Huge Deficits May Alter U.S. Politics and Global Power – New York Times

Economically, we are apparently on our way out, barring some miracle.  We are now so deeply in debt to China and other lenders, that there is no credible economic model which shows us “above water” until the mid-2020’s.  Many economists feel we cannot ever fully recover as a result of our debt.

In an article entitled Huge Deficits May Alter U.S. Politics and Global Power there is a telling quote.  Here is an excerpt:

“For Mr. Obama and his successors, the effect of those projections is clear: Unless miraculous growth, or miraculous political compromises, creates some unforeseen change over the next decade, there is virtually no room for new domestic initiatives for Mr. Obama or his successors. Beyond that lies the possibility that the United States could begin to suffer the same disease that has afflicted Japan over the past decade. As debt grew more rapidly than income, that country’s influence around the world eroded.

Or, as Mr. Obama’s chief economic adviser, Lawrence H. Summers, used to ask before he entered government a year ago, “How long can the world’s biggest borrower remain the world’s biggest power?”

The Chinese leadership, which is lending much of the money to finance the American government’s spending, and which asked pointed questions about Mr. Obama’s budget when members visited Washington last summer, says it thinks the long-term answer to Mr. Summers’s question is self-evident. The Europeans will also tell you that this is a big worry about the next decade.”

We borrowed and spent ourselves into something that will soon look like an ever weakening irrelevance.  Huge defense budgets over decades starting with the Eisenhower years, intensifying under Reagan and continuing under Obama have sent us to the poor house. Sixty years of huge defense budgets have robbed us of a future.

You see?  We really cannot war ourselves into prosperity.  Stand by for big changes in the way we live.

CWO3 Tom Barnes, USCG (Ret.)