Comment 6 by RDfan :

When I think about America nowadays, my heart leaps with joy and my stomach churns in disgust. It's became the land of dreams and nightmares all in one. It's both amazing and fcuked up. Is the US still the world's last, best hope? Probably yes, sadly.

What do you base that on? If I had to list some of the most significant problems facing the world they would include things like Global Climate Change, Population Control, and the cause of peace vs war for nations to solve problems.

The US is far behind countries such as Germany in dealing with climate change. Many, possibly the majority of people in our Congress don't even recognize that its a real problem let alone want to do anything to fix it.

Our policy on population control (abstinence only) in the recent past was a nonsensical, unscientific, approach dominated by theocratic dogma.

The US fairly recently thumbed its nose at the UN and started a war against Iraq -- a country that posed no threat to the US in any tangible manner. And while Obama has made some steps in the right direction we are still in Iraq and Afghanistan, starting to go into Africa and we use our predator drones to kill anyone we choose outside the US.

So again, on what do you base your claim that "the US [is] still the world's last, best hope"?