The great corrupter of public man is the ego. Looking at the mirror distracts one's attention from the problem.
When my body is strong, I feel stronger inside. I feel more capable of handling emotional situations. Usually I'm more of a inside-out person, but this was a great case of me from the outside in.
All comparisons between America's current place in the world and anything legitimately called an empire in the past reveal ignorance and confusion about any reasonable meaning of the concept empire, especially the comparison with the Roman Empire.