About 10 more years is my best guess. Empires last, on average, 250 years, and we're getting near that mark now.
At it's end of life, the Roman Empire had it's coliseum, it's gladiators and it's "bread and circuses", it's corrupt politicians gathering ever more power to themselves at the expense of the public. We now have ball players as national heroes, actors (rather than warriors and statesmen that actually do the building and maintaining of empire) as heroes, an almost entirely corrupted political class, and a welfare state representing our very own "bread ans circuses". Just as Rome had it's invasive barbarians that provided just enough extra OOMPH! to bring the state down, it's Vandals, Visigoths, and Celts invading from the north to assist in destroying the state from within, we now have our own "barbarians" invading across our borders, primarily from the south this time, but with the same purpose and result.
There is no longer any one in power who is trying to maintain the empire - they are actively courting it's destruction in the name of personal enrichment for themselves, the rest of us be damned. Just as happened to Rome.
We are on the downhill run of this empire, and have been for some time now. We're getting near the finish line.
Just as Sky observed above, some of us have seen all or most of the current situation before, in the 1960's, right down to people re-using the same ideas, the same catch-phrases and wording, and replaying some of the same events from that era. Far from being an indicator that "this has all happened before and we survived it", it's more a demonstration that this has been going on a long time with no rest periods, and the empire is nearing the exhaustion point now.
Rome itself is still there, but it's empire is gone, it's character changed from what it once was. So too I think a core of the Federal American Empire may survive, in a much reduced and changed state, but the rest of the empire that was will experience drastic changes, including the inevitable change of hands into the hands of new owners.
There are people out there, people that you and I don't know - at least I don't - who are orchestrating this destruction from behind the curtain with the objective of enriching themselves at the expense of the rest. They are using the time-honored tradition of "deconstructing" the society and individuals who used to be, in an effort to "reconstruct" them, rebuild them, in the image those people want them to exist in. They are actively tearing down the edifice in an attempt to raise an entirely new one, more to their liking, on the ashes of what was, One must utterly destroy what was in order to rebuild anew on that same ground and in their own concept... and that new building always reflects a changed power structure to benefit only the builders, never the worker bees.
I'd say about 10 more years is all we'll have to finish experiencing the death throes of this empire. The only questions left at this point are what comes next, and how prepared will we be as individuals to exist within, or outside, of it?
NOW is the time to plan that out for you and your posterity... if it's not already too late, that is.
.
At it's end of life, the Roman Empire had it's coliseum, it's gladiators and it's "bread and circuses", it's corrupt politicians gathering ever more power to themselves at the expense of the public. We now have ball players as national heroes, actors (rather than warriors and statesmen that actually do the building and maintaining of empire) as heroes, an almost entirely corrupted political class, and a welfare state representing our very own "bread ans circuses". Just as Rome had it's invasive barbarians that provided just enough extra OOMPH! to bring the state down, it's Vandals, Visigoths, and Celts invading from the north to assist in destroying the state from within, we now have our own "barbarians" invading across our borders, primarily from the south this time, but with the same purpose and result.
There is no longer any one in power who is trying to maintain the empire - they are actively courting it's destruction in the name of personal enrichment for themselves, the rest of us be damned. Just as happened to Rome.
We are on the downhill run of this empire, and have been for some time now. We're getting near the finish line.
Just as Sky observed above, some of us have seen all or most of the current situation before, in the 1960's, right down to people re-using the same ideas, the same catch-phrases and wording, and replaying some of the same events from that era. Far from being an indicator that "this has all happened before and we survived it", it's more a demonstration that this has been going on a long time with no rest periods, and the empire is nearing the exhaustion point now.
Rome itself is still there, but it's empire is gone, it's character changed from what it once was. So too I think a core of the Federal American Empire may survive, in a much reduced and changed state, but the rest of the empire that was will experience drastic changes, including the inevitable change of hands into the hands of new owners.
There are people out there, people that you and I don't know - at least I don't - who are orchestrating this destruction from behind the curtain with the objective of enriching themselves at the expense of the rest. They are using the time-honored tradition of "deconstructing" the society and individuals who used to be, in an effort to "reconstruct" them, rebuild them, in the image those people want them to exist in. They are actively tearing down the edifice in an attempt to raise an entirely new one, more to their liking, on the ashes of what was, One must utterly destroy what was in order to rebuild anew on that same ground and in their own concept... and that new building always reflects a changed power structure to benefit only the builders, never the worker bees.
I'd say about 10 more years is all we'll have to finish experiencing the death throes of this empire. The only questions left at this point are what comes next, and how prepared will we be as individuals to exist within, or outside, of it?
NOW is the time to plan that out for you and your posterity... if it's not already too late, that is.
.