The next crash is coming. It has to be. Just listen to former comptroller David Walker, who says, among other things, “We face a tsunami of spending, due to the retirement of the baby boomers, that could swamp the ship of state. Every year we don’t act, the number goes up two to three trillion dollars.”
I guess in the back of our minds, many if not most of us know it. (How else do you explain the rush on gold and guns?)
And the forgone conclusion is that we’ll get through the upcoming disaster – we always do. We got through the Great Crash of 1929. We got through World War Two. We can get through anything right? After all, we’re Americans.
The problem is that we aren’t the Americans we think we are. We certainly aren’t the people we used to be.
- Today we would never summon the muster to build the Hoover Dam (completed two years ahead of schedule by the way). We can’t even build wind farms for fear of harming the flora and the fauna.
- Firebombing cities like Dresden and Tokyo? Never. Atomic bombs on cities like Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Never. Ending a global catastrophe as soon as humanly possible using less-than-politically-correct means? Nope.
- Can you imagine how the America society of the 1930’s soup line and the 1940’s GI Joe would have reacted to a lawsuit charging that coffee was too hot and that the cups needed to bear large warning labels?
My grandmother was born in 1899… When she was in her early ’20s her husband used to ridicule her because her teeth were crooked. So one day she’d had enough. She went to the dentist and demanded that he remove all her teeth… all of them. She was warned that there would be a lot of bleeding and a lot of pain (anesthesia in the 1920s wasn’t quite what it is today), but her mind was made up. Her only instruction was that if she passed out from the pain, the doctor was to finish the job. And that’s what happened. She awoke on the dentist’s lawn.
Don’t get me wrong… there are people out there with plenty of character. Our military, police departments, fire departments, etc. are filled with them. But the problem is that our culture has wandered away from common sense, humility, and objectivity and instead strutted right into agenda, entitlement, and hubris. Doubt it? Just look at our politicians.
The fact is that a financial and social Hades is coming. And if that isn’t bad enough, we as a culture can’t even control ourselves when the Lakers win the Championship. What do you think is going to happen in a couple of years when China won’t buy anymore of our national debt? What’s going to happen when we start laying off the police. How are we going to handle brownouts and blackouts and public transportation cutbacks? The Americans that we think of ourselves as (the 1930s and 1940s Americans) could easily handle such a crash. But I have very strong doubts if the Age of the “American Mall Rat”, The “Litigation-Mad” American, The “I Want My MTV” American will be up to the task.
Alan Speakman
Grand Rants 
It’s hard to change an Americans spending habit, when for two decades the government and banks had made it so easy for us to spend above our means. The children of the 30’s are becoming scarce. The stories of real life hardships of scarce. This whole economic downturn, is going to be hard for the children of the 70’s 80’s and 90’s to change spending habits. If these habits do not change every child of the past three decades will be looking for another handout from the government.
Ah. But what happens to the regulations that keep us from building power plants, or protecting our homes, once the brownouts come and the police forces leave? It won’t be an easy transformation, or a quick one, but I do have hope in the generation that is forced to finally face that reality.
I couldn’t agree more.
The Reuvenator
“What do you think is going to happen in a couple of years when China won’t buy anymore of our national debt? What’s going to happen when we start laying off the police.”
China has spent billions of dollars to pin the yuan on the US currency and to keep it from a free floating currency. If they stop buying our debt they just kill their own economy. Unless, there are so many emerging countries that China can supply with all there goods and they are willing to buy.
Laying off police, already happening. St Pete, Florida has cut the police budget for the year. Sheriff froze hirings, and laid off police already. Hillsborough county same thing.
It’s hard to imagine that people are willing to give up rights such as guns and privacy issues(Patriot act).
“Socialism 2009” where are these kids parents to teach them that it is OK? Socialist agenda beginning with Bush. I will keep my guns and rights everyone else can keep the “CHANGE”
America has lost its soul. It doesn’t honor its traditions, has forgotten its history, cannot recall the sacrifices that got we where we are. But it can harp on every failure than recall the many and unique successes that are the envy of the world. We are a nation that needs walls not to keep our citizens in but to prevent the world’s citizens from flooding us.
We have allowed people who hate what America stands for to pervert its legal system, its goverment, and education systems to destroy our institutions. My grandfather never asked the government for anything. He never complained about the Depression nor spoke about WWI. My father never spoke about his service in WWII though he complained about being recalled for Korea and the loss of two toes to frostbite.
We were brought up to never buy what we didn’t need. We understood the difference between a need and a want. Today I see infants who are in their sixties. Letterman is a good example. Aside from being a pervert, if he had acted this way fifty years ago he would have been horse whipped.
But we are a more sensitive society today. Hell I wish I was born a hundred years ago when the Congress didn’t mandate what kind of toilets and lightbulbs we used or spend its time investigating drug use in ball players while bankrupting the nation and linning its pockets.
Great post!
Mr. Jackson,
Alan here… I wrote that post, and am floored by the depth and history of your understanding, and your comment. Not many people left who can think objectively anymore. Clearly, you’re one of them. Thanks for your kind words,
Alan Speakman
I have been thinking the same thing about todays u.s. citizens for a long time. I have even watched some of them react during ‘mini’ local disasters and I can assure you that your evaluaton is without a doubt right on target. Never have I been witness to such a mass of soft, cowardly, 911 callers in all of my life until the last 10 yrs. So concerned about sporting their latest BMW SUV, demanding a law for this and that, threatening me with the ever present “I’ll call the police” for sawing up downed trees for firewood. (Its bad for the eco-zone don’t cha know!!) all the while sneering at those few of us that still make a living by busting our ass for 10 hours a day in hard physical labor, can handle a weapon, and never use the 911 system. No they will not do well and I confess that I am almost looking forward to their panic when it all falls apart. By the way I’m 44 yrs old believe in firearms rights, don’t believe in drug laws, and am ready for whats coming.
[…] The Next Economic Crash – Absolute Disaster […]
[…] The Next Economic Crash – An Absolute Disaster […]