| Submit your comments on this article |
| Economy |
| EuropeÂ’s Disaster Is Headed Our Way |
| 2011-11-13 |
| h/t Instapundit As an author who has just published a book on the crisis of Western civilization, I couldnÂ’t really have asked for more: simultaneous crises in Athens and Rome, the cradles of the WestÂ’s law, languages, politics, and philosophy. ...Athens, Rome, Washington ... The shortest route from imperial capital to tourist destination is precisely this death spiral of debt. |
| Posted by:g(r)omgoru |
| #13 ...Athens, Rome, Washington ... The shortest route from imperial capital to tourist destination is precisely this death spiral of debt. Well, we don't have to worry about that. The crime's too bad in Washington for it to become a tourist destination. |
| Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain 2011-11-13 22:30 |
| #12 Anguper Hupomosing9418 posted: They know the country has the right software. They just canÂ’t understand why itÂ’s running so damn slowly. That's easy! There's a Trojan Horse virus in the White House. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2011-11-13 22:16 |
| #11 You think gold will make you rich? Nope, I am less likely to get any gold than that gold asteroid is to strike. But in my sci-fi scenario the US could easily revert to a gold standard & so force our creditors to eat the public debt, cost per troy ounce be damned. If they didn't want to redeem treasury paper in gold, the creditors would still be free to hold on to it. But more valuable than that, none of the current federal incumbents would ever again hold a public office. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2011-11-13 20:17 |
| #10 Still, american gold made Spain the dominant power of the time. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2011-11-13 16:36 |
| #9 The whole history of that era is of massive inflation (i.e. decrease in the purchasing power of the currency of the time(which was gold)). |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2011-11-13 16:30 |
| #8 16th Century Spain, BP? |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2011-11-13 14:48 |
| #7 Anguper Hupomosing9418 You think gold will make you rich? The only think that would happen is that the gold price would halve. |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2011-11-13 14:33 |
| #6 I much prefer Ferguson's previous Newsweek article: America's 'Oh Sh*t!' Moment Key point: Is there anything we can do to prevent such disasters? Social scientist Charles Murray calls for a “civic great awakening”—a return to the original values of the American republic. He’s got a point. Far more than in Europe, most Americans remain instinctively loyal to the killer applications of Western ascendancy, from competition all the way through to the work ethic. They know the country has the right software. They just can’t understand why it’s running so damn slowly. What we need to do is to delete the viruses that have crept into our system: the anticompetitive quasi monopolies that blight everything from banking to public education; the politically correct pseudosciences and soft subjects that deflect good students away from hard science; the lobbyists who subvert the rule of law for the sake of the special interests they represent—to say nothing of our crazily dysfunctional system of health care, our overleveraged personal finances, and our newfound unemployment ethic. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2011-11-13 10:42 |
| #5 There is a 3rd option - a massive asteroid with a 24kt gold shell and a creamy nougat center of pure light sweet crude 'unexpectedly' strikes Washington DC as Zero addresses a joint session of Congress. The remains, being public property, are sold off to retire the national debt and reboot the moribund US economy. What's not to like? |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2011-11-13 10:37 |
| #4 There are 2 options... 1/ Tell creditors they've only got 20% of their deposits. 2/ Inflate 80%. |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2011-11-13 10:17 |
| #3 Debt is increasing so lets not talk about fixing the problem of existing debt until we can stop generating new debt. |
| Posted by: Mike Ramsey 2011-11-13 09:05 |
| #2 FTA: There are an unknown number of European banks that are effectively insolvent if their holdings of government bonds are “marked to market”—in other words, valued at their current rock-bottom market prices. The number of US banks that are effectively insolvent if all their holdings were to be 'marked to market' is also unknown - IMO most of the TBTF banks are in that category. All that bad debt will have to be eaten by someone before economic growth can resume. The oligarchy prefers that the taxpayers eat their debt for them. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2011-11-13 08:16 |
| #1 He's right that it's the debt, he's wrong about exports solving anything. |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2011-11-13 07:34 |