I have been reading the commondreams and counterpunch websites for some time now. These feature a collection of articles written by left leaning writers mostly bemoaning the state of the US. That is only natural since most of the contributors are Americans. Reading these people one gets a sense of a US sliding gradually and to its citizens imperceptibly into an anti-thesis of democracy. The history of the US has always been dominated by a small number of issues down the years. In the late 18th century, the basic issues were gaining independence from the UK primarily on a point of principle. The people who raised the banner of revolt were those who had been among the upper sections of colonial society. Perhaps that was why they had a perception of being secnd class citizens; a perception of their concerns being ignored by the mother country. Once the revolt got underway, the basic issues were winning the war (which was literally a matter of life and death for the leaders of the rebellion) and formulating a set of rules to govern the country once victory was achieved. The second issue was articulated as a negative. The new country was not to be like Europe as it then was. To their credit, the leaders of the rebellion came up with a document that was strongly inspired by events that had been occurring in England for some centuries; a document robust enough and flexible enough to stand largely unscathed for two centuries.

The first half of the next century was taken up largely by the issue of slavery. This culminated in the civil war. It is interesting to note that just as the US had broken away from England on a matter of principle, the Confederate States also tried to break away from the Union on a matter of principle. The British had unsuccessfully tried to suppress the revolt. The northern states were successful in their attempt to keep the union intact. The civil war was also a point of change. Afterwards, the US started a concerted effort to colonize all the lands between the eastern half and the Pacific. This was done at the expense of the native american tribes who made treaty after treaty with the government only to find them being repeatedly broken. At the same time, industrialization started on a massive scale. This resulted in the so-called Gilded Age in which there were massive income inequalities. This in turn resulted in attempts to decrease this inequality which was resisted by the newly rich industrialists. The result was repeated massive strikes strongly resisted by the Establishment.

In the 20th century, the first half was dominated by first the Roaring Twenties and then by the Great Depression. The Second World War was a turning point. Afterwards, there was the Cold War on the foreign front and the Great Society domestically. All this culminated in the right wing / big business backlash known as neo-liberalism.

It is this latter issue which has become a problem for the rest of the world. Prior to the 20th century, the US was pre-occupied domestically. Now however, its impact on the world is too great to be ignored. This has had the unfortunate consequence of short-circuiting the development of most of the world. Incidentally, this is a process which started with European colonialism.