…named Naill Ferguson, writing in Vanity Fair, claims the “American empire” is in inevitable decline, with Europe already further along the road to oblivion. He cites many of the usual cultural-conservative whinge targets–sexual libertinism, pop-culture dumbness, immigrants, cultural diversity, a lack of intellectual and fiscal discipline, kids who don’t respect their elders, disinterest in religious authority, and particularly diminished military capacity in the form of fewer foot soldiers who receive inferior training and, yeah, discipline.

Ferguson compares today’s western powers to ancient Rome. Like that decadent and overstretched power, he thinks we’re on a path of converging historical forces heading straight for a decline-n’-fall.

Ferguson doesn’t ask whether empires are, by and of themselves, a good thing to have, and whether ceasing to be an empire is, by and of itself, a bad thing to be.

I will ask.

And my answers, as you might expect: No and no.

As we all should have learned in recent years, military conquest/occupation is a crude, wasteful, and usually futile way to spread influence.

As we all should have learned from the Soviet debacle, militarist/authoritarian culture is a lousy way to foster democracy, self-reliance, artistic achievement, material prosperity, or social health. It doesn’t even do that reliable a job of keeping its own elites in power.

A post-imperial America, a post-imperial world, is worth promoting/defending. And you can’t effectively promote or defend such a world by imperial means.