Rotarian Dr. Roger Whitcomb once again gave us his non-partisan view of the state of the world from his viewpoint as a former college political science professor and world traveler. He began by noting that we've been living in "the global liberal order" for the past 75 years with overall very positive results for humanity where cooperation is more sensible than conflict. The liberal world order of the 21st century is more prosperous, healthy and peaceful than ever before. Great progress has been made but he feels that people are losing faith in the liberal order because of some recent events and Nationalists have come out of the woodwork saying that we don't need global cooperation.
Whitcomb believes that the major problems of the threat of nuclear war, terrorism, climate change and technological disruption can only be addressed through global cooperation. He pointed out that Mr. Trump's detractors see him as a man whose rhetoric and actions threaten the fabric of American democracy whereas his supporters believe that he has been necessarily tough on non-American entities like China and North-Korea. He also believes that Mr. Trump has acted erratically in the Middle East much like his predecessors.
The conclusion was a statement of his belief that to confront the many world problems it will be necessary to have more global cooperation and to reemphasize our common global identity for the sake of humankind and planet earth. He ended by saying that the current situation is troubling and the confrontation between globalists and nationalists is surely going to be a continuing theme in world politics for some time to come and that it's going to be a "bumpy ride"