxed, over-regulated and over governed. I think that a selfish and second rate political-media class, and an historic shift of money and energy to the Indian Ocean is meshing with a demographic and economic crisis across the western world.
I do not agree that Russia is anything other than growing or regenerating either; and I do not think that the Russian federation will fragment in any confrontation. I am totally unconvinced of this 'Turkish power' thing that Americans of all stripes seem so keen on; one wonders if they have asked any representative of the former subject peoples of the ottomans for their views.
I also wonder if the next century won't see a radically new sort of American federalism, possibly accompanied by civil violence, and a new sort of American Union. There is some sense in the idea of 'space power'; but it isn't the lumbering NASA monolith that will mine the helium-3 on the moon, its India and China who are already planning to do so.
I think that war is a murderous and destructive evil and I am unconvinced that markets should be the be-all tool of the economic kit; we work to live in dignity, and should never live to work as slaves.
Ah, lazy Sunday projections before what may be a disastrous Hallowe'en for the west in the real world. It's probably of little interest to you if your job or your savings or your pension or your house are in trouble, or if you can't walk down your own streets and feel safe. Yet, it is diverting. Have a look.
George Friedman is an influential American foreign policy consultant. He is utterly unconvinced of any notion of American decline; he has not noticed that the American Navy certainly doesn't control the Indian Ocean, and he has, as far as I can see, not paid too much attention to India and China.
However, he has attempted at least to project forwards in foreign affairs. He suggests, in the series of videos of which the one below is the first, that the twenty first century will see the rise of Turkey and Mexico.
He also thinks that radical destructive capitalism, which he at least acknowledges is not a conservative force, will integrate the world with North American domination of the Pacific and Atlantic. He suggests that solar power in space will create advantages for the United States, that war is progressive, and that Europe and Japan will decline into demographic collapse and a failure to assimilate immigrants.
I think that it is possible to take issue with Dr Friedman's points, but it is Sunday, and I thought that I would suggest to people interested in this sort of armchair thing to have a look.
From my own point of view, I think that oil is running down, that big, statist organisations in western governments are angering and antagonising western citizens, that we are over-taxed, over-regulated and over governed. I think that a selfish and second rate political-media class, and an historic shift of money and energy to the Indian Ocean is meshing with a demographic and economic crisis across the western world.
I do not agree that Russia is anything other than growing or regenerating either; and I do not think that the Russian federation will fragment in any confrontation. I am totally unconvinced of this 'Turkish power' thing that Americans of all stripes seem so keen on; one wonders if they have asked any representative of the former subject peoples of the ottomans for their views.
I also wonder if the next century won't see a radically new sort of American federalism, possibly accompanied by civil violence, and a new sort of American Union. There is some sense in the idea of 'space power'; but it isn't the lumbering NASA monolith that will mine the helium-3 on the moon, its India and China who are already planning to do so.
I think that war is a murderous and destructive evil and I am unconvinced that markets should be the be-all tool of the economic kit; we work to live in dignity, and should never live to work as slaves.
Ah, lazy Sunday projections before what may be a disastrous Hallowe'en for the west in the real world. It's probably of little interest to you if your job or your savings or your pension or your house are in trouble, or if you can't walk down your own streets and feel safe. Yet, it is diverting. Have a look.
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