The Illusion of Glory: When America Starves Its Own and Still Pretends to Lead the World

The SNAP Scare: A Glimpse Behind the Mask

This November, millions of Americans braced themselves for a nightmare: the federal government was on the verge of halting SNAP benefits — the food assistance that keeps tens of millions of families alive.

For weeks, Washington postured and argued.

Political theater. Blame games. Threats of shutdown.

All while low-income parents and elderly citizens wondered how they would eat.

Then, with performative “relief,” the Trump administration announced that benefits would indeed be disbursed for November.

And Americans were told to be grateful — as if feeding citizens with their own tax money is an act of mercy, not a fundamental right.

The Real Picture of “American Prosperity”

Let’s be clear:

The United States is not a nation of abundance. It is a nation of contradiction.

It boasts of freedom, yet has the highest incarceration rate in the world.

It lectures the world on democracy, yet its own Congress nearly shuts down every year because its politicians treat governance like a poker game.

It calls itself “the richest nation on Earth,” but nearly 40 million Americans live in poverty, and half the country is one paycheck away from homelessness.

And when the government “shuts down,” who still gets paid?

Members of Congress. Presidents. Their staff.

The same people who weaponize people’s hunger as a negotiation tool continue to receive tax-funded salaries while the poor scrape together survival.

That is not leadership — that is organized cruelty.

The Greatest Victims of the American Empire

The biggest victims of America are not always the countries it bombs, sanctions, or lectures.

They are the citizens trapped within it, paying the price for an empire that devours its own.

Millions of working Americans wake up every morning to a system that rewards greed, criminalizes poverty, and calls it “freedom.”

Veterans sleep under bridges. Teachers use food stamps. Mothers work three jobs and still can’t afford childcare.

And when the system collapses under its own corruption — when the government stops functioning, when healthcare fails, when the rent triples overnight — the victims are told it’s their fault for not “working harder.”

That is not democracy. That is a machine of exploitation wrapped in a flag.

Why Do African Nations Still Glorify This?

And yet — many African leaders still treat America like a god.

They chase its approval, mimic its politics, and quote its presidents like scripture.

They beg for grants from a government that cannot even feed its own.

They welcome U.S. ambassadors as if the emissaries of empire come bearing wisdom, not manipulation.

Why?

Because colonization didn’t end — it simply changed its accent.

Western media still paints America as the promised land, while hiding its poverty, its decay, its mental illness, its suicides, its mass shootings, its broken families.

Meanwhile, African officials send their children to American universities, buy property in American suburbs, and praise the same institutions that imprison their own citizens at home with IMF loans and fake democracy.

It is a delusion — one that must end.

The Truth Africans Must Accept

America has nothing left to glorify.

Its empire was built on credit, on war, and on lies.

Its economy thrives on debt, its politics on division, and its culture on distraction.

Every year, the mask slips a little more.

When African nations look to America for leadership, they are staring at a decaying empire mistaking noise for power.

They are worshipping a system that would collapse in months if it were held to the same standards it imposes on the developing world.

Meanwhile, the very people inside America — the workers, the poor, the single mothers, the veterans, the indigenous — are treated like collateral damage in a government that only serves itself.

The Call for Africa: Stop Imitating the Sick

Africa cannot heal by imitating a dying patient.

If America is a model, it is a model of what happens when greed becomes governance and survival becomes a privilege.

The future will not belong to those who chase America’s approval; it will belong to those who reclaim their sovereignty, who build systems of their own — moral, agricultural, spiritual, and economic.

America’s chaos is not a warning; it is a prophecy of what happens when a people forget community for capital.

African nations must now decide:

Will we keep copying the blueprint of failure, or will we build one of freedom?

The Final Reflection

When the U.S. government “approves” the release of food benefits, it’s not mercy — it’s survival theater.

And every African leader watching should take note: this is the nation you glorify?

A country that almost starved its citizens over political egos, while its lawmakers dined at the table of empire?

The illusion of American perfection has ended.

It is time for Africa to stop bowing to ghosts and start building its own gods.