I just can't get over the absolute arrogance of that headline.
Poor Ali. "I am the greatest". Now he is a shambling, sick, old man. Kept alive by therapy and drugs. With uncountable riches of no value to him. Soon he will be dead and 50 years from now his name will draw blank looks.
Every person, every race, every country, every "civilization", which has had its turn at being the "greatest" thought it was eternal. Where are they now?
It seems that when a race or a country begins its assent they are glad with small achievements and small goals: Being warm at night, having a full belly. Not being afraid. After a while, however, they begin to take these achievements for granted. A birthright, as it were. And then they decide that this birthright should free them from the drudgery of the meaner tasks of life and so they hire (or enslave) "lesser or sub-human" people to do the dirty work which gives them time to pursue the arts and religion. And one fine day, even tho they can't raise nor kill a beef cow, raise a vegtable crop, tan a hide, weave nor make a garment, defend their home or country nor other needful thing, they look at the fine mansions they have (had) built (by lesser folks) to keep themselves warm at night and at the huge cathedrals they have (had) erected to show their God how much they love him and they take a moment from their indolence and say, "We are the Greatest"! And their decline begins.
IMO, when the newspapers and the TV talking heads began their competition and decided they needed to CREATE and MANIPULATE history and CREATE and MANIPULATE the news, civilization as we know it started down the crapper.
And too, it's like Kev sez, from a capacity point of view, you can't keep feeding and doctoring the professional n'er-do-wells so's they can have a bunch more n'er-do-well babies to climb on your back. Simply stated, therre is only so much soup in that bowl. Which of your children are you gonna put to bed hungry so the n'er-do-wells can eat? And, No, it's not gonna happen tomorrow but we're heading in that direction at an alarming rate. 300, 000,000 peeps in the USA and more acoming.