We must consider the possibility that it is too late

It won't brighten your day, but David Solway's piece at PJ Media today is essential reading.  He's not the first to pose the question of whether we are at the tipping point, but he takes probably the broadest and deepest range of factors into consideration of any such thinker I've encountered.

The difference between history’s winners and losers obviously depends on the criteria we adopt to discriminate between success and failure on the level of nation, culture and civilization. For the purposes of this article, I will leave the display of military splendor and the creation of great art out of the equation. Neither military parades in a public square nor architectural wonders constitute a boon for ordinary people, even if they produce a feeling of national pride. Rather, I define success as a function of three complementary factors: the ability to survive intact for extended periods; the achievement of approximate prosperity in a largely impoverished world; and the fostering of a relatively free, confident and vigorous citizenry. 

He quotes fellow PJ Media writer Roger L. Simon at a particularly chilling juncture in the examination he develops (emphasis mine):

When one examines the social and political conduct of the United States today, one sees both anarchy and absolutism at work: a divided citizenry, giving the impression that America comprises really two — or more — competing nations, with the threat of secession floating in the air and economic chaos in the offing; and an increasingly autocratic political administration governing via executive privilege, the bypassing of Congress, the proliferation of draconian laws and regulations, internal espionage, stygian secrecy, constitutional delinquency, bureaucratic engorgement and the assumption of elitist privilege converging in the person of a “great leader.” The octopal state has its tentacles everywhere and its citizenry is subject to the invasive probing of a panoptic and all-encompassing entity. “1984 is here,” writes Roger Simon, “Someone is watching me, monitoring whatever I do. If I make a mistake, I will pay for it. My future will be bleak.” “And here’s the big problem,” he continues, “it’s hard to see how it’s going to get better.” 

There is a person in the comment thread underneath who chimes in a few times, trying to assume an offhand demeanor and hew to a "now-let's-not-get-all-doom-and-gloom-here" message, but his (or her, I suppose) choice of substantiation comes across as pinched and shallow in comparison to the fullness of Solway's perspective:

When people talk of "America in decline," just what are they referring to?

In an absolute sense, America continues to lead the world. The whole world uses Microsoft/Adobe software, Apple computers, Boeing aircraft.

But in a relative sense, the rest of the world is catching up. China and Japan are manufacturing powerhouses. India is starting to be a software development powerhouse. But we know how to fix that. We need to do more to improve our own economy, infrastructure, and education of the young, just as they are doing. 

So why are folks on PJ Media so upset?

In the 1970s, President Richard Nixon (who ran as a conservative Republican) had proposed universal catastrophic health insurance based on guess what? An employer mandate, and Medicaid cost sharing with the states! What Nixon was proposing wasn't all that different from ObamaCare today.

So why are some conservatives freaking out over ObamaCare? They didn't freak out over Nixon's similar proposal.

What I think is upsetting folks around here is not that America is in decline. It's that *Reaganism* is in decline. The voters re-elected Obama who is trying his best to end the Reagan free-market approach. Even in the GOP there is growing disenchantment with globalization.

For one thing, this commenter displays a very basic ignorance.  Nixon neither ran nor governed as a conservative.  More to the point, though, this technocratic view of what American (or Japanese) success consists of completely overlooks Solway's criteria for a successful civilization.  Japan and India and China hardly embody the fealty to freedom that distinguishes America from every other of history's nation-states, kingdoms or empires.  As I've said before here, a populace of IT whizzes and engineers and Six Sigma black belts hardly tells us whether the nation in which that populace lives has the spiritual fortification to thrive.

But that's the kind of "meh"-type shrugging that passes for deep examination these days.

Fortunately, real intellects like Solway continue to look into this matter of how long we have, and what might be done.