Where Does America Fit In The World?

Choices to be made about America’s future place in the world, from large and in charge to walking softly and fixing our own problems first. Global strategist Ian Bremmer joins us.

Iraqi forces, run out of Ramadi this weekend. By ISIS. Now just 75 miles from Baghdad. Even as US warplanes pummeled ISIS from the sky. It’s a big deal. And it raises the question again of just how deeply the US should be involved. Not just in Ramadi and Iraq, but all over the world. Should we send in troops and fix things? Should we turn our attention homeward, and fix the United States? Global strategist Ian Bremmer says we have to decide. We can’t go on jerking from crisis to crisis. And now is the time to choose. This Hour, On Point: choosing a solid, clear global course for the USA.
-- Tom Ashbrook

Ian Bremmer, president and founder of the Eurasia Group. Author of the new book, "Superpower: Three Choices For America's Role in the World." Also author of "Every Nation for Itself," among others. (@ianbremmer)

The Atlantic: The Disintegration of the World -- "The forces of globalization have created pressures at home that businesses can no longer safely ignore. One symptom of our era of change is an erosion of trust in major institutions, prominently including corporations: in 2015, the public-relations firm Edelman found that, for the first time since 2008, trust in business broadly declined, falling in 16 of the 27 countries included in the firm’s annual trust survey."

Newsweek: The changing role of America as a global superpower — "Bremmer wants America to be open: to trade, to immigration, to ideas. But, 'instead of throwing money at other people's problems let's invest more money more wisely in American education, rebuild our infrastructure ... Putting an end to our prohibitively expensive Superhero foreign policy can make all that possible.'"

Harvard Belfer Center: The Future of U.S.-China Relations Under Xi Jinping — "The future relationship between China and the United States represents one of the great mega-changes and mega-challenges of our age. Unlike other such changes, the consequences of China’s rise are unfolding gradually, sometimes purposefully, but most of the time imperceptibly while the world’s attention is drawn to more dramatic events elsewhere. With the rise of China, we are observing the geopolitical equivalent of the melting of the polar ice caps."