First off let me clarify that I'm no Trump supporter either. :) That said, I've been reading a book called "The Accidental Superpower" that I find very insightf

First off let me clarify that I'm no Trump supporter either. :) That said, I've been reading a book called "The Accidental Superpower" that I find very insightful, and the author makes arguments similar to the ones you mentioned. He argues that since WW2 the US has defended free trade around the world (through "the Bretton Woods system") essentially "for free" - even though we shoulder the defense burden for the rest of the world we haven't used this to negotiate treaties that are biased in our favor. The author sees this system ending in the next 20 years (i.e., the US will no longer defend the world's commerce for free) and he spends a large portion of the book discussing how different countries around the world will have to adapt. A couple interesting notes: the author predicts that in a world with less free trade the US would do relatively well thanks to shale oil and our other natural resources (like rivers and rich farmlands). He also talks a lot about demographic changes. He says in the US this will cause some pain from ~2020-2030 as the baby boomers retire, but we'll recover as millennials enter the most productive years of their careers (40s-early 60s). However he also predicts much more dire consequences for Russia due to demographic changes, and suggests they might not recover from a decline starting around 2020. Compare: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Russia_Sex_by_Age_20150101.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Russia_Sex_by_Age_2015010... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USA_by_Sex_and_Age_2015-07-01.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USA_by_Sex_and_Age_2015-0... I can't repeat the entire analysis from the book in this box but I've found the author's comments to be thought-provoking so far. :) Of particular interest to the HN crowd, the author also argues that demographic issues mean that right now there is an unusually large amount of investable capital available, but this will soon change as baby boomers begin to retire and switch from accumulating and investing their money to trying to stretch what they've already earned to last the rest of their lives. He predicts we'll see much less money available for risky investments starting in the next few years, due simply to demographic changes around the world.