1122 Foreign Affairs are Immaterial

Contrary to what most Americans conceive, impactful things happen in other countries too, but Americans can be forgiven their ignorance because of the small, barely noticeable affect of those happenings on our everyday lives. Simple observation suggests that foreign affairs are immaterial: maybe because their management has been impeccable but it’s more likely that anything could happen and it wouldn’t make any difference for very long before the slack is taken up. For example, I know almost nothing of what's happening in China, even while I was visiting there. China’s a big powerful country; we’re told it verges on being the world’s most influential but there’s no evidence of that happening yet? There’s got to be world-changing events going on in China but somehow they don't change my world, at least so far as I notice. It’s a universal observation: for a decade I was basically a recluse traveling, and when I re-emerged it was as if the world had been in a time-warp, nothing happened: the news was the same, just the names were different. It's as if I don't know about something, it didn't occur. Apparently trees that fall in the woods really don't make a sound?