Ron Unz on the decline of America

The truth is, when you look at the audience here, all of you, regardless of whether you're young or old have lived your entire lives when America was the most powerful, most successful country in the world and in many cases, the most prosperous country in the world.  But the problem is prosperity, power and success breed arrogance.  It breeds an unwillingness to look at reality and the result of that many times is the nemesis of a country and I think we're seeing that right now in the United States, and we've been seeing that for at least the last couple of decades.

~ Ron Unz, "The Decline of America," "Mises in Reno" event, 0.25 mark, May 23, 2023