{"id":40260,"date":"2018-11-08T06:57:47","date_gmt":"2018-11-08T11:57:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=40260"},"modified":"2018-11-08T06:57:58","modified_gmt":"2018-11-08T11:57:58","slug":"trump-gorbachev-and-the-fall-of-the-american-empire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=40260","title":{"rendered":"Trump, Gorbachev and the fall of the American empire"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 class=\"headline\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.atimes.com\/trump-gorbachev-and-the-fall-of-the-american-empire\/\">Trump, Gorbachev and the fall of the American empire<\/a><\/h3>\n<div class=\"content sticky-sidebar-relative\">\n<div class=\"content-read-more\">\n<p>\u201cThe only wealth you keep is wealth you have given away,\u201d said Marcus Aurelius (121-180 AD), last of the great Roman emperors. US President Donald Trump might know of another Italian, Mario Puzo\u2019s Don Vito Corleone, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=SeldwfOwuL8\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">his memorable mumble<\/a>: \u201cI\u2019m going to make him an offer he can\u2019t refuse.\u201d Forgetting such Aurelian and godfather codes is propelling the decline and fall of the American empire.<\/p>\n<p>Trump is making offers the world <em>can<\/em> refuse \u2013 by reshaping trade deals, dispensing with American sops and forcing powerful corporations to return home, the US is regaining economic wealth but relinquishing global power.<\/p>\n<p>As the last leader of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR),\u00a0Mikhail Gorbachev\u2019s <em>perestroika<\/em> (restructuring) led to the breakup of its vast territory(22 million square kilometers). Gorbachev\u2019s failed policies led to the\u00a0dissolution of the USSR into Russia and independent countries, and the end of a superpower.<\/p>\n<p>Ironically, the success of Trump\u2019s policies will hasten the demise of the American empire:\u00a0the US regaining economic\u00a0health but losing its insidious hold over the world.<\/p>\n<p>This diminishing influence was highlighted when India and seven other countries geared up to defy Washington\u2019s re-imposition of its unilateral, illegal sanctions against Iran, starting Monday.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The US State Department granting \u201cpermission\u201d on the weekend to the eight countries to buy Iranian oil was akin to waving the green flag at a train that has already left the station<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The US State Department granting \u201cpermission\u201d on the weekend to the eight countries to buy Iranian oil was akin to waving the green flag at a train that has already left the station.<\/p>\n<p>\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Trump, Gorbachev and the fall of the American empire \u201cThe only wealth you keep is wealth you have given away,\u201d said Marcus Aurelius (121-180 AD), last of the great Roman emperors. US President Donald Trump might know of another Italian, Mario Puzo\u2019s Don Vito Corleone, and his memorable mumble: \u201cI\u2019m going to make him an [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3602,15907,7844,259,9589,2534,22843,742,827,3142,1174],"class_list":["post-40260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-geopolitics","tag-american-empire","tag-asia-times","tag-donald-trump","tag-empire","tag-imperial-decline","tag-mikhail-gorbachev","tag-raja-murthy","tag-soviet-union","tag-united-states","tag-us-empire","tag-us-foreign-policy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40260"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40260\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40261,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40260\/revisions\/40261"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}