Do you think it's reasonable to say that since at least around the 1970s, on net, the people running the United States have been consistently trading power for greed?
Since arguably the 1940s the people running the United States have been consistently trading power over the domains they consider illegible and confusing for power over the domains they consider tractable and familiar, under elite job market conditions where they are incentivised to know as much as possible about abstract court politics and the manipulation of language and as little as possible about the real world.
Even right now, you see the Trump family, the various oligarch families in the cabinet, fiddling the figures, stealing and enabling mass disasters, they are doing what they believe is right and good while having horrific delusions.
Two excellent primers on this, albeit with more of a focus on the parallel problem in the EU establishment than the US, are below:
My question was grounded in ignorance and curiosity. Appreciate the response, gives me a lot to think about. Cheers
I don’t say that lightly, and it’s certainly not just the US that has that problem either. Australia, where I live, is infected with it.
When I said leadership, I didn't mean just the president, but all those with the most power and influence leading the country. Presidents, senators, Congress, supreme Court justices, Federal department heads, etc.
It seems like the things that made america powerful have been chipped away at over decades. Maybe it's just a lifecycle playing out and inevitable?