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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: im a survivor who wrote (24990)	8/10/2003 12:55:51 PM
From: Rarebird	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 89467

The entire US self-made situation is absolutely absurd. The US has charged militarily into the blood soaked sands of Iraq and, in the process, anchored 60-70 percent of the entire US Army in a situation that is a direct parallel to a gigantic Gaza Strip - with no known or stated exit strategy. The US is stuck. Now, in parallel but in the different fields of monetary policy and fiscal policy, Greenspan too is charging forward into an assured monetary sand trap for the US Dollar, while President Bush, in acting through the US Treasury, is charging forward into another sand trap of explosively climbing US budget deficits. Geo-strategically, the US is stuck and cannot extricate itself without a huge debacle. So is Greenspan - with his latest clarion call that he will create endless "liquidity" for as long as required until the US economy shows "growth" again. So is the Executive branch - which has sent the US Treasury out on an accelerating budget deficit expedition of unprecedented scale. Something has got to give here. I pity the poor professionals in the US Treasury. They consistently find facts which likely make their hair stand on end and calmly report them. Then, after they are all safely closed up back inside their offices, they are simply ignored by their political superiors. An Example: According to the US government's own estimates, the Federal debt will jump to $US 7.3 TRILLION by 2004, an increase of 17.7% from 2002. By 2008, the debt is expected to stand at $US 9.4 TRILLION, an increase of 51.6% from 2002. These numbers ought to speak for themselves but even if they are said aloud, nobody is listening in the political USA. Back In The Real World: The United States has lost 2.6 million manufacturing jobs since mid-2000, a 15 percent employment drop. This is a rolling economic calamity. Manufacturing is the last step in the chain of production before the goods are transported towards the final consumers. The jobs that these many individual men and women have been marched away from will likely not return for a long time to come. Have a factory stand idle for too long and it makes no economic sense to restart it. Much better to build a new one with far better equipment. But then, all the previous workers with experience on the old equipment stand unqualified. On the other side of the US manufacturing coin stands the American family. The average debt of American households has increased by 56% from 1995 to 2002. It has gone from $US 49,639 in 1995 to $US 77,466 in 2002 according to statistics from the Federal Reserve and the US Department of Commerce. In 1975, that figure was $US 10,406. US household debt alone is now $US 8.4 TRILLION. $US 6 TRILLION of this is principal on mortgages. The "disposable" personal income of American households totals $US 7.8 TRILLION. In examining the entire US economic situation, one has the sense of being surrounded. Wherever one looks, one finds all forms of economic assets encumbered by loads of previous debts. This runs from paychecks to houses to businesses and corporations to the many States in serious budget troubles to the Federal side where all balance and caution has been lost with the accelerating dive into deficit spending. Something has to break in such a situation. Tick - TICK - T-I-C-K.