Trump was right about one thing, we are a nation in decline, but it’s not for the reasons he’s claiming.

Maybe even the start of Americans engaging with reality, I’m not holding my breath though.

End? It was always a myth?

It is difficult to get Drezner to understand that American exceptionalism is already dead when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.

I view FA as an arena for American political elite to build legitimacy for their ideas.

That, combined with an expected surge of corrupt foreign policy practices, will leave the United States looking like a garden-variety great power.

I’m surprised to hear such strong language out of FA. I normally expect boring policy-style language.

He believes that the U.S.-created liberal international order has, over time, stacked the deck against the United States.

I’ve perceived that things have never been better for American international order than under Trump/Biden.

he will likely use Schedule F—a measure to reclassify civil service positions as political slots—to force them out.

Interesting precedence if so. Having career civil servants keeps things from changing too fast, and turning them political could enable instability. I’m curious how this interacts with the Hatch act.

The first is the inevitable corruption that will compromise U.S. policies.

I’m surprised at the emphasis on “corruption” language, especially in FA. This type of language gets people labeled “troublemaker” as Chomsky might say.