America in the Year 2016? Obama: Whether we like it or not, we remain a dominant military superpower: America in the year 2016:

We all will rest better tonight knowing that our president is concerned about America's outrageous military power. We can be comforted that he plans to do something to tamp it down. If you think Obama did not mean exactly what he says in the video below: "whether we like it or not we remain a dominant military superpower," you are seriously not paying attention to the world around you - check yourself for ADHD. Some country, perhaps some dictator, will always be the "most powerful." Who would Obama choose to fill the void America leaves...one day probably not too far away? Perhaps we might look to the year 2016. If you are already aware of Obama's "superpower" comment, just skip on down the page to the year 2016.

America 

in the 

Year 

2016

First Obama's "superpower comment" from Cassy Fiano at Hot Air:

Now, Obama may have been simply referring to the fact that we get dragged into world conflicts. As a world superpower, that is true. But as I recall, we are supposed to be a force for good in the world. Part of being a force for good in the world means that, occasionally, we have to be the “world’s police”. 

Let’s think about WWII and Germany. If Obama was president then, would he have bothered fighting the Nazis? Or would he have just let them continue their evil reign throughout Europe, murdering millions along the way? 

Yeah, sure, it’s easy to say now, in retrospect, that of course he would have helped to liberate Europe and destroy the Nazis. But remember his position on preventing genocide during the campaign? Specifically, he said that preventing genocide in Iraq was not a good enough reason to keep our troops there. 

Why should we believe he’d have wanted to stop Hitler if he wouldn’t have had a problem letting Hussein continue his tyranny and terrorization of Iraq? The point is, being a superpower in the world is a good thing

In January 2008, the New York Times published a piece by Parag Khanna. The 8-page article goes on an on - I'll admit I did not read every word; it was written by a Liberal. I'll admit that on the first page there is some scolding of America for Afghanistan and Iraq and our "imperialism." That aside, the article takes us to 2016 and a world where "America's standing in the world remains in steady decline:"

It is 2016, and the Hillary Clinton or John McCain or Barack Obama administration is nearing the end of its second term. America has pulled out of Iraq but has about 20,000 troops in the independent state of Kurdistan, as well as warships anchored at Bahrain and an Air Force presence in Qatar. Afghanistan is stable: Iran is nuclear. China has absorbed Taiwan and is steadily increasing its naval presence aroudnt he Pacific Rim and, from the Pakistani port of Gwadar, on the Arabian Sea. The European Union has expanded to well over 30 members and has secure oil and gas flows from North africa, Russia and the Caspian Sea, as well as substantial nuclear energy. America's standing in the world remains in steady decline...

At best, America's unipolar moment lasted through the 1990's, but that was also a decade adrift. The post-cold-war "peace dividend" was never converted into a global liberal order under American leadership. So now, rather than bestriding the globe, we are competing -- and losing -- in a geopolitical marketplace alongside the world's other superpowers: The European Union and China. This is geopolitics in the 21st century: the new Big Three. Not Russia, an increasingly depopulated expanse run by Gazprom.gov; not an incoherent Islam embroiled in internals wars; and not India, lagging decades behind China in both development and strategic appetite. The Big Three make the rules -- their own rules -- without any one of them dominating. And the others are left to choose their suitors in this post-American world...

And Europe's influence grows at America's expense. While America fumbles at nation-building, Europe spends its money and political capital on locking peripheral countries into its orbit. Many poor regions of the world have realized that they want the European dream, not the American dream. Africa wants a real African Union like the E.U. We offer no equivalent. Activists in the Middle East want parliamentary democracy like Europe's, not American-style presidential strongman rule. Many of the foreign students we shunned after 9/11 are now in London and Berlin: twice as many Chinese study in Europe as in the U.S. We didn't educate them, so we have no claims on their brains or layalties as we have in decades past. More broadly, America controls legacy institutions few seem to want -- like the International Monetary Fund -- while Europe excels at building new and sophisticated ones modeled on itself. The U.S. has a hard time getting its way even when it dominates summit meetings -- consider the ill-fated Free Trade Area of the Americas -- let alone when it's not even invited, as with the new East Asian Community, the region's answer to America's Apec.

Let's skip to the last page of the essay:

[On the last page he says the American president in 2016 should] "channel" his/her "inner J.F.K." "You are president, not emperor. You are commander in chief and also diplomat in chief.  Your grand strategy is global strategy, yet you must never use the prhase "American national interest."...that means no more talk of advancing "American values" either." What is worth having is universal first and American second. This applies to "democracy" as well...

Of course, we know today that this author adores Barack Obama. Let us make certain his 2016, or any other similar possibilities, never becomes reality beginning with November 2010.


Obama at end of Nuclear Summit: Whether we like or not, we remain a dominant military superpower (video)