Becoming weak and flabby, losing will, losing moral compass, like an old jock with a beer belly who quit going to church/believing in God....
Wonder if this is a radical thought. I think part of our problem is that we are trying to act like we should, as a country, have a moral compass. That we should be above such trivial matters of staking out the most territory we can, simply because we can, and defending it against any that attack it. Shouldn't the goal be to win to protect our own and nothing more?
Other animals don't make life as complicated as we do. A pride of lions just stakes out territory and raises their family on it. If another pride of lions comes around, they don't get all worried about the other pride's right to exist, they just run them off... perhaps taking that pride's former territory too, if it has good hunting on it.
I think we get ourselves in the most trouble when we are trying to act like God. I don't mean "act Godly", I mean, when we are threatened, or there are other territory battles going on that don't even involve us, we go in and try to "fix" them rather than just beat them. When did it become wrong to just feed ourselves and our own, fight off attackers, and not turn territory into a moral issue? When did we decide we have to empathize and understand both sides equally?