You’re going to have to help me with the implications of your first graph. Are you suggesting we need less political liberty to ensure higher economic growth?
Actually, to many, it appears that free countries are getting away with turning to socialism, as the sheeple let them...while in authoritarian countries, the leaders can't afford to ignore economic realities--they must adopt free-market policies to gain the economic growth that allows them to keep the populace pacified.
I think that it also points out that we can't pretend that we have some birthright to prosperity as Americans or Europeans or whatever. Countries that were once far behind us are now owed a great deal, and we find that our influence is waning as these places can pull economic strings and influence global politics with money we owe them.
I find it extremely sad that a man who was right on the money (no pun intended) in his predictions (Ron Paul) was ridiculed--and still is--while Americans (many of whom realize that tax-and-spend wasn't a great idea) have had no problem with President Bush's borrow-and-devalue-and-spend approach.