Scenario: Populist America

PORTAL PAGE FOR Populist America

INTRODUCTION
Where Mercantilism was the major economic theory between the 16th and 18th Centuries, Capitalism between the 18th and early 21st Centuries; Populism has become the primary economic theorem of the world since the mid-21st Century. This school of thought has led to a more progressive society and the creation of a democratic economy where companies are run much like democracies and payment is determined by the amount of work one does and the risk involving that work. Economic Rights are protected in most nations along side Civil Rights; and as such an era of economic justice has since come into being.

Cultural Changes

 * Due to the creation of the Pacific Ocean Treaty Alliance (POTA):
 * A mixing of cultures began to occur in the 2040s, leading to a more liberalized culture of the Pacific Rim.
 * The Federation of Europe is looked upon as the most conservative developed nation.
 * Social Networking and E-mail has become the primary from of communication around the world.
 * Thanks to the Energy Crisis of 2020 and the energy rationing of the Flood War the number of automobiles in the world ceased to grow at the rate it had prior to these events, leading to a greater reliance on mass transit.
 * Thanks to a global ban on High Fructose Corn Syrup, obesity levels around the world have significantly dropped.
 * Thanks to the development of Pulse Detonation Jet Engines in the 2010s:
 * Global travel is much more common as it now only takes 3 hours to fly from Beijing to New York.
 * International Trade has grown significantly in the more isolated regions of the world.
 * Following the clean up of the Low Earth Debris Field, space flight became common place.
 * Space Hotels became a popular tourist destinations by 2065.
 * Due to the communications and high-tech industries having been largely in the Western and Northern States, as well as the mass migrations driven by Global Climate Change, the West and North is now the population center of America.
 * The global hub of culture, trade, and power is now centered in the Pacific rim nations. As such the western world is no longer the dominant civilization, but rather the Pacific World.
 * Due to the information revolution of the early 21st Century:
 * Analog Media (i.e. Newspapers, Boradcast Radio and Television) ceased to exist by 2025.
 * All News and information is streamed through procedurally generated outlets that take information fed through both local reporters and subscribers.
 * Cell Phones, Media players, and netbooks became indistinguishable form one another by the late 2010s. The first true "All-in-One" device was the Apple iPod Omni.
 * Shortly after the end of the Flood War most clothing companies began to produce cloths with fiber circuits. Allowing people to use their clothes as servers.
 * Due to the liberalization of bio-ethics laws in the Pacific over the first three decades of the 21st Century:
 * Designer Children have become the norm in most Pacific countries, leading to longer life-spans, higher IQs, and a more dynamic economy.
 * The term "parent" has lost most of it's meaning as now most people are more than capable of caring for themselves by age 16.

Political Changes

 * World War II is now remembered with the same distance as WWI was by the previous generation.
 * The Iraq and Nigerian Wars are remembered in the same light as the Korean and Vietnam Wars.
 * Populism is accepted as a key platform of every major American political entity, much like Capitalism was prior to the Second Depression.
 * Left and Right are no longer used to describe someone's political leanings, as the Nolan Chart has replaced the left-right spectrum.
 * With the greater integration of the internet, and the subsequent death of TV and Radio by the middle of the Second Depression:
 * News Anchors no longer exist; independent journalists or organizations like the Associated Press and STRATFOR have become the primary outlets of news.
 * Organizations like Huffington Post, Drudge Report, and Air America have become reporters of the news, but are largely considered to be purely opinion centers; however with the wide range of these organizations coming into being after the collapse of News Corp and Time Warner, honest journalism is actually easier to find than in the 2000s and 2010s.
 * Freedom is no longer just some arbritary rally cry for conservative fringe groups, it has truly become the symbol for all that the US stands for, many attribute this to both the injustices of the Bush and Palin Administrations, as well as the crusades of Presidents Huntsman, Duncan and Edwards.

Entertainment Changes

 * The Video Game Industry supplanted Movies as the primary format for entertainment in 2023 with the widespread use of neural interfaces.
 * All media is now digital, and is either streamed or stored in holographic crystal devices.
 * Popular TV shows and Film from the past have been reformatted for player interaction.
 * The Avatar trilogy has surpassed Star Wars as the most popular classic sci-fi trilogy of all time.
 * Bollywood briefly surpassed Hollywood as the most profitable film industry in the world prior to the video game industry's complete dominance of the entertainment industry.
 * Music became completely open source by 2020 when Internet 2.0 made internet piracy law impossible to enforce. Most bands make the majority of their money through live,pay-per-view shows or Deals with Disturbion Groups.
 * Tim Burners Lee is considered one of the most important humans in recorded history for the invention of the World Wide Web.
 * Net Neutrality became protected under constitutional law in 2044 with the signing of the 35th Amendment to the US Constitution.

Religious Changes

 * Due to the Atheist Movement of the 2000s and 2010s:
 * The Big Bang Theory and Theory of Evolution are now as uncontroversial as the Theory of Gravity.
 * Teaching Creationism and Intelligent Design in Public Schools was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2023.
 * Human Euthanasia is now an accepted practice by doctors for the last few terminally ill patients.
 * Stem Cell Treatments are now as common medical practices as inoculations.
 * Evolution is now accepted by 95% of the world as scientific fact..
 * Scientology ceased to exist in 2037.
 * The Church of the Latter Day Saints collapsed in 2040s.
 * Due to the cut in Teen Abstinence Programs
 * Proper Sexual Education Programs have led to the US having a much lower teen pregnancy population.
 * The transfer of STDs among teens is much lower than OTL.
 * The religious views of the 20th Century and early 21st Century are largely considered to have been fanatical.
 * Persia, while still largely Shiite, is a much more moderate state in the Middle East.
 * In the Federation of Europe, Catholicism is on the rise once again.


 * Eastern Europe is largely Eastern Orthodox and Sunni Muslim.

New Stuff
Mars Map has been finished, and the front page has been reformatted.