President George W. Bush will leave behind a weakened America and therefore also a weakened West.

America's might in the world has been based on its economy, not on the size of its population. America's economy is by far the largest in the world, but its population 350 million people is only about 5% of the world's population. It is the economy that has given America its military and diplomatic strength, and the status as the only super-power in the world. Its past rival, the Soviet Union, did not vanish due to a lack of military power, but because its economy gave out.

In the long run America's position as the sole superpower in the world is unsustainable, because large developing countries - particularly China and India - are growing their economies with a much faster space. They are catching up by having absorbed Western economic thinking and by entering the global economy, which earlier consisted to a large degree of the West only. America's and the West's diminishing share of the global economy is partly a result of the triumph of the Western thinking.

Bush the younger's years have accelerated this trend. He inherited an economy in which the federal government was almost debt-free. With the very large tax cuts, supported by the then Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, and with the cost of the probably counter-productive war in Iraq, the U.S. government is now debt-ridden. Added to the Federal Reserve's expansionary monetary policy under the Greenspan years, the American economy now sucks in the bulk of all the savings in the world.

A debt-ridden economy is fragile, which has become painfully clear during the past year and in particular during the past few days. The Bush Administration has been forced to propose an emergency $700 billion aid package to prevent the American financial system from imploding. $700 billion equals another Iraqi war. Americans are entering a period of uncertain times with a heavy package in the form of debt.

Luckily there is the presidential election in November and a new administration in January. In a democracy a country can take a new direction when old policies have failed. The question is whether either of the two candidates can provide the new direction. Barack Obama, with his brilliant mind and lack of cemented positions due to the shortness of his public life, might find the right solutions. John McCain, at 72 and with some 30 years in the Congress, might on the other hand cling to old thinking including the belief that America is as powerful as it ever was.

The most terrifying outcome would be that McCain is elected, but would become incapacitated, and the inexperienced and simplistic Sarah Palin would together with her snowmobile champion husband be occupying the White House.

Olli Raade


Below Bill Maher's interview with Bob Woodward: