Posted on 07/02/2011 9:20:31 AM PDT by Kaslin
With the country mired in debt ($14.3 trillion and counting), entitlement programs such as Medicare and Social Security running out of money and unemployment seemingly stuck above 9 percent, some wonder if its twilight time for the United States.
I know why America is falling into a cataclysm of debt and cant get out, wrote Henry Allen, a former Pulitzer Prize winner, in The Washington Post on June 17. He blames, a squalor of doom and debt that prompts the best sort of people to spit sarcasms at each other during cocktail hour, to weep and rage the way Congress is doing as the debt limit looms on Aug. 2.
He writes that, for many families, their best days seemed in the past. We were not unusual -- in so many families, the money had been made, the money had been spent. But this is unnecessarily fatalistic. Decline isnt inevitable. In many ways, its a choice, one made by both individuals and governments.
For example, Allen writes that his ancestors built railroads. Sadly, people dont build them anymore, but government policies have a lot to do with that.
If you set out to build a railroad, after all, youd need to obtain lots of land, and that would require any number of environmental impact statements. Neighbors would use federal and state lawsuits to slow your progress, meaning youd spend years tied up in red tape before you could lay any track. And besides, the federal government has vowed to build high-speed rail lines hither and yon. You cant compete with Uncle Sam.
Still, there are plenty of ways a person can succeed. Instead of a railroad, why not start a trucking company? Or get some Segway scooters and begin giving tours of your historic neighborhood? American prosperity is restrained only by American ingenuity, and our ingenuity is virtually boundless.
Allen imagines a very different America, though. The conversation usually goes this way: proposals for impossible cuts in spending are met by equally impossible refusals to make them. Slash Medicare? Stop saving oppressed foreigners from tyranny? Raise taxes? The rock and the hard place. Its a question of standards, he writes.
He sees the country mired in ennui, unable or unwilling to move forward. Instead of doing something, Allen imagines us wringing our hands as problems get worse. However, there are proposals to address our problems. Rep. Paul Ryan, for example, drafted a proposal that aims to fix Medicare -- not by slashing it, but by introducing consumer choice for those under the age of 55. This market-based approach would unlock the power of American creativity and could allow our system to deliver better medical services for less money. Its certainly worth a try.
The House of Representatives has passed the Ryan plan, while the Senate voted it down. The proposal is likely to loom large in next years presidential election, and thats probably good. It would give Americans a stark contrast upon which to vote. Allen concludes that our decline could mean shoddy treatment even for our nations fallen heroes. Next thing, wed be tossing the bodies of veterans into common graves, though this has already happened at Arlington National Cemetery.
Hes correct that the scandal at Arlington is an embarrassment. But the problem isnt that our government ran out of money to operate the cemetery. Instead, as the Post documented in a series of stories, the federal government poured millions into upgrading a computer system, yet the cemeterys administrators used pencils and note cards to keep burial records. Its a case of government waste, not government wasting away.
But all is not lost.
By every benchmark, this present age should be an American century, here and abroad, writes Victor Davis Hanson of Stanfords Hoover Institute. New finds of coal, natural gas, oil, tar sands, and oil shale keep growing, not declining.
And, he adds, In an increasingly hungry world, American farmland is the most productive on the planet. Our farmers are surely the most gifted and innovative. The United States has inherited a vast, developed infrastructure; our duty is to improve and expand it, not, as our ancestors had to, start from scratch by building a Hoover Dam, intercontinental railroad, or port facilities in Oakland.
The tools are there. We just need to use them.
It isnt inevitable that the United States must slide into decline. If it does, it will be because Americans chose to, not because we had to. Lets make the right choice.
Depends entirely on Americans.
If we let our parasite classes continue to grow, continue dictate our national priorities, continue to threaten the productive sectors, then, no, there are nothing but dark days and slow (or not so slow) slide in poverty and tyranny.
Not until we go through the mother of all sh** storms.
Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!
Not until our government institutions and processes undergo a massive gargantuan PURGE!!!
Right. A total collapse of the current system is needed. There is no way out of the box. We are in a Box Canyon with no way out. If the GOP raises the debt ceiling kiss it all goodbye. It is the borrowing stupid. They can not spend if they can not borrow. They can not continue borrowing from the Fed. That is why the current goings on in Washing ton are nothing more than a Dog and Pony Show for the ignorant masses who truly deserve what is coming.
What doesn’t kill us will certainly make us stronger.
Strangely enough, I don’t think our “food stamp President” has any intention of reversing the downward trend.
Problem. Taxtakers outnumber Taxpayers 4 to 1 and they are allowed to vote.
How are ya gonna break the controlling corrupt elite? Not in the next couple of decades or so, IMO. Why do almost half of Americans feel that we are in permanent decline? There will be no revolution by the people because they will have their football & six-packs, they will continue with dumbed down public screwals teaching more political correctness & more of the TSA.. Yea, a great legacy to give to our offspring.
If we don’t change our immigration policies, everything else will just be rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Demography is destiny.
I agree
First kill all the MSM, then the Lawyers, then, MAYBE, we’ll have a chance.
If America make a resurgence it will be from the ashes.
I couldn’t agree more. I look at a nation like Australia and could only wish we had a similar situation in the US.
There, the average immigrant is more educated than the general populace. They give preference to those who come from English-speaking nations, who pass English exams, younger individuals, those will college educations and work experience in their chosen field. In short, they import productive citizens who will succeed. We import any slop off the street and think nothing of it—including those who disrespect our laws and show up uninvited from the southern border.
I thought it was an illegal Ponzi scam.
I DID after all have that money disappear from my paycheck for 50 years and I certainly didn't volunteer to have it disappeared.
Seems like it would be tough to make it darker than it is, but Obama will certainly try.
The federal government needs to get out of the welfare and food stamp business. Let the states handle it. You will see states overnight shutting out illegal aliens and ending the entitlement gravy chain as none of the states are going to want to take on the other states's outcasts.
Being on welfare or government assistance should be a very humiliating experience, reserved only for the hardest cases as a TEMPORARY measure. While receiving this assistance, they need to be put to work, even if it is picking up cigarette butts on the side of the road. For those not physically able to do the work, they should still be given something to do, even if it is sitting in a chair at the post office, telling people what line to get in. This includes women with children. We cannot allow women to get away with being breeders of children on the government dime. Welfare benefits should be DIMINISHED if additional children are produced while on the dole.
People need to realize the rewards of hard work. Nothing feels better than purchasing your first home with money that YOU earned. Sure beats standing in a soup and bread line. The Democrats and liberals are EVIL for perpetuating the welfare gravy train. They are the destroyer of lives. For once you go on government assistance and make it a way of life, you are useless to society and worst of all, useless to yourself.
Nothing fills a person with more self-esteem than a long career of productive work in which both society and the individual benefits.
In fact, if we really wanted to put the nation back on track, we would reward people for making more money by reducing their tax burden. In other words, the opposite of a regressive tax. So as you make more money, the percentage of tax you owe will be reduced. This will reward hard work and excellence and the government would receive MORE tax revenues because people would be motivated to produce more.
For example, somebody making $50,000 a year or less may have a 35% tax rate under my system. That $17,500 in taxes. However, when you make $75,000 a year, your tax rate drops to say, 25%. So you are paying $18,750 in taxes but have a lot more money left over for yourself because hey, you worked hard and you deserve it. Once you hit $100,000 a year, your tax rate drops to 20%. You are paying more in tax dollars ($20,000) but now have $80,000 all to yourself because you deserve it.
Taking it to the extreme, you might only have a 5% tax rate when you hit $500,000 a year or more. Now you are paying $25,000 a year in taxes but you now have $475,000 all to yourself because you are just that darn good!
Now with a tax system like that, wouldn't that just motivate you to get out in the business work and kick some butt! Not only will this be good for you and your family but it will be great for our society as well. The economy will go right through the freakin' roof with a system like that. Unemployment will go to near zero because we'll need all those people to build those luxury homes, yachts, and other consumer goods that we can now all afford.
Palin--so unlike President Obama--clearly understands how overbearing government and flat-out government corruption can do to a country, having seen it first-hand in her time running a private business and as Governor of Alaska. Her "can do" attitude is something so desperately needed in the USA, and it of my hope that she supports this three-point plan to revive the American economy:
1. Aggressively audit every Federal, state and local government agency for bureaucratic overlap, agency bloat and excess regulations and use the audit results to start drastically cutting the size of government, freeing up trillions of dollars per year for more productive economic activity.
2. Massively overhaul our income tax system to dramatically reduce the yearly compliance cost (freeing up well over US$200 billion per year for more productive economic activity) and encourage American residents and businesses to keep as much of their savings and capital investments in the USA as possible. The Steve Forbes flat income tax plan should be AT MINIMUM what an overhauled income tax system should look like.
3. Aggressively oversee the activities of Wall Street, especially given the history of Wall Street financial shenanigans that caused the 1929 and 2008 stock market crashes. We need to require real liquidity backing for hedge funds, derivatives, and other new-style investments, increase the minimum margin requirements for futures trading to 20%, and re-impose the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act to protect bank assets from the ups and downs of the equities market.
I'm in line right behind you...:oP
The U.S. adds one international migrant (net) every 36 seconds. Immigrants account for one in 8 U.S. residents, the highest level in more than 80 years. In 1970 it was one in 21; in 1980 it was one in 16; and in 1990 it was one in 13. In a decade, it will be one in 7, the highest it has been in our history. And by 2050, one in 5 residents of the U.S. will be foreign-born.
Currently, 1.6 million legal and illegal immigrants settle in the country each year; 350,000 immigrants leave each year, resulting in a net immigration of 1.25 million. Since 1970, the U.S. population has increased from 203 million to 310 million, i.e., over 100 million. In the next 40 years, the population will increase by 130 million to 440 million. Three-quarters of the increase in our population since 1970 and the projected increase will be the result of immigration. The U.S., the worlds third most populous nation, has the highest annual rate of population growth of any developed country in the world, i.e., 0.977 percent (2010 estimate), principally due to immigration.
Immigration, legal and illegal, has had and will continue to have a major and far-reaching impact across a broad spectrum of existential challenges that confront this nation, e.g., national security, the economy/global competitiveness, jobs, health care, taxes, energy independence, education, entitlement reform, law enforcement, social welfare programs, physical infrastructure, the environment, civil liberties, and a continued sense of national identity/shared sense of endeavor. Immigration policy is the defining issue of our time with enormous implications for the future of this nation and the preservation of our patrimony. Changes to our existing immigration policies should be an integral part of the solutions to our problems. Yet, rarely will you read or hear immigration policy linked to these challenges by the political and media elites. Instead, legal immigration has become the third rail of American politicsfor Republicans only.
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