With the 4th of July approaching, I'm sure that many Citizens of the USA will be looking at their country and its Government.
I therefore doubt that I can or should contribute anything to this debate since many of their own people are doing quite an adequate job of critisizing themselves.
I will say this, it seems to me that we (the rest of the world) are dealing with two different US of A's, on the one hand, certainly I and I'm sure many of you, in this industry have met and made friends with many wonderful people from the US and we are aware of the great wealth and potential of the country. On the other hand many of us have to deal with a bureaucracy that seems to have gone out of hand and to have lost the ability to reason intelligently.
Now assuming that the same rule holds true in the US as in the rest of the world, where not necessarily all of the best and brightest people are occupying the offices of the Government machinery, then it is perhaps understandable that often times the "appearance" of taking appropriate measures to deal with a situation may be more important then actually achieving that objective. We can only hope that the passage of time will help to improve the execution of what at times seem to be onerous and excessive requirements, painted with a very broad brush indeed. I think we are already seeing some modifications to procedures that are making the passage into or through the US a less chaving experience.
I wish that I could contribute to keeping the USA strong and on an even keel with the rest of the world, rather then having to perhaps live to experience its position as the worlds dominant superpower being replaced by a rising economic giant like China!
There seems little likelyhood of the countries of the EU becoming sufficiently united to being much more of a "United Europe" then they are now! and judging from some of the edicts emanating from Brussels I am not sure that I would be impressed any more favourably then I am by those coming from Washington
Enjoy your Summer!