Further out, the future seems brighter. As Joel Kotkin writes, this could be yet another American century. We're still an entrepreneurial hotbed, our energy resources are plentiful, most of our rivals will be in decline by 2030, we retain the edge in military hardware, we're an agricultural superpower, and we're unparalleled in our ability to absorb different races, religions and cultures, "an increasingly critical factor in maintaining global pre-eminence.