HONG KONG ? I stepped out of The Bubble as soon as I stepped on to Korean Airlines 7854 from New York to Inchon Korea. The Bubble is the current pre-Copernican ideology advanced by our leaders and echoed by our media that the world revolves around the U.S.: the richest, strongest, most advanced country. In fact, we are the most heavily indebted country in the world, more dependent on foreigners than at any previous time in our history, and unchallenged only in our military strength. Because almost no in-depth foreign news is heard inside The Bubble most in the U.S. are unaware how exposed our position has become.
‘U.S. calls for immediate flexibility on renminbi’ blared the headline on the Financial Times the steward handed me. Remember that? Our trade deficits are unsustainable. The dollar will fall dramatically, or U.S. interest rates will spike, if nothing is done. You wouldn’t know this was an issue from the New York Times, which concentrated yesterday on domestic environmental issues, the domestic stock market, prisons in Oklahoma, and the Iraqi insurgency; or CNN, which led with Michael Jackson.
‘China passes Japan to become world’s #3 exporter’ another newspaper here reported today. How about that story: the rise of China? Another issue one is unlikely to see placed in global context in the U.S. media. (The U.S. is the world’s #1 exporter, although it imports even more, followed by Germany; France is #5).
Foreign media are almost silent about Iraq. As soon as one leaves the U.S. one is reminded that the war is a cost born overwhelmingly by the U.S.
These abstract issues have real-world consequences. JFK, for example, used to be one of the world’s best airports. It is now mediocre relative to its competitors. The much vaunted new AirTrain, for example, finished this year at a cost of $1.9 billion, extends only to subway stops close to the airport – not all the way into Manhattan – costs a hefty $5, and is littered with non-functioning walkways and dead escalators. At the other end of a trans-Pacific flight one emerges at Inchon into a brand-new airport completed just a few years ago – and continues, if headed to Hong Kong, to another sparkling new facility. The U.S. has built just one major new airport in the last 10 years: Denver’s. Advancing Asia, by contrast, boasts massive new facilities from Korea to China to Hong Kong to Malaysia.
Keep transferring $1.75 billion every day to foreigners, and this is the result.
For those readers as ignorant about these matters as I am, and who therefore thought, as I did, that Bob might have become temporarily insane while typing the apparently random characters “renminbi,” rest assured: Bob’s sanity is fully intact. “Renminbi” is Chinese for “people’s currency,” and simply refers collectively to the Chinese currency units of the yuan, the jiao, and the fen. Ya learn somethin’ new every day.