actually, high tech and manufacturing have been going away since the '80's. IBM lost out on the personal computer to foreign labor produced pc's. GM closed plants during the most profitable time in the company's history - why didn't they retain american jobs?

the usa is like rome though. consumption, no production, stagnated and corrupt government. but the real reason rome was rome and we are too is that the world runs on our currency. the world accepted rome's coinage, that's what really made them an empire. funny thing about saddam hussein right before we sacked him - he was telling OPEC to drop the dollar as the standard for trading oil. you can forget about fishing for pleasure when the world dumps the dollar, you'll be fishing for dinner, literally.