I was minding my own business, doing some research .. (vanity)

with assist from answers.com ^ | April 17, 2012 | knarf

[knarf]

I used to spend hours in a library going from book to fascinating book ...

[knarf]

I used to spend hours in a library going from book to fascinating book just reading for the sheer joy of it.

Today has been a very weird day for us and a series of events had me looking up the definition of Balkanized.

THAT led to Banana Republic and it is THIS definition that just synopsized and sat me down for some time.

I'm still comparing and contrasting this one page with present United States.

[Nifster]

Plenty for comparison nit much in the contrast arena.... more’s the shame

[iowamark]

The US is dependant on a single export?

[knarf]

I never knew where the term "Banana Reoublic" came from, for starters.And within that little paragraph about O Henry were conveniently hyperlinked words that in a very short time, added a lot of flesh to a lot more than what your question asked.

There is a lot of interesting history.

[Chipper]

Debt, from local to Fed? Considering our debt has passed GDP, you could stretch it to say we export public debt. The second paragraph definitely sounded familiar.