Big Think

Question: Are we prepared for a waning of American power?

Dennis Kucinich: You know this whole idea about pax Americana needs to be looked at. I mean there’s an arrogance behind it. We’re not the only country in the world. And an Americentric view is actually dangerous because it says that . . . that our decisions . . . that we don’t have to worry about the impact of our decisions on the rest of the world. We can make 25 percent of the greenhouse gases and who cares? We’re America. We can arm ourselves to the hilt and tell other countries, “Don’t you even so much as have a nuclear power plant.” See you can’t do that. You can’t . . . you can’t . . . you can’t have a credible position in the world saying, “Don’t do as we do; do as we say.” And so because the U.S. spends more than the rest of the world put together for military, we’ve used our military might to try to impose our views on other countries when our morality should do if we had leaders who took that position. But they don’t, so we use arms. And we end up in a mess where we’re hated in different countries. I want America to be loved again. I want America to be respected as a country that takes care of its own people.

Recorded on: 10/19/07