Rome is already burning. Prepare for the worst.
– With The US Still Trapped in Depression, This Really Is Starting to Feel Like 1932
– Howard Davidowitz: Obama is ‘Mr. Mass Destruction’ – US Economy ‘Is a Complete Disaster’
Harvard professor and author Niall Ferguson speaks about the financial crisis during an opening session of the Aspen Ideas Festival on Monday afternoon. |
Harvard professor and prolific author Niall Ferguson opened the 2010 Aspen Ideas Festival Monday with a stark warning about the increasing prospect of the American “empire” suddenly collapsing due to the country’s rising debt level.
“I think this is a problem that is going to go live really soon,” Ferguson said. “In that sense, I mean within the next two years. Because the whole thing, fiscally and other ways, is very near the edge of chaos. And we’ve seen already in Greece what happens when the bond market loses faith in your fiscal policy.”
Ferguson said empires — such as the former Soviet Union and the Roman empire — can collapse quite quickly and the tipping point is often when the cost of servicing an empire’s debt is larger than the cost of its defense budget.
“That has not been the case I think at any point in U.S. history,” Ferguson said. “It will be the case in the next five years.”
Ferguson was conscious of opening the Ideas Festival on such a stark note.
“Walter Isaacson, the leader of this great institution said, ‘Don’t be too dark!,’” Ferguson said.
The affable British scholar tried to keep it light. He used a stage whisper to tell the Aspen Institute audience, “I know you’re not comfortable with the word ‘empire,’ especially just after the Fourth of July, but you are the Redcoats now.”
He said the U.S. is now deeply in the red as a country because of a combination of the Great Recession, the resulting federal stimulus and financial bailout programs, two wars, the Bush tax cuts, and a growth in social entitlement programs.
And economic debt can lead to a sudden loss of military power and global respect, Ferguson said.
“By combating our crisis of private debt with an extraordinary expansion of public debt, we inevitably are going to reduce the resources available for national security in the years ahead,” Ferguson said. “Because as a debt grows, so the interest payments you have to make on it grow, even if interest rates stay low. And on current projections, the federal debt is going to be absorbing around 20 percent — a fifth of all the taxes you pay — within just a few years.
“The item of discretionary federal expenditure most likely to be squeezed is of course defense. And there are lots of historic precedents for that,” said Ferguson, who is the author of “Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the Lessons for Global Power.”
Ferguson said the financial crisis that started in 2007 has “has accelerated a fundamental shift in the balance of power,” with the U.S. shedding power and China absorbing it.
“I’ve just come back from China — a two-week trip there — and the thing I heard most often was, ‘You can’t lecture us about the superiority of your system anymore. We don’t need to learn anything from you about financial institutions and forget about democracy. We see where it has got you.’”
David Gergen of CNN, who moderated the discussion, which also included billionaire Mortimer Zuckerman, asked Ferguson whether it made a difference if the U.S. declined as a world power.
“Having grown up in a declining empire, I do not recommend it,” Ferguson said. “It’s not a lot of fun, actually, decline. To be more serious, a world in which the United States is no longer predominate is not likely to be a better world, actually.”
In what he called his “light moment,” Ferguson said, “I think there is a way out for the United States. I don’t think its over. But it all hinges on whether you can re-energize the real mainsprings of American power. And those two things are technological innovation and entrepreneurship.
“Those are the things that made the United States the greatest economy in the world and the critical question is, ‘Are we going to get it right?’ Can we revive those things in such a way that in the end we grow our way out of this hole the way the United States grew its way out of the 1970s and of course out of the 1930s?”
The Aspen Ideas Festival continues through July 11 at the Aspen Institute. Such notables as U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates, U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein, and former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan are scheduled to appear.
A number of events are open to the public, but tickets were going fast on Monday through the website Aspen Show Tickets. Aspen Public Radio also plans on broadcasting a number of festival events live, including on Tuesday at 10:30 a.m. and at 1 and 5 p.m.
by Brent Gardner-Smith, Aspen Daily News Staff Writer
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Source: Aspen Daily News
Change we can believe in:
– US Missiles Deployed Near China Send a Message
– Obama Administration Plans Secret Big Brother ‘Perfect Citizen’ Net Surveillance
– General James Mattis who said it was ‘fun to shoot people’ takes over US Central Command
– EU gives US access to its citizens’ private financial data
– Obama Administration To Sue Arizona Over Immigration Law
– Third US carrier, 4,000 Marines augment US armada opposite Iran
– Now truth is bad for you: ‘Obama warns Erdogan international Gaza flotilla probe bad for Turkey’
– Obama Internet ‘Kill Switch’ Approved By Senate Committee
– Americans buying their own health insurance face an average 20 percent increase in premiums
– Big Brother DHS And DOD Want To Open US Skies To Spy Drones
– President Obama Has Already Outdone Every Previous President In Prosecuting Whistleblowers
– US government debt to rise to $19.6 trillion by 2015
– Left-Wing Icon Daniel Ellsberg: ‘Obama Deceives the Public’
– US: $13 Trillion Debt Poised to Overtake GDP (Chart of Day)
– 10 US States Where An Absurd Percentage Of The Population Works For The Government
– US ’secret war’ expands globally as Special Operations forces are deployed in 75 countries
– Paul Craig Roberts: A Plague Upon The World: The USA is a “Failed State”
– President Obama Wins The Right to Detain People With No Habeas Review
– US posts 19th straight monthly budget deficit; April deficit nearly four times higher than in 2009
– Hyperfast missile to strike anywhere on Earth within an hour wins President Obama’s support
– President Obama Repaying His Masters At Goldman Sachs
– Marriage Penalties Increase Dramatically Under ObamaCare
– The No.1 Trend Forecaster Gerald Celente on ObamaCare, Dollar Devaluation And Gold
– Rep. Ron Paul: President Obama Is ‘Not A Socialist.’ ‘He Is A Corporatist.’
– Dylan Ratigan Show With Alan Grayson: The Great Con Job By The Fed, The Government And The Banksters
– Michelle Obama says Barack’s Home country is Kenya – full statement
– Obama Administration Approves Targeted Killing of American Cleric
– Judge Napolitano on Obama’s Private Army
– Obama Gives ‘Pesticide Lobbyist’ Post as Chief Agricultural Negotiator
– It’s Official: America Now Enforces Capital Controls
– Rep. Ron Paul: Healthcare Will Drive US To Bankruptcy
– Gerald Celente: This time they will close the Banks & Wall Street (03/27/10)
– John Pilger: Have a Nice World War III, Folks
– The War on WikiLeaks … and Why It Matters
– White House Press Corps longest-serving member Helen Thomas on her one question for Obama
– Joe Biden to Barack Obama: ‘Mr. President, This Is A Big F****** Deal’
– Rep. Ron Paul: Healthcare Bill is ‘Blatantly Unconstitutional And Contrary to The Ideals of Liberty’
– US: THE Most Important Chart of the CENTURY
– Health Care Bill ‘Dangerously Expands IRS’s Power’
– US Government Preparing For Civil Unrest In America
– Record: National Debt Up $2 Trillion in Just 421 Days on Obama’s Watch
– Obama agencies invoking secrecy provision more often than under Bush
– US budget deficit hits record $221bn, the largest monthly deficit in history
– Michael Moore: ‘Democrats are a bunch of wusses … It’s disgusting … I’m sick of them’
– President Obama signs one-year extension of Patriot Act
– Cybersecurity Bill To Give President Obama New Emergency Powers
– Judge Napolitano and Angela Keaton on Freedom Watch: Obama’s Bush Foreign Policy
– Obama Signs Law Raising Public Debt Limit from $12.4 Trillion to $14.3 Trillion
– President Obama’s Pledge Never to Raise Taxes on Anyone Making Less Than $250,000 a Year
– Paul Craig Roberts: It Is Now Official: The U.S. Is A Police State
– Prof. Russell Roberts Testifies Before House Committee: ‘I Want My Country Back!’
– Director of National Intelligence Says US May Kill Americans Abroad
– President Obama Ups Pakistan Drone Strikes in Assassination Campaign
– The New Vision of the Obama Administration: War Without End
– Pentagon’s New Record Black Budget Tops $56 Billion
– Rep. Ron Paul on Obama seeking to assassinate ‘US citizens’ he labels as terrorist
– White House to Paint Grim Fiscal Picture: Another Record Budget Deficit
– US: GDP Mirage – The Last Hurrah
– Marc Faber: Obama Makes Bush Look Like a Genius
– Obamanomics: Why Did the ‘Stimulus’ Fail to Help the US Economy?
– Paul Craig Roberts: How Wall Street Destroyed Health Care – Greed, Be Thou My God
– President Obama to indefinitely imprison detainees without charges
– Ron Paul: US Foreign Policy is Bankrupting America
– Rep. Ron Paul: State of the Republic Address – ‘Dangerous Times Indeed.’
– America’s Impending Master Class Dictatorship! (MUST-READ!)
– The CFR Controls American News/Media
– US: Unfunded Benefits Dig States’ $3 Trillion Hole
– The No.1 Trend Forecaster Gerald Celente: Financial Mafia Controlling US and Wall Street
– Peter Schiff: The Lunacy of US Government Programs
– Former Dean of Harvard College Harry R. Lewis: Larry Summers, Robert Rubin: Will The Harvard Shadow Elite Bankrupt The University And The Country?
– Experts: Dollar Crisis Looms if US Doesn’t Curb Debt
– Fitch: US Must Cut Spending To Save AAA Rating; US December Deficit Nearly Doubles
– The Coming Sovereign Debt Crisis
– US slides deeper into depression as Wall Street revels
– PIMCO’S Bill Gross: ‘Let’s Get Fisical’ (… or why the US will not make it.)
– Barack Obama’s Health Care Lies And Reversals
– US sheds 85,000 jobs in December; Record 40% Of Unemployed Without Job For 27+ Weeks
– US: Public Pensions Face $2 Trillion Deficit
– U.S. Avoids Technical Default By Three Days
– As an American, I refuse to buy mandatory health insurance … that supports Big Pharma
– Prof. Dr. David Michael Green: Now I’m Really Getting Pissed Off … With Obama
– US Treasuries Post Worst Performance Among Sovereign Markets In 2009
– US losses will top $400 billion on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
– US: More Ammo For The Treasury Bazooka
– US government wants farmers to use coal waste on fields
– The No.1 Trend Forecaster Gerald Celente: The Terror And The Crash of 2010
– We’re Screwed! Hyperinflation like in the Weimar Republic; Great Depression worse than in the 1930s
– US Congress: Banksters Get $4 Trillion Gift From Barney Frank
Traitor in chief:
– Treason: Obama gives INTERPOL immunity from the Constitution (Amending Executive Order 12425)
– Peter Schiff on Obamacare, Freddie Mac & Fannie Mae: The Nightmare Before Christmas
– Obama administration backs Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac no matter how big their losses may be
– Rep. Dennis Kucinich: US War Presidents ignore Congress and Constitution
– Obamacare: Big payoffs to senators on health bill stoke public anger
– US: Trillions Of Troubles Ahead
– Chinese central banker Zhu Min: ‘The world does not have so much money to buy more US Treasuries.’
– Obamacare: Change Nobody Believes In
– Obama’s surge comes at a cost: At least $57,077.60 per minute
– US National Debt Tops Debt Limit
Hypocrite in Chief (Funny):
– President Obama: Another Busy Day in The Oval Office!
– Fascism in America: By Political Definition The US Is Now Fascist, Not A Constitutional Republic
– John Williams of Shadowstats: Prepare For The Hyperinflationary Great Depression
Liar in Chief (NOT funny!!!):
– Barack Obama Lies 7 Times In Under 2 Minutes!!!!!
– Rep. Dennis Kucinich: ‘These Wars Are Corrupting The Heart Of Our Nation!’
– Famous Investor Jim Rogers: Incompetence In Washington, Abolish The Fed And The Treasury
– Rep. Dennis Kucinich: The Truth About Afghanistan
– Obama’s Big Sellout (Rolling Stone Magazine)
– Obama administration to lift debt ceiling by $1.8 trillion
– Climategate: President Obama’s rule by EPA decree is a coup d’etat against Congress, made in Britain
– Obama administration tells Pakistan: Tackle Taliban or we will
– MSNBC Rachel Maddow: War President Obama
– Ron Paul: ‘Obama is Actually Preparing Us For Perpetual War’
– Afghanistan Surge to Cost At Least $40 Billion, That Is $1.333.333 For One US Soldier Per Year
Liar in Chief (Over 300 soldiers died in 2009 because of this lie!!!):
– Obama: ‘I will promise you this, that if we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am President, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home. We will bring an end to this war. You can take that to the bank.’
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