Is America Going Broke?

[Robert Oak]

David Walker can see the future, and it scares the hell out of him.

His title is comptroller general of the United States, which makes him the head auditor for the most important and powerful government in the world. And he's desperately trying to get a message out to anyone who'll listen: the United States of America's public finances are a shambles. They're getting rapidly worse. And if something major isn't done soon to solve the country's intractable budget problems, the world will face an economic shakeup unlike anything ever seen before.

http://www.macleans.ca/topstories/world/article.jsp?content=20050307_101541_101541

[gumby]

1. Isn't that the plan?

The Bush Death Cult considers mere humans "fodder units" whose only function is to enrich Cult members. An "economic shakeup" would only benefit their dark plans.

[EVDebs]

2. It's past tense now, Robert ! Look at the current deficit clock...

http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/

When I looked it was "$7,788,102,449,775.95

The estimated population of the United States is 295,939,830
so each citizen's share of this debt is $26,316.51.

The National Debt has continued to increase an average of
$2.00 billion per day since September 30, 2004!
Concerned?"

And the household debt chart is scary too !
http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/crisis/2003/housedebtchart.htm

BTW, Robert Oak, our old pal Kmarx is now a DUer !

[Robert Oak]

7. Cassandra complex

Yes, much of this is the Cassandra complex in that we know it's going
on and point that out to deaf ears...without moving past the
point of "look, look!" and taking strong action, both for
self-preservation as well as politically.

At least that's my story.

Honestly, America is so asleep I don't see this freight train being
stopped before it crashes down the building, so to speak.

[dweller]

3. "HOW CAN AMERICA FIX THE PROBLEM?"

"On Nov. 1, 2000, as George W. Bush was campaigning for the White House,
he warned an audience in Minneapolis that the Democrats would lead the
nation into a future of higher taxes and slower economic growth that "could
mean an end to this nation's prosperity." Bush won the election in part by
portraying himself as an antidote to tax-and-spend liberals. Yet despite this bold
austerity rhetoric, discretionary spending rose 23 per cent in Bush's first term.
Just over four years after harping on the dangers of fiscal irresponsibility, the
President is on his way to making his own warnings a reality."

from the article.
dp

[dcfirefighter]

12. By slashing discretionary spending

and by changing the way we create money.

More specifically, require larger (full?) reserves for deposit banking, while shifting from a fiat-debt backed money system to a fiat-credit backed money system.

In short, take away the ability of private banks to create money (with interest) and give it back to the US Treasury, where they would create money (without interest) to be accepted as payment for taxes, etc.

It would mean that you'd no longer collect interest on banking deposits (though you could on a money market or mutual fund).

It means that you'd no longer compete with the US government for credit.

It means that we'd stop having to pay $200B? on debt service, and gain an additional $200B in seignorage: a swing of $400B, roughly the size of the deficit.

Then of course, we'd have to stimulate the economy by taking taxes off of employment and productivity, and placing them on consumption / occupation of natural resources.

[Lorien]

4. Sobering article

It's amazing to me how clueless most American's are about this issue. But I guess I shouldn't be so surprised; this article came from Canada, not the U.S.

[doodadem]

5. People are just clueless

I would say 95% of people in the U.S. refuse to see this runaway train bearing down on them. It's going to be a very, very rude and catastrophic awakening.

[ozymandius]

11. I like the runaway train analogy.

An acquaintence and I were discussing the federal budget, warts and all. She is a Republican - easily to the tipping point of a neo-con and quite proud of the "bold" economic plan of the Bush administration. She also has an MBA from a prestigeous school.

:shaking head: There's just no helping some people see reason. Her zeal for what Bush is doing to America is like standing in the path of a train and cheering on its progress.

[Toby109]

6. We are morally bankrupt.

Is that the same thing?

[Robert Oak]

9. documentary: "The Corporation"

gives a nice overview on how the entity "corporation" dominates
our world and our lives.

I personally believe the world is morally bankrupt and one
of the fundamental reasons is our 'leaders' are souless entities
which by definition are sociopathic (or psychopathic, depending
on how you want to look at it), there is no human being behind
this entity...it's a hollow legal definition, yet has been granted
through legal definition certain chractacteristics of a human being.

Seriously the corporation, legally a person, doesn't give a rat's
ass about anything except profits and by law is required not
to give a rats ass, except profits for the shareholder.

This is the entity, not attached in reality to a single person...
i.e. you can't point to "Monsanto" like one would point to Hitler
and say this person is guilty of war crimes...even though Monsanto
is guilty of crimes against humanity...it's an organization itself...
with human attributes, yet when the shit hits the fan and one wants
to make this entity accountable...the entity is protected by
corporate domestic and international law.

so this is the dominant force in our lives...it's not surprising
people are modeling themselves morally and ethically after this
souless empty beast that is man-made and acting as sociopaths
in response.

We need a corporate moses to come down from the mountain with the
new 10 corporate commandments ordained by the highest authority
and any corporation who does not abide by the law is chewed up
into the fires of internal damnation...

oops, but that sort of miracle relies on the corporate entity
having a conscious, a soul...which of course it does not.

Yuck...who made up this reality...well, may they come back in a future
life and live in it.

[Toby109]

10. Couldn't agree more

We have allowed our government, the sole entity that we have to represent our interests, to be suborned by corporations which are not the human beings endowed by our creator so referenced in our Declaration of Independence.

When will we ever learn?

[EVDebs]

8. Remember Bush's Trifecta "Joke" ?

'Hitting the trifecta' http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2003_09_07_dneiwert_archive.html

"You know, when I was running for President, in Chicago, somebody said, would you ever have deficit spending? I said, only if we were at war, or only if we had a recession, or only if we had a national emergency. Never did I dream we’d get the trifecta."


Absolutely disgusting Mr. President.