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My point concerns the end of the article: the author applies their three phases to the last 35 or so years of American society, conveniently ignoring the rot that came with their childhood, adolescence, young adulthood, &c.

So no, the point isn’t defeatism. It’s to observe that so many of these types of polemics come with a healthy dose of rose colored glass.

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I agree with this overall sentiment. When the author speaks of "crappy institutions and leaders" I understand he mean something along the lines of "we shouldn't accept this level of performance from things we can change" or some other call for more effective government/infrastructure/etc.

It's when the author drops into 'overwhelming debt ending in failure' that he drops the mask enough to show that he doesn't want any sort of government or public infrastructure. It's a libertarian, leaning anarcho-capitalist, viewpoint that explains the discontinuity in tone that permeates many of the articles I sampled from this author.

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