Since the end of the Cold War, the only thing we can say for sure is that the United States is the sole remaining superpower. I can't fathom why this is such an important prospect.
On the one hand, it's a statement of fact. On the other, our foreign policy now is based on the notion that "everyone knows" we're the only superpower left in the world. Surely one day the world will see the relevance of this and dictators might start behaving in Democratic and humane ways, no oppression, no gassing your people. A number of prospects, some important, some not, arise at the dawning of this new age. But what is it that keeps Americans on edge about this new world we've found ourselves atop?
If being number one is such a good thing, why haven't we been able to convince ourselves that this is indeed the "best of times?" No one is thinking this any longer. What is left to describe or label?
Right-wingers are good at labels. But they've been fanning out across the land for too many years and with too much concern aimed at sorting the Christians from the heathen, the righteous from the enemy Democrats, you name it.
If there is to be hope in the world, it apparently won't well up from the realization that America is the sole remaining superpower. We still have tragedies that crop up from time to time. And we have nuclear proliferation and a North Korea that hasn't moved out of the 1930s politically.
I can't get it out of my mind that America is the only superpower left in the world at a time when it probably matters least.
"History repeats itself" is an axiom that comes to mind when someone tries to make a point about whether we should wage war or peace or just rest on our laurels. It isn't appropriate to say that history repeats itself if something new and exiting is on the horizon.
When have we ever before seen a world so forthrightly dominated by a superpower such as the United States?
Some wingers and neocons will say that now is the time to consolidate our values and march our little virtues up Main Street and across the globe to spread democracy. Who is ordained to carry out such a crusade? Democrats? Republicans? Your local weird-ass militia?
Why did we ever think the Soviet Union was a superpower? How on Earth did we ever attach that name to such a corrupt and bankrupt system? The word superpower continues to fall flat on my ears because it was used by so many to describe the Soviet Union. And then, switcheroo, Wall comes down, freedom bubbles up, and the Soviet Union is all of sudden a third world country with a first rate military. Now we're getting somewhere.
I'm not so sure that any of these terms or arguments were that convincing, except to the CIA, DIA, NSA, and all those other "intelligence" minders.
There were economies and cultures under the Russian and American paw that laid suppressed and hidden -- only to spring up at us like Barbarians at the gate when the paw was removed.
America and the Soviet Union, through their rivalry, masked a lot of problems. To say that we're the only superpower left is to say that victory in the Cold War is as hollow as a yet- to-be-defined stampeding horde.
If the objective of that victory was to come out on top as the remaining superpower, then we only achieved a half-victory because history isn't done repeating itself.
We're amassing destroyers and cruise missiles again. No one likes to see twisting children in agony because some socio-path is leading a country that is as complicated as Iraq ever was.
The aim is never as true as you'd like, the cause never as proper as you originally thought, the relief for the people of Syria never as permanent as you hoped your aim could achieve. I wish it weren't so, but history is a flawed teacher.