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When my wife and I lived in America, every time our wedding anniversary came round, crowds would gather in the streets of our neighbourhood, flags would appear on every front porch and fireworks would illuminate the sky. They weren’t celebrating us, of course. It just so happened that the day we got hitched was July 4th, the same day on which America (some years previously) got divorced.
We were struck, as Brits, by the joy of these occasions. No other country I can think of celebrates its founding quite like America does, perhaps because no other country was founded on such a big, beautiful idea: that people from elsewhere can come there and enjoy life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Journalists are predisposed to point out cracks in this picture: times when Americans, being human, have not lived up to their ideals. But after travelling to 45 American states in the past two decades, my overwhelming impression is of a country that succeeds more often than not. The astonishing prosperity of its suburbs, where homes are twice as big as those in Europe; the creativity of intellectual life in America, from faculty room to fab; the friendliness and fundamental
decency of the vast majority of its people; there is nowhere like America.
So I warmly concur with our cover package this week wishing the United States a happy 250th birthday. But as we celebrate, we also take stock. Our lighthearted interactive series on 250 years of US history
concludes
on a note of hope, mixed with alarm.
Our cover leader
argues that America remains the world’s pre-eminent economic, military and scientific power, and that if it maintains its lead in artificial intelligence, its dominance could grow. Yet its national politics have not in living memory been as ugly or as venal.
In a six-page essay, my fellow deputy editor, Ed Carr, ponders what might happen if
America’s foreign policy remains predatory
even after Donald Trump leaves office. One of our data maestros looks at empirical measures of power, and finds that America grows ever mightier in absolute terms but has
diminished slightly in relative ones.
On the domestic front, we introduce
a new BBQ index
to measure the cost of a July 4th cookout, and find it has risen sharply, largely owing to Mr Trump’s tariffs and war on Iran. And one of our culture writers takes
a drive down Route 66,
which reminds him “just how vast and hospitable” his country still is. If you want
to listen to a podcast,
John Prideaux, our executive editor, retraced the footsteps of Alexis de Tocqueville, the author of arguably the best book ever written about America.
In The Insider this week Zanny Minton Beddoes, our editor-in-chief, grills a team of colleagues about the health of America’s democracy and its changing relationship with the rest of the world. You can
watch the episode now.
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