Dr. Martin Hash Podcast

You only need to look around to see that there is no decline in America. Even homeless people sleeping on the streets doesn't mean there's more homelessness, it just means that the rest of the population now accepts seeing them on the sidewalks; no more batons, insane asylums and Work Farms. America's history is one of continuous improvement; both in the physicalities of life and intellectually, plus more people are participating than ever before. However, it doesn't take much thought to suspect this upward trajectory can't continue forever. Maybe it could with the old “American Dream” mythos, where everyone was always working to better themselves, but now a lot of people never even knew what that was? Kids especially, they get an iPad when they're 2, helicopter parents, and self-identified gender before they ever see a wrench or know what one is used for. Self-autonomy they know, personal responsibility they don't.

Meritocracy is no longer promoted nor admired in youth; the opposite in fact, an atmosphere of “inclusiveness” that borders on Marxist “from those according to their ability, to those according to their needs” ideology. They certainly don't want the difficulty and stress of starting their own business, in fact they don't want to work at all, but instead go on a new kind of Welfare where rather than it being charity, it's a Right, called Basic Income. How can productivity possible keep up with consumption when everyone is “doing something meaningful.” There's a theory that all successful societies eventually reach this point of narcissistic hedonism, and collapse under their own weight, or are conquered by their hungrier neighbors, but it's probably going to be something else. The “decline,” if indeed there is one, isn't the many who are faltering, it's the concentration of power and wealth by the few.