"I believe you have something that belongs to me."

... the sentence Professor A. Hartdegen posed to his nemesis
expecting a response at the most poignant moment
in the 2002 remake of a classic story. It is a story whose premise
and consequence revolves around the object
Mr. Hartdegen is prompting for in the statement above. An object, a
machine that he had created, of perfection.
Perfect as the synchronization of time in the universe. A creation
that inadvertently and also logically held
the answer to the only question he had sought for his entire
life... ; so flawless that he had to traverse
800,000 years for that answer. The value-neutral vehicle that
inaddition to representing the great fruition and
good in his life but also the tragedy and undesired consequence...
the consequence that was the inescapable result
of him... a story of fiction... or is it?

The United States is the remaining superpower left in the world...
the stabilizing force for peace amongst nations.
It has the ability to shape the course of history, just as Mr.
Hartdegen could with his creation. The question remains
is America heading in the wrong direction for the next 50 years? It
is the question that has been posed by many politicians,
scholars and possibly other from other professions. Marketers?
Salesmen? We do have by far the most recognizable brands in
world commerce. Let's believe for the moment the sale of an idea from
a phrase in the story about A. Hartdegen that one can
infer the future by observing the the world in the present. What does
the future hold for us when we can't see other countries
through the rational of our foreign policies that we have adhered to
for the last 50 years... 'the enemy of my
enemy is my friend'?(Vol.2, no.1) What if that rational can only be
seen through another... China... the countries
of Iran, North Korea and Venezuela... that of our enemies, will be
their friends... will we be the inescapable
result of our potential tragedies? Will the greatest game theorists
that delivered us from the Cold War save us
from our future... 'the future is now'...

Thomas Friedman a Pulitzer prize winning writer wrote that the world
is flat. China will not be the country it
is now 50 years from now. It will be like us equal in size of power
maybe more and to do that it needs energy...
energy demands that our world will not be able to sustain comfortably
and adequately for all without serious
dislocations as we've hit a peak, the Hubert Peak... the inevitable.
We could potentially find ourselves in a very
precarious situation. One with very little room from which to
maneuver from; a position in which it will be difficult
to mitigate the risk as a great nation, a superpower should.

Our position as a debtor nation to another(China) that will have the
ability to dictate its' own history in accordance
to its' desires in the time frame of discussion could leave us in an
even more precarious position; one that wil see
a diminishing effectiveness of our nation to be a stabilizing force
of the world. A game theory scenario that will benefit
mainland China into pressing the assimilation of Taiwan into its'
national policy of a single nation; a scenario that would
be increasingly difficult if not impossible to mitigate the risk even
for the brightest and greatest of minds, the Alexander
Hartdegens can save us from...


[Under Construction]