Once upon a time we led the civilized nations by example. The examples of our acceptance of the Rule of Law; or a concessionary political system that sought compromise to advance legislation; a judicious use of military force (see: WW2) when needed; our educational resources were directed to nurturing forward-looking academics, engineers and scientists who did research that did things like build computers, made medical advances that provided hearts and put a man on the moon in less than a decade.
No longer. American Exceptionalism now means that no one except the 1% is entitled to much of anything within or outside our borders; and that revenue now flows one way. Up.
Why is this important? Because the enablers of the 1% have essentially cut off the flow of money for medical research at the NIH and other places to help America lead the way out of the potential Global Pandemic of Ebola. The republicans have been asked to approve minimal reactive funding for what is essentially containment in West Africa, and have turned down or cut funding requests by the White House because scoring political Tea Party points are more important than helping contain a Pandemic or making it seem that Obama is doing anything other than playing golf (their latest talking point).
We were once the most successful experiment in being a Republic, ever, on the scale that this noble undertaking of Democracy was attempted. Now we've become a sad joke, a country run by men and women who would 500 years ago been happy to sign off on the idea that the Earth was the literal center of the universe; witches could turn an enemy into a toad and a feudal system of government was a great idea.
An Englishman is a person who does things because they have been done before. An American is a person who does things because they haven't been done before.
--Mark Twain