Reports of America's demise have been greatly exaggerated

The polite word for all of this is, of course, bullshine, peddled before in days of yore. On hearing the news of Pearl Harbor, Winston Churchill, who really did know a lot about America, observed that many “silly people” thought America would soon be but “a vague blur on the horizon,” weak, indecisive and inconsequential. “But I had studied the American Civil War, fought out to the last desperate inch. American blood flowed in my veins. [I knew] that the United States is like a gigantic boiler. Once the fire is lighted under it there is no limit to the power it can generate.” And that’s no fantasy.