Bulwark Takes - The Age of America is Over

Episode Date: April 5, 2025

Tim Miller and JVL dive into the bleak future of American democracy, global influence, and national identity. Is the age of America truly over? From authoritarian drift to international irrelevance, they explore worst-case scenarios—and why even the "best case" might not be enough.

Hey guys, it's Tim Miller from the Bulwark here with JVL. We were taping this late night because I was on an airplane listening to JVL talk to Sarah. You can go get that in our subscribers only secret podcast. You can go to bulwark.com slash subscribe to get the Sarah and JVL secret podcast. But anyway, they were discussing his newsletter that was titled The Age of America is Over. It was a really great chat. But I was so excited to download it for the flight because I'm in a really dark place about the state of America. And I think you titled the secret podcast Dark Something. And I was like, this is going to be just what I need, some darkness to feed my darkness. And what happened was Sarah, as is her want, was like giving, she was clear eyed, but giving a more, what is it?

What is the hopeful way that we could recover America, that America could rebound? Like, how can we fight this? And those are all great instincts, but it's just not where I am right this second and so i was like i want to do a darker version of this secret podcast with jvl where we discuss the worst case outcomes for the end of the age of america so will you do that with me sure thing man i mean i uh i mean sarah makes you want to be a better person and that's one of the reasons i love her and i would follow her anywhere. But I would say I and I want to believe I want to believe Sarah, but I found her case, which essentially was we can recover. These guys are going to tear everything down. We won't ever be able to go back to what we were.

But if we have a vision and a will will we can build something new that's great and for a couple different reasons i i don't believe that's true or i that's wrong i don't believe that's likely likely about that yeah right yeah no likely and because i sure think it's possible and i think the thing that resonated with with me that you kind of wrote was basically uh when you wrote the age of her goes over i think one of your social media posts was like i don't think like people have come to terms with like where we're at like how bad the situation actually is right now because yeah yeah because like 5 000 points down in the dow is a really bad two days but you know everybody's everybody's going along with their lives so they've thought that deeply about the worst case outcomes and so as a antidote to

your podcast what i did next on the flight was read from this book the captive mind that ann applebaum suggested from a polish uh a polish author who was living through the move from the nazis to the commies back in the 1940s and 50s and this was giving me what i was looking for okay scratch your edge this was scratch your so i want to read this section cold war poland i think that's where we're headed i want to read this section and i think it covers what how where i want with you. Okay. He is writing now from Poland about how the man of the East, the Polish, they cannot take Americans seriously because they've never undergone the experiences

that teach men how relative their judgments and thinking habits are. Their resultant lack of imagination is appalling because they were born and raised in a given social order and in a given system of values. They believe that any other order must be unnatural and that it cannot last because it is incompatible with human nature. But even they may one day know fire, hunger, and the sword. And I was like, yes, yes, sir.

That is right, says La Milos. That is right, says La Milos. That is my language. Because I just think that the lack of imagination right now is really kind of striking. Because I just look at all this and it's like the world is going to reorder around us without us. And I think that there's a very lack of imagination. And let's imagine how it could go. To me, I look at it, it's like, I think it's Sarah's outcome is just as likely as the outcome where the dollar is not the reserve currency anymore, that we devalue it so much and our instability becomes so great that that the bad order, you know, change that changes, which has major financial consequences for us that the Chinese and EU slash Canada, Australia, like enter enter the space we were in because we've totally stopped all soft power and that we retrench into kind of like a bigger hungary or turkey like kind of a slightly bigger turkey yeah and uh and that to me feels like you know maybe not the most likely outcome but something that we're staring down the barrel of right now. Yeah, I the most likely outcome is probably some version of we get through this and we we stave off the authoritarian attempt somehow.

We prevent the total collapse of the rule of law in the United States. We preserve free and fair elections. And we enter what is essentially like the third American Republic. And, uh, that's like the most optimistic thing I can think. Like it's, it's 2029, it's January, 2029. And we are still very much a liberal democracy. Uh, the rule of law has held the executive branch is not able to disappear people off the streets with impunity. And even in that scenario, which again is, I'm calling it most likely, I don't actually believe

that's the most likely, but I'm just, you know, I don't want to sound like I have Trump derangement syndrome or something. I actually do think it's probably the most likely, but in, you know, a plurality. But it's a low variant. It a plurality. It's not the majority. Right. It's a plurality. Right. I mean, you know, when we say most likely, maybe this is like a 35% outcome. But even in that, we are now like France post-World War II. We are simply a one nation among any and not even a leading nation we're a nation which sees ourselves as being world historically

important and still has a bunch of legacy power and momentum behind it we have a seat on the security council why does france have a seat on a security council right it's just it's just an artifact and economically like we have some things that will probably you know we have some things which are important. Resources-wise, Silicon Valley, Hollywood, some of that. Sure. But we don't get to dictate anything to anybody anywhere except maybe Mexico. Right. Right? And the world trading order, we have to adapt ourselves to it.

Does the dollar stay the world's reserve currency in that? Even in that scenario, I think a decade from now, maybe not. I mean, I think that becomes a coin flip. What if we're not the world's reserve currency? Can we run budget deficits because our other countries willing to buy up our debt? No. Right. I mean, this is this is a massive reordering of America's place in the world.

And what strikes me is that in America, I don't think hardly anybody has their heads around this. And the entire rest of the world sees it. Yes. It's a great thing i mean if if people if if people in america don't understand that the canadians are looking at us like like i i mean the canadians no offense right love love our canadian neighbors and you know but and and they should be looking at us that way yeah right i mean if any if people did not watch the mark ke Carney speech yesterday, he spoke for about 45 minutes. Um, and it was a shocking to see a world leader speaking with such command, uh, over events

and facts. I mean, you put him next to Donald Trump speaking and it is an embarrassment. Yeah. It's simply a national embarrassment, But also somebody speaking so frankly, because that is not typically how world leaders speak, right? Everything is euphemism and it's guarded and hedged. And you just said that world is over. I mean, do you know how bad things have to be in diplomat speak for heads of state to talk like that about their neighbors? It's also just real talk.

Some of you might look at that and say, oh, well, maybe that's going to help them in the campaign because people are so mad at America. That's not what this is about. But it's just a blunt truth. How can you look at a country that is allowing this stuff to happen right where trump is just like running roughshod tanking the economy randomly over whims and like disappearing people and breaking the law and there's no like none of the other institutions are doing anything like he was convicted of felonies and it all just went away i mean this is this is, again, like, France, just this week. It's below banana republic shit. And banana republicans, they arrest people. And we have seen this happen three times in the last

18 months. We saw it happen in South Korea, Brazil, and now France, where there was a national leader with an incredible populist movement behind them who broke the law and the rule of law held and said, get bent. And it just happened to Marine Le Pen, right? And the world, I mean, this is, again, and so why did this happen in America? And this gets to your point, Tim, it's the failure of imagination, right? The Supreme Court's failure of imagination that, well, you know, everything's going to be fine here. We just we don't want to upset these voters too much. McConnell's failure of imagination. Biden's failure of imagination, really. I mean, like a lot of the big business, the big corporate, you know, folks that got along with Trump.

There just is a failure of imagination just really across the board about how bad it could be but now he's in a situation where again i so back to the carney speech even if you're the rosy 2029 scenario comes in how can you look at america and be like we've got a lot there's that's a high trust relationship where we can do these kind of financial deals and get in these long-term military and economic entanglements you know because the past is because it's like you look at the country like that and you're like if this can happen if it can get go this fucking wonky over a game show host like what could i mean who might come after what if there's a recession the

next the democrat comes in there's a recession and then Democrat comes in, there's a recession. And then what follows? Like, we can't rely on those people. One of the two parties in a two-party system is totally lawless. Yeah. So what you're describing is the same dynamic for why the tariffs won't work, right? So why aren't Trump's tariffs going to work? And by work, I mean, like, spark a resurgence in low-end manufacturing and stuff. And the reason is because in order to do that, somebody would have to make investments

in factories, right? That takes lots of capital. There's a long lead time and nobody's going to spend money on low margin industries and infrastructure in a a society where the rule of law and like how economics proceeds are a matter of whim who's going to work in these factories right we're fucking disappearing the the working class immigrants that were not all the jobs and obviously to be some american citizens but like there's a shortage right now there are job openings they're manufacturing job openings in this country. We have a worker shortage. It's like the whole thing is just ridiculous.

But this is why, again, even in the rosy scenario here, the rest of the world understands that in terms of the medium and long term planning, they absolutely have to plan around america yeah because america is no longer a trustworthy ally or partner right america the american people can fly and they were able to to look past it once right once and it's well you know that was a crazy thing that happened and nobody knew he kind of lost it was an accident you know like he lost a popular vote you know but to have it happen again after the insurrection after the convictions with the same guy and he runs on he doesn't hide the football he just says all the stuff he wants to do and he wins again at that point you just simply can't make put a tv host in charge of the military right like we're in a military partnership with a country that has a tv host in charge of the military and where the

vice president's shit talking me in private text messages i can't be in a i can't be in a reliable military partnership with them and where where the intelligence community is compromised yeah by their adversaries right i mean Europe is still in an adversarial relationship with Vladimir Putin. And our DNI is, I'm sorry, but compromised with the Russians. Like this is, you know, they can't share intelligence. We have no idea what's happening

at the general staff level in the armed services in America. We don't know if these new guys are trustworthy or not. All of these plans, and these things take a long time to happen, but they're going to happen without us, and they are going to be plans and contingencies that view America as maybe a neutral, benign presence or maybe a threat. And the fact of that, I think, carries the potential to drive us closer to the authoritarians. I mean, one of the reasons that Trump likes Putin and Xi and views the Europeans as adversaries is because the Europeans are committed to liberal democracy

and he doesn't want that. The last little anecdote from today that has made just again, like when you're just trying to wrap your head around how the rest of the world is going to be seeing this and judging this, it's a small thing, but so there's an earthquake in Myanmar. Oh yeah. Right. and we had three i guess it was just like three people three people yeah it's not like three people that were there as part of the state department usaid something and like we called them back they're like in myanmar supposedly helping like sleeping on a cot and america's like no we are not doing that anymore we're calling three people back

and this is just like we are spitting in the face of the people of miamar and the people around the world who interact with america through that way have gotten the message that we're spitting in their face like they get it like they're not consuming this oh there's waste there's a lot of fraud happening or this is part of some american culture war with the globalists and elon and who knows they'll come back so they're like no i they see clearly that america is not interested in them anymore and like all of those nodes, again, just matter as far as what our role is in the world and what kind of power we have and how we can leverage that and how it benefits us and opportunity.

And one more thing just related to this that I saw today, another thing that's just coming to me. It's like 100 plus thousand foreign students or something have already gone back yes they've said that they're not gonna they're not gonna they're not gonna come here for the net for they've either left this semester or so they're not coming back for next semester so again like think about the most important thing about foreign students is tim tell me they pay full tuition yeah and so one of the reasons universities in america have really loaded up on foreign students in the last decade and a half is because they wind up subsidizing

all of the domestic students who are getting financial aid yeah so when those foreign students disappear this is going to make it harder for funding. Like, again, all this is so stupid. Yes. Yeah. The waterfall effect is just A, on American economy and power and strength here, but then on then who go back. You know, like, what is your relationship to America? Like all those, you know, all this stuff like she studied here, right?

Like and had like relationships with Terry Br branstead the governor of iowa like there's just things that happen in the 10 and 20 and 30 year where it's just like around the world we're sending the message that we're sending a big middle finger to like everybody except for putin and the saudis and the other like you know oil bear you know oil fascists in the middle east and like besides the leaders of the petro states and putin like everyone is getting the message that we don't give a fuck about them and so they're going to reorient without us i just i just to me i just feel so obvious and i think that it's like i wanted to talk through with you because it's like it does make you feel like you're going a little crazy sometimes when you're like i this thing feels so obvious to me and it like hasn't

sunk in with people yet. So let me explain. I want to ask you. This is one of the things Sarah and I thought about a little bit. Not thought about. That's wrong. One of the things we talked about. She talked about how, again, we could build something new together. And I don't think America is capable of that anymore. Together with who?

No, with America, right? With Americans? Together among Americans? Yes. Like, you know, we emerged from this crisis and there's a new consensus to rebuild. I look at the American society and to me it is so decadent and foolish, I don't believe you can get any sort of consensus. We haven't had a popular vote winner go over 53% since like Reagan, I guess, right? And it used to happen all the time. We used to be able to go like, you know, 56, 42 or something. And we have been inching away from that for 30 years. And that has finally caught up with us. And that, I mean, this is just one thing to sort of broadly illustrate the point that we don't have consensus on anything. And that means that we are a sick and failing and degenerating society. And, you know, even if you could get to like, oh, well, pick your great democratic liberal person with vision, right?

In 2019 gets elected. Okay, let's pretend they get all the way up to 51.5% of the vote. That is not enough cushion and not enough support to build anything meaningful. Right. Yeah, I'm pretty much on your side of this. live in this world where 47 percent 45 percent 44 percent of the country wants lawless illiberalism then we are fucked and there is nothing to be done about it yeah i mean i'm i'm more on your side side of this discussion i will say the sarah the the one thing that that that appeals to the sarah argument to me is like i just i think it's going to be so bad over the next three years like i just don't think people have any fucking idea how bad it is and i do think

that there are going to be a lot of people that are blindsided by how bad it is and maybe that badness could yield something that could come out of it i don't think there's a zero percent chance of that i will say covid really shook the shook me about that me too right because again million people were dying and uh even with that it was like great joe biden won by 70 000 votes in three states right i mean and so the fact that covid didn't kind of bring us together in any way and did worse, frankly, makes me not very confident in the prediction that if things go really bad, that I, you know, again, there were some out extenuating circumstances about the COVID and blame shifting and the came from China and all that, right? Like, if it really is a single man, like if Donald Trump singularly orchestrates a catastrophic disaster that really ruins people's lives broadly, maybe that shakes something loose. I'm not like hopeful of that. I just,

I don't think that there's a 0% chance of that. But to me, it's even like, okay, and then that happens. And then, you know, maybe there's a period of rapprochement. I mean, I think about, you think about Germany, would have been hard to predict in 1950 that Germany would be, you know, 70 years later, like a global, not only disrespected, but like a key partner and kind of a central partner in the free world. So, you know, I mean, like it is, it is repairable. So again, I don't think it's a 0% chance. To me, I think that it feels unlikely right now. I should say that.

I do want to caveat. What I am talking about are things that will happen in the timescale of our lives. Right. Like if you want to zoom out to 70 years, then sure, anything can happen. Right. zoom out to 70 years then sure anything can happen right but we are we are looking at a project which is a multi-generational project yeah that you and i are unlikely to see the the fruition of right and uh like we we are going to die in a world that is very different than we spent the first half of our lives in uh And in a world which is different than our parents ever experienced and our grandparents

ever experienced, frankly. And that is very, very bracing. But to go back to your Polish author, that was once a common experience for people to be born into one world and die in another. And in America, we've just gotten used to the idea that not for us, because this is the natural state of things, right? This is liberalism and democracy and the rights of man. This is the end of history, as Francis Fukuyama wrote, right? And that was a really interesting theory. And I think it simply turns out to be incorrect. The captive mind, if you're looking to get down in dumps with me. JVL, this was perfect. This is

what I was looking for, okay? Yeah for can we scratch that edge yeah I needed to just really kind of marinate in the despair of the state of affairs for our beloved America so thank you for doing that everybody else subscribe to the feed

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