re: #144 Wendell Zurkowitz ((slave to the waffle light))
We are still far, far away from a collapse along the lines of Rome or Byzantium but yes, we will have to sober up and see that we can no longer compare our role in the world to what it was before 2001.
Not quite the Fall of the USSR with tank in the streets, etc. but the decline of the British Empire post WWI/Great Depression, I think.