In no particular order:

Internal threats:
Dysfunctional political divisiveness. Debate is good and the foundation of a functional democracy. HOWEVER, when debate degenerates into ad hominem attacks and vulgar name calling without any ability to consider opposing viewpoints, then there’s no foundation to build upon.

Bloated government. Not necessarily just at the federal level either. There are plenty of bloat at the state and local level. CUT THE FRACKING SPENDING! Put the government programs out in the open and let “the people” decide what portion of their tax money should go to support which programs. Social programs are needed, but the bureaucracies take the bulk of the money to ensure the money isn’t wasted on the poor.

An education system more focused on “self esteem” than edumakasion. Textbook writers pushing agendas, especially in the historical and social contexts.

Immigration without assimilation. Single-sided PC Multicultural tyranny based on a moral relativistic fallacy.

External threats:
States and non-state actors: Not really a threat to the U.S., not in the big scheme. Sure, we might lose a city to a smuggled nuke, but the U.S. is BIG. And most people do have commonsense when reality bites them in the butt. I believe the majority are Jeffersonian—it’s just a matter of waking up from the complacency of a thriving economy and 180 channels on cable.

Flu. Superflu. Avian flu. Something else. It’s been a hundred years since a real pandemic and we’re much more connected than we were 100 years ago. 13 Monkeys is a real possibility.

Comet impact. Definite threat—probablity small, but still greater than zero. And not really a damn thing we could do.

Summary:
We could lose the east coast, we could lose the west coast and still vestiges of Western Civ would survive. We seem to be our main threat—our own internal conflicts and lack of coherant long term vision threaten this great experiment. Yet I remain optimistic because if there’s one thing our short history has proven, it’s that Americans are unpredictable and infinately innovative and flexible when needed to be. Hell, even if all tech got wiped in a massive EMP, our Amish would still be around to rebuild the country. -cp

Massive debt. The USA is now the world’s largest net debtor nation.

Environmental destruction: global warming, ecological degradation, all the rest.

Resource depletion. Self-explanatory.

A decaying industrial infrastructure. Industry has now been largely supplanted by finance and speculation, while investment in actual production continues to stagnate, or is financed by an unsustainable accumulation of private debt.

An education system that exists to placate a handful of special interests (ie, the religious right) by reducing America’s educational curricula to the lowest common denominator.

Electoral myopia. The public is wholly uninformed and largely unfit to decide who governs it. It will make decisions on the basis of emotions and whoever has the better advertising scheme rather than what is in the nation’s long-run best interests.

Endless wars abroad that end up draining the country of its resources, while alienating potential allies and revealing much about America’s military capabilities and tactics to its potential rivals (notably China).

Loss of international credibility as a “leader of the world” (as though it weren’t low enough already) due to various antics, most recently the suspension of habeas corpus in the Military Commissions Act.

Creeping dominionism. If religion continues to gain influence in the government, the result will be cultural, economic, and scientific stagnation of the kind that affects modern day Islamic states.

Demographics. In a few decades, white Protestants will be a minority in America. Depending on attitudes then, racial tensions could surge if this group begins to view itself as being “under threat”.

The continued growth of the military industrial complex, both absolutely and in a manner designed to cater to special interests rather than strategic imperatives.

The potential obsolescence of much of American economic infrastructure. This happened to Britain at the pinnacle of its power: technological innovations had no leeway, and were eventually co-opted by Germany and America, causing Britain to lose its leading position in the world as the producer of many industrial products. The same thing seems to be happening between Asia and America today: many of the latest plants are now overseas.

That’s all I can think of for now.

1) A truly significant disruption in oil distribution. Not just super high prices, but dry taps, like in the seventies.

2) a wave of protectionism, particularly between the big economies (Nafta, EU, China, etc.).

3) A banking meltdown in China.

4) A run on the dollar (instead of the slow deflation we’re gonna get [hopefully]).

5) A Chinese invasion of Taiwan that isn’t successful in a week or less.

6) A flu variant we didn’t see coming.

7) An expansionist Iran (possibly related to number 1)

8) A turn away from R&D in the US, or an flight of research dollars to other places (like India and China).

With the exception of a major cometary or asteriod impact, I actually think that civilization has become crash-proof. Even an all-out nuclear war would not extinguish civilization (although thing would be screwed for a good 20-30 years).

Clearly the biggest threat is that one day someone, perhaps the Raelians or the NORKs, will succeed in creating the ultimate biological weapon:

Paris Hilton gene-spliced with a bear into some sort of terrifying Bearis Hilton Super Soldier.

And then we’re all fucked.

The sooner humanity can put down its PSPs and copies of US Weekly to band together against this threat, the better off we’ll be.

Going Global on the Threat Down
Please arrange in whatever order you wish. Not mad but just so!

• Religion without personal conviction ““ god helps those who help themselves

• Living in your own pond ““ One horse town! With blinders

• Living without sustaining ““ produce what one needs!

• Things I am made to do by the Government ““ my apology (I mean within not without)!

• Food and shelter abuse (rat packing!): Welfare of all who inhabit

• Driving: Public transportation should be for all and free. Not anarchic am I?

• Overworking: A month’s vacation for all who toil ““ (8.5% of life time)

• Papyrus! ““ Only have a child if you can afford a Blacberry!

• Flatlanders: remember the wheel and the Earth is a ball!

*Not breathing: taking care of oneself

Lexington Green, you strike me as a glass half empty kinda guy ;)

I’m surprised no one has mentioned the fact that we are poisoning our bodies by eating refined, processed foods with all kinds of additives. A few generations of poor nutrition leads to diminished reproduction; 15% of US couples are infertile. Diabetes, heart disease, cancer, Alzheimers, ADHD, allergies, arthritis, and autism have all been linked to modern foods. So far modern medicine has kept one step of ahead of chronic disease, and our life expectancy continues to rise. I wonder for how much longer. At my school, about 20% of the student body have medical issues ranging from severe allergies to eczema to bizarre abnormalities I have never heard of.

Sonagi:

I’m surprised no one has mentioned the fact that we are poisoning our bodies by eating refined, processed foods with all kinds of additives.

This strikes me as remarkably myopic of recent centuries. This is the first century in which we have conquered disease, starvation, and the average lifespan is approaching 80 years. Refined, processed food is just fine as long as its included in a balanced diet.

Curzon,

We have indeed conquered starvation in the US, but we have not conquered malnutrition. Our nation, blessed with abundant fertile land and a large agricultural industry, is capable of providing nutritious food to every American man, woman, and child, but instead nutritious whole foods are transformed into packaged products with twenty different ingredients, most of which add sweetness and/or extend the shelflife.

We have NOT conquered disease. Infectious diseases are much less of a threat, but two chronic diseases, diabetes and heart failure, are on the rise, and cancer continues to be a major cause of death, striking 40% of Americans at some time in their lives.

A serving of macaroni and cheese once in a while isn’t going to shorten anyone’s lifespan, but Curzon, many of the kids I have contact with consume a diet that is almost exclusively processed: sugary cereal for breakfast with juice instead of fruit; a hot lunch that is a nutritionist’s nightmare – think chicken nuggets with BBQ sauce and fruit cocktail drowning in syrup; and a dinner that probably came out of a box or a jar.

I shall restate this idea from my previous post:

So far modern medicine has kept one step of ahead of chronic disease, and our life expectancy continues to rise.

Statins, stents, and bypasses have made it possible for folks to live with arteries clogged by years of eating unhealthy foods. Former President Clinton is alive and well not because of his diet but because of technology and surgical procedures that did not exist a generation ago when my father was disabled by a heart attack and died a few months later of a second one. Modern medicine deserves far more credit than the food industry for enabling Americans to live longer lives.

Another factor in our rising longevity is the decrease in smoking rates since the 1960s.

Interesting link on singularity, Kende. I am, however, skeptical of AI as a threat in my lifetime. Computers are much, much faster than humans, but their “thought” processes are nowhere near as complex as ours. Computer translators cannot even do a decent job of turning English into Chinese because their “brains” cannot handle the multi-layered context of language. Speech recognition technology is still in its infancy. The other day I practically had to staccato shout my answers into an automated system, and I speak clear SAE with no regional accent.

I agree with you very much on #9, energy diversification.

Interesting points, Elizabeth. Viruses and bacteria are organisms evolving in nature, not created and nor controlled by humans. Computers, being non-organic, could never propagate themselves. Ghengis Khan may not have patronized the arts, but he was highly intelligent as evidenced by his military successes. Evil people may win wars, but not stupid people. Intelligence is much more broadly defined than creating and enjoying high culture.

“Computers, being non-organic, could never propagate themselves.”

Well, I wouldn’t say never but I suspect you’re right. Nonetheless, I do not think that, if artifacts of any intelligence were to be a threat to humans, their success would depend on the kind of broad intelligence you describe. Viruses aren’t even capable of evil, but they are dangerous. But this comes back to what sort of threat we are talking about.

Sonagi,
The rise of processed foods came at the end of our struggle against hunger. You are right that technology now allows us to deal with the resultant effects upon our body (including quite possibly the inflamation that causes heart disease, as well as the obvious type-2 diabetes, etc). However, with hunger now defeated (i.e. supply of quick nutrients), our rising wealth will eventually allow us to move toward a balanced nutritional meal. The challenge will be moving people away from the sugar/glucose dependancy we have formed. Just google “heritage chicken” and you’ll see that alternatives are arriving; for the wealthy now, for others later.

Hopeful technologies on the horizon to combat the threatdown (again, in no particular order):

Nanotechnology. Microscopic robots working on the molecular level to rebuild and repair the human body from the inside. Nanotech assembly “replicators” building nearly any tangible item you can think of, from food and clothing to advanced, miniturized electronics. Also works for desalination of ocean water and extraction of minerals from same.

Solar energy satellites in geo-synch orbit. Taking the high energy solar output (“cosmic rays”) and converting it to microwave energy tranmitted back to receiving stations on earth. However, until we get into high orbit, focus on nuclear power plants.

Space elevator. Useful for getting into low Earth orbit safely. Either a stationary elevator or a “spoke” system. Once you have a cheap and safe way of getting into space, it’d make disposal of waste nuclear materials practical—use a mass driver to just toss the waste nuke into the sun.

Controlled evolution. I’ve viewed the singularity as a logical step in the evolution of humanity. There’s only so much room in the brain, and it’s not always the perfect medium for storage or transmittal (even with nanotech assist). Plus, as medical science pushes the edge on unlocking the genome sequences (what RNA coding is responsible for what particular biological function), we’d be able to engineer tough, resilient bodies with virtually unlimited lifespans.

Just a reminder, much of the technology we take for granted today was science fiction just a generation or two ago: Microwaves to cook, PCs, MRIs, space travel (even if it is local), color T.V., fiberoptic communications, INTERNET, anti-lock brakes. We don’t even want to go down the road of medical miracles.

All I’m saying is, if there’s a profit to be made, someone will figure out what to do. We’re barely scratching the surface on understanding the physical realities of the universe—we’ve got a decent grasp of the electromagnetic principles down and are working on the strong and weak nuclear forces—imaging the possibilities when these forces are understood as well as E-M. Eventually we’ll also nail down gravity and inertia—it’s only a matter of time IF Western civ can keep things going long enough.

We’re in a race between making a fool-proof world, and the fools that would bring it down (wherein lies the threatdown—fools and foolish behavior for short term gain). Y’all know the rest of the quote. -cp