We’re on the verge of a great, great depression.

Told you so at least a year ago.

Getting out of Afghanistan now would save about $500 billion a year for a start.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/43236764

 

Perhaps we ought to allow the depression to happen; maybe even allowing the monetary system to collapse so the dollar is revalued. That way we could start all over again from the bottom and work our way back up, remembering what it took to bring us down in the first place.

 

No offense meant to your opinion, but so many would suffer horribly. It is sad we have been here before, no one wants to see this happen again. I believe that if our representatives would have the balls to make serious cuts in the budget, this could be allieviated. It would be a horrid day in our history, this is why I continually push the representatives to CUT< CUT< CUT!!!

 

While it might cause suffering, it would bring almost everyone down to one level playing field; sort of like resetting the clock to zero and start all over again.

The problem is that the money is there; its all how they spend it. With extreme draconian cuts, the government could end the deficit in 2-3 years, tho' our military would literally be reduced to a mere skeleton force, with a majority of the defense left up to the states. Eliminate all foriegn aid, get rid of serveral government agencies, such as the department of transportation, dept of agriculture, TSA, dept of commerce, Bureau of Alcohol, Firearms and Tobacco; Dept of energy, Nuclear Regulatory agency, Bureau of Land Managment, ect; all these and others could be handled on a state by state basis. It'll work, just that the government nogs won't admit it.

 

Got to love it when the anti war try to protest the war using the whole budget scare tactic. Especially when there are plenty of wasteful socialist programs that c kould be cut without cutting military spending to get us back on track.

 

Behold, the prophet! Funny about prohets, they are never right. Wasn't it only a week or so ago a self appointed prophet of doom was proven wrong, again, and immediately changed the end of the world date to November.

Getting into a time machine an unelecting George Bush is the way to fix your country's problems. But Dr Who doesn't seem available when you need him does he?

Take your false prohecy and sit on it please. Nothing is inevitable except if everyone reacts like you and just sits there wringing their hands crying "Oh woe is me".

Very sad to see people reduced to this level of post.

 

I'm not even the prophet, just a reporter.

You started digging the hole you are in when you elected Reagan.

The problems you have are what are called "structural" problems. You are not collecting enough tax from the very wealthy and redistributing it. What then happens is that the very rich then engage in what are termed "rent seeking" a form of economic behaviour that is a form of taxation by the rich on everybody else - for example, excessive speculation in commodities that drives up prices.

The idea with redistributing money from the very rich towards the rest of society is that it speeds up the velocity of money - how fast money is converted into goods which are then sold at a profit and the money recycled. The poorer people have no choice but to spend what they receive.

This is basic economics that you can look up yourself.

However the biggest structural problems you face is with your economy. Thirty year of special deals - corporate rent seeking behaviour, have made your industries inefficient, fat and happy - and highly uncompetitive, and it has nothing to do with wages paid either.

By structural, I mean propping up industries that should have gone bankrupt which makes it difficult for new and innovative industries to take their place.

For example the American steel tariff, kept the steel makers in business but made steel cost more for other American businesses.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_United_States_steel_tariff

As another example, American refusal to take climate change seriously and restructure industry accordingly will make you even less competitive in future.

It's all quite simple really. The funniest part of it is that American economists know exactly how to cure these problems but your legislatures won't allow it because they are owned by big business.

 

The verge was a few years back...

 

Really!

I mean, we have MILLIONS of ELDERLY and DISABLED people we could cut off and starve before we had to touch the Afghanistan war budget.

Heck, if we entirely cut off college scholarships and loans maybe we can afford to start a small war in Somalia again, or Syria!

These wasteful "socialist" programs are NO PLACE for our tax money to go, especially when it could be spent in such a positive way bombing and destroying villages and people in the ME!

 

I agree. I was against the bailouts right from the beginning; because it hasn't fixed the problem. The problem was irresponsible specualtion and poor regulations with zero accountability. And that is exactly why we're headed for a great depression.

 

Nothing has been less regulated than it has in the past two and a half years.

 

And this time there is no FDR to protect you and help you bail yourself out.

The police and the SWAT teams plus all that spying stuff will be useful in keeping you under control.

 

Frodo, ...

Who are we kidding?!

Americans are more interested in "how quicly First Lady Michelle Obama goes through her staff".

 

Unfortunatly for us, we havent been here before, depression wise.

There are huge differences between the depression of early 1900's and what one would mean today.

The self suffiency of the people of the great depression dwarf what we are today. We are limited in many ways compared to the people in the depression era.


The carnage would be horrific in todays nanny state. Cities would burn... It would be chaos.

 

thanks to Bernacke, what the US will experience in the next few years is an inflationary depression.....much worse than in the 1930's!

 

When it all comes down Left Leaning folks will be unable to bug out .

 

Pretty much. And even if they do, they better not come to my neck of the woods.

 

Too bad diversion tactics don't change the bottom line.

Hey! Maybe we could put Michelle to work so she could help pay off hubby's debts!

 

Well done sir .

 

do you remember the great depression of 1990?

you don't because it didn't happen, despite what ron paul said back in 1988

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gh5oKTY9PoY"]www.youtube.com[/ame]

investment people and politicians often have ulterior motives when they use the sort of rhetoric quoted in the op

 

Where is the evidence anything the Democrats have done sine 2007 has worked?

 

Totally support leaving and Iraq too. Can we stop the Billions to foreign countries particularly the ones who hate us? That would be good too.

 

How about since 2001 after the attacks? Nothing has worked at all. Wrong leader since then- both sides of the isle are to blame, not just Democrats. Republicans have done their fair share of bad policies.

 

The economy was much better in 2001-2006 than it has been from 2007-2011.

By any measure.

 

Maybe,,,hey how about she sell the Fat kids that food....