WRITING in the Wall Street Journal, Walter Russell Mead is the latest in a long line of cheerleaders for American global leadership to maintain that, no matter how it might look, America is not in decline. "The United States isn't in decline", Mr Mead writes, "but it is in the midst of a major rebalancing. The alliances and coalitions America built in the Cold War no longer suffice for the tasks ahead." It turns out that what Mr Mead means by "major rebalancing" is that America is in decline.
The Economist | American decline: It's the end of the world as we know it