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What About This 'American Exceptionalism?' [1]

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Date: 2025-01-16

Back when I was a kid watching the National Basketball Association in the 60s and 70s, I don’t remember there being many foreign players in the league. There might have been some, but by far and away the teams were staffed with American-born players who went to American colleges before turning pro.

Decades later, the game has spread throughout the world and the talent level in many countries has greatly improved. So much so that when the current NBA season opened there were a total of 125 international players from 43 different countries covering six continents on the 30 team rosters.

Does that mean America has gotten worse at basketball? I don’t think so.

While you may not like some of the playing style and strategy we’re seeing today, when it comes to the basic skills of the game – like shooting, dribbling, passing – not to mention overall size, strength, and athletic ability -- today’s players appear every bit as good if not better than most of their counterparts from years ago. And the United States still fields a very strong team when it comes to international competition, having won the gold medal in the last Olympics.

No, I don’t think the United States is getting worse. Players from around the world are getting better. And because NBA teams aren’t hesitant to seek the very best talent they can find, you’re seeing more international players – some of whom have become real stars of the game – getting opportunities.

After all, there may be about 330 million people in the United States, but there’re about 8 billion in the rest of the world. So, I wouldn’t worry about our so-called “American exceptionalism” when it comes to basketball.

That doesn’t mean it’s not an issue in other more important areas. And I’d argue we need to take a look at not just our skills and knowledge in various particular fields, but how we’re doing as a country, which is pretty damn important, too.

You’ve probably read or heard about the recent split in the Republican Party over H-1B visas, which are used to allow high-skilled foreign workers to live and be employed here. This is a good thing as far as rich Silicon Valley businessmen are concerned, but terrible to many of the MAGA base who don’t want more immigrants allowed in this country for any reason.

Hate’s hate, man. There are no qualifiers.

Elon Musk, wingman for/owner of four-time indicted, twice impeached, sexual assaulter, tax fraudster, insurrection inspirer, wannabe fascist dictator, convicted felon, incoming president Donald Trump, himself a former H-1B visa holder from South Africa, is for the program.

Musk said it’s important to seek the best talent wherever it is. Of course, some people think he likes this type of visa because it allows him to hire people for less money and to keep them in line under the threat of deportation.

Still, as much as I think Musk is an asshole who left to his own devices will do more harm to our country and the world then good, he is right about this. If you want to be the best in the world in something you need to be willing to bring in the best from the whole world, not just your particular country.

America is still the greatest country in the world, and if we filled these high-skilled jobs with just Americans I think we’d still be pretty good, but we wouldn’t be as good as we could be. The numbers make that clear.

Former presidential candidate/current irritating punk Vivek Ramaswamy, who was born in America to immigrant parents, used this debate as an opportunity to attack U.S. 1990s pop culture, such as its television shows, as a big culprit in why we haven’t developed more engineers here.

Maybe they should have spent more time watching the NBA.

You remember Ramaswamy. He and Musk are co-chairs of the committee Trump started that was supposed to cut $2 trillion from the U.S. budget, until after the election when Musk admitted it might be more like $1 trillion. Whatever. Just let us know what you guys come up with.

Look, it’d be easy to take Republican concerns about how many high-skilled workers our country is turning out more seriously if they gave a damn about education in the first place. When you’re hoping to abolish the Department of Education to help fund tax cuts for the rich and corporations it’s kind of a tipoff about where your head is.

But beyond that, when you’re against universal pre-k and school breakfast and lunch programs, when you want to cut funding for food stamps, which in many cases help homes with children, and use taxpayer money for school vouchers, which will cut funding for public schools, most devastatingly for the poorest districts, are you really trying to provide the best educational opportunities to as many children as you can?

When you’re demonizing trans kids who’re just trying to fit in, or banning books on behalf of the fanatic Christian right, or sabotaging the teaching of history because you’re pandering to white parents who might feel uncomfortable about parts of it, are you really striving for the soundest educational system possible?

And when kids have to spend time doing active shooter drills because you won’t lift a finger to even try to mitigate the carnage in our era of just about daily mass shootings, do you really give a shit?

***

So, is America exceptional? The country that – while being far from perfect – has accomplished so much in its 200-plus year history? Well, we’re still the greatest country in the world, but I’d say we’re not exceptional at this point in time.

An exceptional country wouldn’t elect someone as corrupt, unfit, racist, and hateful as Trump once, let alone twice. An exceptional country wouldn’t put in office so many pathetic members of Congress fawning over someone like Trump. Seeing them abdicate all responsibilities of leadership. Displaying not one shred of political courage or even a clue -- let alone a basic knowledge -- of what a moral compass is. All pretty much without consequences

No, we’re not exceptional right now. We’re good at basketball and a lot of other stuff, but as a group, as we stand on our section of the stage that we share with the rest of the world, we’re not exceptional because of the possible damage to our country and the world that we’ve opened the door for. That so many have decided we’re okay with.

Will we be exceptional someday? I hope so. We’ll see. Who would have thought we’d have fallen as far as we have. That we’d be prepared to put our military, our intelligence community, our health services, our Department of Justice and FBI, our stewardship of our planet, and our children’s future into such incompetent, corrupt, stupid, and destructive hands.

In the meantime, we better keep the visas coming, not just for high-skilled workers but for the millions who do the manual labor jobs many Americans can’t be bothered with. The truth is, we need these folks to help keep our economy going, something we can’t do by ourselves.

If we really were exceptional more of us would’ve figured that out by now.

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Thank you for reading my post. You can see my other writings on my blog: Musings of a Nobody. Please share and subscribe for free via email on its home page.

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