...a homerun in a high school baseball game one time and has based their entire life on being a sports hero of some kind--America did not come to dominate the 20th century through its own hard work and ingenuity. America was the fortunate recipient of world events and two vast oceans that helped shield her from the worst effects of two brutal world wars.
Being able to eventually--and reluctantly--step in and save the world through a manufacturing base that had been geographically protected from the wars and then benefitting from being the better option for the German scientists that we snapped up to help us dominate the science arena in the post-WWII world was the secret sauce of America's success.
Certainly, the potential was there for America to be a global leader by the end of the 19th century, but without the chaos in Europe and the acquisition of the scientific minds and technology coming out of Europe through the dual conflicts it is highly unlikely that America would come to be the dominant superpower of the 20th century--nor would it have probably even had the aspiration to do so given the isolationist trends of the day in America. The world wars would completely change the paradigm and the future of the U.S.
Barring what is happening in Russia and Israel today, the rest of the world does not seem poised to make that mistake again soon. The irony is that the MAGA movement that currently dominates American policy is actually poised to cede everything that could have kept America on the top of the heap. Far from being on the field to even accidentally hit another homerun to brag about, America seems to have decided that even playing with a bat is too much to ask--so I guess we will just take our toys and go home and brag some more about that one time we hit a homerun....
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