Cascadia National University, Lecture Hall, January 2518

So, today we're going to delve a little more into the Fall of the American Empire, because when one talks about how an empire falls, it can be easy to ignore the forest for the trees. Even that phrase had less connotations to an American than it does to us, for example.

To an American, the phrase simply meant focusing on a particular isolated piece rather than noticing that there were a lot of that one piece around. An American would have had no concept of the idea of overlooking an incredibly valuable long term asset in favor of destroying it for quick profit.

Now, profits lead to treasure. The cults and elite groups that held the empire in check thought they had solved the age old problem of treasure by simply claiming that their wealth did not exist. But around the world, people saw the standards of living. They saw the treasure, and they wanted the treasure.

So, what does any group without money do when they want it? They go where the money is. Of course, those at the top, assuming their own families were taken care of, assumed that the influx of cheap labor could only be a good thing. Due to air travel, which was extremely common among wealthy citizens at the time, they actually believed that every country was pretty much exactly the same, because they were treated the same everywhere they went. They claimed that they were "Citizens of the World" with no loyalty except to the goodness and equality of all mankind. (It is worth noting that many of these patricians lived in opulence, and strongly believed that the sacrifices to bring about their world would be paid by someone else.)

So, as the great American roads fell apart, natural physical barriers began to reassert themselves. Despite the American attempt to stem the tide of people looking for their piece of the world's treasure, man-made barriers proved no match for the natural world's ability to stop man in his tracks. People began to rely on neighbors. Some neighbors became family. And families started looking out for themselves.

American Cult Leaders greatly encouraged this kind of tribalism, because they believed it would lead them to even greater cult power. The idea was that if every group could be neatly divided, eventually a messiah would appear who appealed to ALL of them. This savior would of course, lead America to heaven, where awaited Angels and Demons, as well as an endless supply of Consumer goods.

Consumer goods? Oh... that's next time.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2Aco73B4L0]