U.S. On The Highway To Hell

At this point, everything the government is doing – and not just the US government but governments everywhere − is not only the wrong thing but exactly the opposite of the right thing. They’re passing more laws, raising taxes, creating more currency and incurring more debt. They should be doing the opposite. We’re currently still in the eye of the storm. Their actions guarantee that when we go back into the hurricane − the trailing edge of the hurricane − it’s going to be much worse and will last much longer than what we saw in 2007 to 2009. Doug Casey

How nice it would be to argue that Mr. Casey is wrong. No matter how much I wish he were, that is unlikely. We are in for very tough times ahead.

Recently I wrote about the insolvency of the federal government and its upcoming default. Mathematically, it is impossible for government to meet its obligations. There simply is not enough income or wealth for it to confiscate. It cannot satisfy the spending path it is on and the promises made.

Cutting spending is a political non-starter. As Mr. Casey argues it is politically impossible:

… just as in Greece, or most of the EU for that matter, most US government spending is on entitlements and welfare programs of various types − mainly Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, so-called Income Security and pensions. Those things are politically and legally impossible to cut; in fact, they’ll grow. Most of the rest of spending is on so-called “defense,” which alone is 25 percent of the budget. As much as Americans love their military, that’s not going to be cut; in fact, the Republicans, idiotically and unbelievably, want to increase it. The other functions of government − the police, justice and regulatory agencies − are really just a tiny portion of government spending.

Impossible might be a bit strong. There will be talk of cutting spending, but it will be token in nature. No politician can afford to truly cut spending. Even Paul Ryan’s “draconian” budget had debt growing over the next ten years.

The Constitution, the document upon which this country was founded and upon which it rose to greatness, is for practical purposes nothing more than a historical artifact. It is now a quaint part of our history. Unfortunately, it provides little constraint on government these days. To the extent that it has remaining significance, it is usually considered an unnecessary barrier, impeding government from what it wants/needs to do, at least in the eyes of the ruling class. The Constitution is mostly ignored with claims that it is no longer relevant to our “complex” world. As Casey put it:

Any part of the Constitution that deals with maintaining liberty for the individual against the state − which is to say the important parts of the document, the parts that made it unique − are now meaningless. In fact, anyone who quotes the Constitution now runs the risk of being jailed, in the interest of “national security,” as a subversive, a dangerous anti-government radical or perhaps sent to an institution for psychiatric procedures.

What has not changed over time is human nature. The Founders and the document they presented recognized man’s insatiable desire for power and willingness to abuse it. George Kennan described it thusly:

The fact of the matter is that there is a little bit of the totalitarian buried somewhere, way down deep, in each and every one of us. It is only the cheerful light of confidence and security which keeps this evil genius down. . . . If confidence and security were to disappear, don’t think that he would not be waiting to take their place.

Addressing this problem and preventing it from corrupting the political class was the primary focus of the Constitution. Now the Constitution is considered outdated because it does not allow for an all-powerful State. Arbitrary power is what John Adams feared:

Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people. When the people give way, their deceivers, betrayers, and destroyers press upon them so fast, that there is no resisting afterwards. The nature of the encroachment upon the American constitution is such, as to grow every day more and more encroaching. Like a cancer, it eats faster and faster every hour. The revenue creates pensioners, and the pensioners urge for more revenue. The people grow less steady, spirited, and virtuous, the seekers more numerous and more corrupt, and every day increases the circles of their dependents and expectants, until virtue, integrity, public spirit, simplicity, and frugality, become the objects of ridicule and scorn, and vanity, luxury, foppery, selfishness, meanness, and downright venality swallow up the whole society.

The deterioration in our governmental educational system has dumbed-down the electorate. Most have little sense of history or understand the issues of the day. The capacity of the average voter appears to be limited to voicing opinions on who will win American Idol or Dancing With The Stars.

Government has created dependency as a means to increase power and attract votes. There is little hope that the US can return to its Constitutional moorings through the normal political process. The number of dependents almost outnumbers the producers, ensuring that they vote for whomever promises them the greater gifts. Furthermore, dependents now believe they are entitled to live off government largess.

The reality is that no one lives off government. Government lives off the productive class and re-distributes a portion of what is confiscated to dependents in exchange for their votes. ”Vote for me and this is what I will give you” has become the slogan of both parties, although the Democrats have used it more effectively.

There is no political solution possible to the spending problem because any attempt to cut programs is equivalent to committing political suicide. The current spending path, nevertheless is unsustainable. So, how does it end? It ends as most failed countries end, in a dictatorship accompanied by martial law. The government will eventually run out of money. Markets will do the job politicians are unwilling to do. They will cut off government funding via a bond market rebellion and an economic collapse.

At this point chaos and civil unrest likely break out and a dictator arises to “rescue” the people from their difficult situation. The political class will be only too happy to accommodate, although there will be contention over which party and who ascends to the role of supreme leader.

Regarding the coming election, it does not matter much in the larger scheme of things. If Romney defeats Obama, there will not be much change. Perhaps the rate of decline slows temporarily, but not enough to avoid the ultimate outcome. Sadly, our political system has not offered the possibility of change for years. Just review the last five or so presidential elections. Does anyone believe that either party put up a truly qualified candidate?

… if you vote the bums out you are just going to get a new set of bums. What kind of people do you think want to be politicians? Primarily sociopaths. The elections are a ridiculous charade performed every four years. People imagine that if you vote for Tweedledum, that he will somehow be an improvement over Tweedledee. There is vanishing little difference between the left wing of the Republicrat Party and the right wing of the Demopublican Party; they’re really the same thing. They are both philosophical statists and collectivists.

Even if, by some miracle, a non-sociopath were elected and set about to change the course of the country, he would be removed from office either by voters or Congress. Neither will allow the drastic change necessary to alter the bankruptcy of government or the collapse of the economy. Politicians are like whores, willing to perform whatever trick the voter wants. Few politicians have either courage or integrity. Even for those who do, they will be overruled by their brethren.

So how does this end? Benjamin Franklin foresaw what would happen long, long ago:

… I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other.

I suspect the run of the US exceeded Mr. Franklin’s expectations. Once we dropped the notion of a Republic and began to act as a democracy, we were lost. John Adams commented on this outcome:

Democracy… while it lasts is more bloody than either [aristocracy or monarchy]. Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There is never a democracy that did not commit suicide.

Something, either a major war or a collapse of the economy, will occur that triggers chaos. The former likely ensures the latter, and the latter is likely the catalyst for dictatorship. When sovereign bankruptcy occurs, people will riot when they don’t receive their government checks. Stores will be looted and lives will be lost. It is this environment which will enable, in Hayek’s terms, the worst to reach the top.

Martial law and the suspension of whatever remains of Constitutional law, the Rule of Law and normal liberties will be ordered to “save” the country. The economy will cease to function. The military will be deployed to keep law and order and, likely, to deliver food and other necessities. At a minimum the military will be called out to protect whatever remains of our economic delivery system.

A sovereign bankruptcy means that there is no more money to pay out by government. Initially, the political class will try to keep things going by printing money. If so, matters will be made worse. The Depression will be preceded or accompanied by hyperinflation which will destroy the wealth and savings of the middle class, rather like Weimar Germany.

Presumably, these conditions may jolt enough people to their senses. But by this time, it will be too late because elections will have been suspended as a result of the “national emergency.”

That is the path we are on. The outcome of this next election may alter marginally the rate at which we decline, but not the ultimate destination. Sadly, I see nothing that will change our outcome.

>>This is going to be a fifty or hundred years war at least

This war has been going on for almost 1400 years. There is no reason to think it won’t be going on for many hundreds more.

As Americans, we have a tendency to think on timescales that are too short. This will be a very, very long haul.

Obama is well on his way to downsizing the United States of America to punish us for our success. He is making it impossible for us to catch up and recover our military strength (after making irresponsible cuts to our defense budget that destroys our national security) as both the debt and the interest on that debt bankrupts us in accordance with Obama’s plans in his dreams “FROM” (not OF) his father.

Prepare for economic hell. All economic projections are overwhelmingly negative.

A band of men joined precariously together 240 some years ago and committed a suicide of sorts and, though the ensueing years WERE bloody, the initial outcome WAS a free and independent populace. There may yet be another group willing to chance it for the ideology of a representative Republic ... again.

History is being repeated, and Tyranny will once again be defeated.

Americans have been purchasing over 10M guns each year since Nov '08 for a reason.

The answer has never been in or from any man. Unless it is the Lord who builds the house they labor in vain who build it. And there is sowing and reaping in anything else.

Matthew 7:24-27

Build on the Rock

24 “Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: 25 and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.

26 “But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: 27 and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”

“The forces of decadence are the forces of evil.”

There is living high within your means and then there is living off of someone elses back.

The evil is when you live off someone else’s back by way of the Government. Simply living the high life if you can afford it is no sin. Only taking bread from the month of the producer is a sin that leads invariably to a despotic order.

Well you got 20 more years of experience with politics to know theses things cannot be changed.

You have in that time witnessed our best efforts to fix these problems failed to produce anything substantial due to these same political despondence. You have seen the results when politicians even come close.

The rest is simply a matter of mathematics.

We are in a corundum that many nations thouout history have long been in, and few if any of them ever survived its almost inevitable outcome.

I guess the problem is not what to do its how to do it. We obviously cannot attack this problem directly. If there is any resolution short of collapse & tyranny it will require a fair bit of deception in-order to avoid the defenses of the entitlement(taker) and political(ruler) class.

Our uniquely american option, the State sovereignty/rights movement, using our States to attack Washington and strip it down, as a means of breaking up this problem into more manageable sizes. Is anther possible vehical from which we might attack this problem perhaps in combination with other efforts.

“After the coup by Romney at the RNC today, I do believe it does not matter who “wins” but just how far down and how fast we will fall down the rabbithole.”

I have found that this was always the the only choice we had in Federal elections. I guess we hoped that by delaying the inevitable we might in the extra time find a way to reverse it.

Admittedly that was a sound strategy, but it has a costs, and that cost is that people thou the generations forget over all that time what freedom really is/was, and thus fail to recognize what they have lost and are losing is significant.

Now we have but two choices, do we go down the rabbit hole an hope that the enemy’s of liberty overplay their hand enough to spark a real revolution against them, or do we continue to drag our feet hoping in the time we have left, with the freedom we have left that a better solution will be devised, one capable of not only halting but reversing the progress of this growing evil...

I guess the Real question is how prepared are we to fight, and how incompetent is our enemy in terms of his proprieties to overplay his hand? Is there enough virtue left in enough of us to even win?

“”The demise of the United States means no people anywhere can long govern themselves.”

Exactly. That says all we need to know. If that fact does not stir mans soul, then there is no hope for the Republic.”

I disagree, we have had a good 200 year run more or less. I don’t know how “long” you require, but to me a revolution every 200 years or so seems more than reasonable, perhaps even too generous a price for our freedom.

Men can govern themselves, but no man nor group of men can govern forever.

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