We fought a literal civil war and bounced back. We've had multiple presidents assassinated but still had continuity of power. I doubt the U.S. is going anywhere anytime soon except maybe down a couple slots on the world's largest economies lists, and that's soley due to population growth.
Some of us who are optimistic believe that the uniqueness of the U.S. lies in its favorable environment for innovation (e.g. YC), so we hope to invent our way out of problems. We grew up on hopeful sci-fi and will stick to it until our bitter end.
> We've had multiple presidents assassinated but still had continuity of power.
Sure, with the peaceful transfer being recently violated for the first, but probably not the last time. The literacy rate in the US continues to decline, and the US keep losing respect on the world stage which is only going to get much worse over the next 4 years.
> Some of us who are optimistic believe that the uniqueness of the U.S. lies in its favorable environment for innovation (e.g. YC),
The US doesn't have an especially favorable environment for innovation than other first world countries, arguably it has less given the lack of regulation.
I may be wrong, but all indications are that this is a sort of "past glory".
I've not personally visited Shenzhen, but every online account (e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toizHWGD-rE) shows that they are making everything there -- the "Designed in California, Made in China" is a tenuous situation, and not guaranteed to last.
Like how DeepSeek was a wake-up moment, there are several more waiting to happen.
Again, this is my very much "secondhand" perspective, but I think the GP's assertion is on borrowed time.
Continuity of power and government is not what people think it is.
The government can continue even if the US stops being a democracy, citizens lose their basic rights (like they did Jim Crows era), or have a civil war without continuity of government breaking.
The US can smoothly slide into Hungary, then Singapore (parliamentary republics only in the name), or more crash into South American Banana Rebublic with some key blues states working, while large parts of the country are effectively lawless or authoritarian.
I think we're going to become Russia, honestly. Or probably even more accurately we're just going to revert to the way we were during the Gilded Age. Oligarchy time.
How do you invent your way out of authoritarian leadership and a sizeable chunk of the population cheering that on? And there's more dystopian sci-fi than there is hopeful sci-fi.
This is not a technical problem; it's a societal/social one.
>We grew up on hopeful sci-fi and will stick to it until our bitter end.
American optimism and hope did not derive itself from "hopeful sci-fi" or tech. The sci-fi and tech came in its superpower phase, post-WWII. American optimism preceded that by decades if not centuries, because its population believed--despite everything--that as country it always strove to act in a morally just manner both domestically and internationally. What's more is that this mythology, cause that's what it was, happened to be accepted by much of world as well. That accomplishment in persuasion exceeds any accomplishment in short-term innovation when the goal is to maintain a long-lasting empire.
There was a time when many thought Nazi Germany was the most innovative and advanced entity in the world. Yet, even at the time, no one who believed that would care to immigrate to Nazi Germany for that reason. The same would be true if China became the most technologically advanced country in the world.
It is the man-child delusion of the broligarchy to claim that American optimism is (was) rooted in technological advancement.
Some of us who are optimistic believe that the uniqueness of the U.S. lies in its favorable environment for innovation (e.g. YC), so we hope to invent our way out of problems. We grew up on hopeful sci-fi and will stick to it until our bitter end.