TW:...with others and we are losing our lead. Many Americans just assume anything we do (democratic capitalism etc.) is the best. Others felt with the demise of the USSR that our way had triumphed never to be challenged again.
But there is an emerging challenge which is the illiberal, non-democratic but mostly capitalist approach of China. And to folks in other nations without a strong liberal democratic tradition, this "other" way is starting looking fairly attractive.
The USSR was illiberal and autocratic but also non-capitalist and it competed pretty effectively for decades. Now we have an autocratic form of capitalism emerging.
The western economies are floundering and our governments (which is to say our publics) appear unable or unwilling to face up to the challenges of aging populaces, overpromised pensions and entitlements and how to deal with threats such as Al Qaeda.
Meanwhile the autocratic but thus far effective rulers in China are providing an intriguing alternative. Our forms of governance do not (unlike I believe the view of some) have some divine right towards pre-eminence. We must earn that respect via performance. And we must earn that respect not only externally, as in time internal interests will yearn for such an alternative as well should the current system falter without any sign of improving.
From Tom Friedman at NYT:
"...You can understand why foreigners are uneasy. They look at America and see a president elected by a solid majority, coming into office riding a wave of optimism, controlling both the House and the Senate. Yet, a year later, he can’t win passage of his top legislative priority: health care.
“Our two-party political system is broken just when everything needs major repair, not minor repair,” said K.R. Sridhar, the founder of Bloom Energy, a fuel cell company in Silicon Valley, who is attending the forum. “I am talking about health care, infrastructure, education, energy. We are the ones who need a Marshall Plan now.”
Indeed, speaking of phrases I’ve never heard here before, another goes like this: “Is the ‘Beijing Consensus’ replacing the ‘Washington Consensus?’ ” Washington Consensus is a term coined after the cold war for the free-market, pro-trade and globalization policies promoted by America. As Katrin Bennhold reported in The International Herald Tribune this week, developing countries everywhere are looking “for a recipe for faster growth and greater stability than that offered by the now tattered ‘Washington Consensus’ of open markets, floating currencies and free elections.” And as they do, “there is growing talk about a ‘Beijing Consensus.’ ”
The Beijing Consensus, says Bennhold, is a “Confucian-Communist-Capitalist” hybrid under the umbrella of a one-party state, with a lot of government guidance, strictly controlled capital markets and an authoritarian decision-making process that is capable of making tough choices and long-term investments, without having to heed daily public polls.
...It was hard to read President Obama’s eloquent State of the Union address and not feel torn between his vision for the coming years and the awareness that the forces of inertia and special interests blocking him — not to mention the whole Republican Party — make the chances of his implementing that vision highly unlikely. That is the definition of “stuck.” And right now we are stuck.
The sad and frustrating thing is, we are so close to being unstuck. If there were just six or eight Republican senators — a few more Judd Greggs and Lindsey Grahams — ready to meet Obama somewhere in the middle on deficit reduction, energy, health care and banking reform, I believe that in the wake of the Massachusetts wake-up call the president would indeed meet them in that middle ground to forge not just incremental compromises, but substantial ones on these key issues. But so far, the Republicans are having a good year politically by just being the Party of No..."
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/31/opinion/31friedman.html?scp=4&sq=tom%20friedman&st=cse
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