To return the discussion from military prowess (my wee-wee is bigger than yours!) to more peaceful means the basic premise that Europe is not going to fade away holds very much true.

The discussion between European and US models within US has next to nothing reason on actual merits of European system(s) (no matter what people this side of Atlantic might wish for). The praise of European model in US is actually an indirect attack on existing US model. By showing successful European model, the critics of existing US model wish to show that things might be done successfully in another country (and subsequently moved to US). Similarly the "US number 1" has nothing to do on reality (anyone with slightest bit of sanity would immediately revamp current US health care system on real merits alone) but wish to upkeep the current model.

Europe is politically and militarily considerably weaker than US but economically and scientifically it is roughly equal. It is also good to remember that despite all the talk of Pacific Century vast majority of US business interests (in terms of invested capital) is in Europe. Similarly vast majority of European business interests lie within US. This is the bottom line of actual reality.

However, US model is praised in Europe in order to get good economic growth figures (but at what social cost?) in order to win economic beauty contest. This resonates nicely with business (who'd like bigger share of the pie) and is being used to lure people (who'd like to look like fashion models and drive really big cars and have wall sized TVs and jobs jobs jobs). So again these models have next to no relevance to reality (US model has larger amount of economic activity but the social cost amongst population is equally very high). This was the reason why several Finnish governmental researchers have dismissed US model as it does not offer more good to greater part of society as whole than existing Finnish model. Researchers of private interests tout US system as a wayto ensure monetary awards are more plentiful (to smaller slice of population).

Currently the beat is on US side of these models but I do not believe it will hold. The current US system is based on foreign indebtness that is simply unsustainable. The EU's better net international indebtness proportion of GDP and higher private savings offer European model longer life expectancy in case of severe recession. Ofcourse it does not mean that recession would be easy in Europe but I also believe that social costs of such recession would be more tolerable than in US.

Thus I agree on idea that believers of US model are better off realising sizable problems within their model and accept the fact that it is more vulnerable to larger part of population than most European models.