Saturday, February 20, 2010

Carpet Bombing our Economy

1. Federal Budget Deficit Bomb: It started with Bush: The wars, TARP, spending. Obama is only accelerating spending. His budget for 2010 is $14.3 trillion. It was $7.8 trillion in 2005. The CBO predicts future deficits around 4 percent through 2020. America's debt at 84 percent of GDP will soon pass that "toxic" 90 percent trigger point

2. U.S. Foreign Trade Bomb: $400 billion in trade deficits are added each year and foreigners now own $2.5 trillion of America, with China holding over $1.3 trillion in Treasury debt. And they're not our biggest bank.

3. Weakening U.S. Dollar as Foreign Reserve Currency Bomb: If the dollar is replaced as main foreign reserves — and it's falling — "the main index measuring dollar strength has gone from 120 at the Clinton-to-Bush handoff to below 80 today."

4. Cheap Money Bomb — Credit Ratings Down, Rates Up: As debt climbs and the bank ratings fall, interest rates will skyrocket.

5. Global Real Estate Bomb: Dubai is falling apart because of over-speculation. People stopped buying real estate. They've got massive empty towers. Even the tallest building sits empty. Commercial real estate bubble is now $1.7 trillion. People are still behind on mortgages at all-time highs; did we really hit bottom on real estate yet?

6. Peak Oil and the Population Bomb: United Nations estimates world population exploding 50 percent — now, it's the United Nations and I'm not paying attention to them anymore.

7. Social Security Bomb: They've been telling us for a while that by 2035 it will go haywire. But for the first time in history Social Security is in the red. Check your calendar: Is it 2035 yet? Let's see, will politicians cut benefits? Nope, they're weasels. Will they raise taxes we can't afford to pay? What do you think?

8. Medicare Nuclear Bomb: It's going broke faster than Social Security. The Republican progressive prescription drug benefit added an unfunded $8.1 trillion. In five years, estimates rose from about $35 trillion to over $60 trillion now. And they are talking about expanding it in the new health care bill? Along with covering 30 million new people?

9. Health Care Insurance Bomb: "The burden has increasingly shifted to employees. Costs are rising faster than inflation."

10. State and Local Government Budget Bombs: "Deficits of $110 billion in 2010; $178 billion in 2011, on top of more that $450 billion in under-funded state and municipal employee pension funds."

11. Under-funded Corporate Pensions Bomb: Guess who picks up the tab for the $409 billion deficit in under-funded pensions that default? Taxpayers.

12. Consumer Debt Bomb: "Americans are still living beyond their means. Even with a downturn, consumer debt rose from about $2.3 to $2.5 trillion." Hmm, spending more, earning less....

13. Personal Savings Bomb: "Before the 2008 meltdown savings rate dropped from about 10 percent in the early 1980s to below zero." Now it's creeping up: 70 percent of our economy is based on spending.

14. War and Military Defense Deficits: "Costs of Iraq and Afghanistan wars — $200+ billion annually, $3 trillion minimum... long-term costs for veteran medical care, equipment renewal, recruitment."

15. Homeland Insecurity Bomb: "Security at airports, seaports, borders, vulnerable chemical plants all increase budgets."

16. Fed/Treasury Bailout Bombs: Government shifts burden of failing businesses from those businesses to the American taxpayer.

17. Insatiable Washington Lobbyists Bombs: You've seen what "no lobbyists" in an administration looks like. It ends up being 30-plus. Andy Stern, the unions, Goldman — voters and even Congress is becoming irrelevant.

18. Shadow Banking Derivatives Bomb: "Wall Street wants no regulation of this $670 trillion, high-risk, out-of-control casino that's highly leveraged versus the $50 trillion total GDP of all nations. We forget that derivatives almost destroyed global economies in 2008-09, finally will by 2012."

19. Dysfunctional Two-Party Political Bomb: Parties continue to choose politics over the good of the country. Progressives continue to infect both parties and thwart the Constitution.

20. The Coming Populous Rebellion Bombs: The media will say those are the Tea Parties. Let me show you what it really is. Van Jones: A 9/11 Truther, radical communist who set up organizations to defend cop killers. He was in the White House and now is going out on a speaking tour with a senator from New York. The influence is already here.

1 comment:

Coulby said...

The economy will soon collapse and Gene has enlightened me that there will be a dollar devaluation.