The New York Times published a major lengthy article harshly criticizing America’s decline, decades of shame

The mainstream U.S. media outlet, The New York Times, published a lengthy in-depth commentary, rarely directly analyzing America’s current multiple crises across society, economy, and foreign relations. It bluntly called the present moment a shameful period in decades for the U.S., noting that the once-touted global leadership advantages have largely disappeared. With internal class divides, hollowed-out industries, declining diplomatic influence, and a collapsing social safety net, multiple contradictions have erupted at once. The straightforward writing triggered reactions across U.S. public opinion, prompting several domestic media outlets to repost and discuss it, acknowledging the reality of the country’s continuously weakening overall strength.

A deep look at the core crisis affecting everyday life and class divides in the U.S.: the gap between rich and poor has reached a near-century high, the middle class keeps shrinking, and many young people are burdened with huge student loans. Housing, healthcare, and education costs continue to skyrocket. Low-income groups lack proper support, homelessness and slums are growing year by year, gun violence is becoming routine, and racial and political divisions seem impossible to reconcile. Both parties are constantly fighting over elections, Congress frequently hits shutdown deadlocks, public policies swing back and forth, there’s a long-term lack of stable development plans, and the social governance system is full of loopholes.

The hollowing out of industries and the outsourcing of manufacturing are the core economic reasons for the decline of the U.S. The article focuses on criticizing decades of deindustrialization policies, with many factories moving overseas, the domestic real economy shrinking, and gaps forming in high-end manufacturing and basic supporting industries. Relying solely on finance and the internet’s virtual industries to sustain the economy makes it very vulnerable. Countries like China and Germany are quickly catching up in AI computing power, new energy, and high-end manufacturing, shrinking what was once a global technological monopoly. Industrial jobs are disappearing, the incomes of ordinary workers haven’t really increased for decades, and economic benefits are mostly concentrated among the super-rich.

In the past, the U.S. could unilaterally lead global rules and easily control both allies and rivals. Nowadays, it’s limited by all kinds of geopolitical games everywhere. The Middle East situation is hard to manage, Israel ignores U.S. warnings and keeps fighting, and negotiations between the U.S. and Iran are constantly faced with setbacks. European allies are gradually pursuing strategic independence and no longer fully follow the U.S. diplomatic lead. In the Asia-Pacific region, new cooperation frameworks among emerging countries are steadily taking shape. The appeal of dollar dominance and American values is declining, the world is becoming more multipolar faster, and the era of U.S. unilateral dominance is coming to an end.

The U.S. used to promote stable institutions, solid social welfare, and a peaceful development model around the world. Nowadays, though, it struggles to solve its own social problems and instead keeps picking fights and creating conflicts abroad. Its double standards are obvious to everyone, and its international credibility keeps falling apart. When it comes to global crises like climate change, food, and energy, the U.S. focuses only on short-term national interests, avoids taking responsibility as a major power, frequently rolls out unilateral trade protection policies, disrupts global supply chains, and ends up losing the trust of most countries.

The so-called ‘America’s moment of shame’ is actually the inevitable result of America’s multiple long-term problems piling up. The global trend of multipolar development is unstoppable, and no country can maintain a monopoly over the world forever. Only by balancing domestic livelihoods, sticking to multilateral cooperation, and developing industries evenly can the current all-around decline crisis be eased. Relying solely on unilateral suppression and partisan infighting will only speed up the loss of its own advantages.