Ellis on Adams on CSPAN's BookTV
Our second president, John Adams, said that success for a person or a nation carries within it the seeds of demise. One of his biographers, Joseph Ellis, said that Adams thought once the focus moves from producing to consuming the jig is up and that the key is to find a president who will "manage American decline" effectively. Ellis laughed and said you won't hear that on the presidential campaign trail: "hire me and I'll manage American decline effectively!". Ellis said that the fact that GNP growth has slowed over the past few decades shows that the American economy is already not what it used to be during the post-World War II days of hegemony. He also said that just because a nation is declining doesn't mean that decline can't be very gradual.
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