America reminds me of my toaster.

So I was thinking about how I saw George Bush in Rome a couple of weeks ago and it got me thinking about toasters. Mum still uses the toaster I grew up with. That thing has been through more bread than Michael Jackson. And I thought it would be the same when I bought my first toaster. I thought it was the start of a long happy relationship. But it wasn’t. Me and the missus are onto our third one now and the reason why is because they just don’t make things to last anymore. It seems to me the same can be said of Empires. I wonder if George pondered on the fact that the Romans Empire rose to power and stayed there for hundreds of years. But poor old America will be lucky to make a century as a superpower. Maybe that’s just the way things are in this fast paced world. Maybe trying to spread global influence takes a lot more than it used to. The disastrous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are costing America lives, credibility and lots and lots of money. Will historians look back at Bush’s tenure as the beginning of the end of America the superpower? The Romans left us sandals, sewers, roads, gladiator films, aqueducts and Toga parties. America, we’ll always love you for your hamburgers, Hip Hop, Disneyland, Coca Cola, Prozac and Velcro. You will live on. The world will come to visit you and listen to tour guides talk about the days when America was the centre of the planet. And maybe in a few hundred years the leader of the current world super power will speed through the streets of Washington, gaze out at its buildings through the heavily tinted bullet, rpg and mini nuke proof glass and wonder where it all went wrong for the USA.