Sobering thoughts on the national debt

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Originally Posted by mr_dove

I'm curious what a full financial collapse in the US would be like. How would one go about preparing for such an event to minimize the damage to my family?

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Expert finacial advisers say...Gold, Silver.
stock up on staples as they will be expensive or non existant (see Katrina)
Ammo is probably going to be non existant, so buy when you can.
Doesn't so much matter about the weapon as long as you can do the job.
Start a garden in boxes or small area if you live in urban areas.

Hey there has to be a reason Soros and other millionaire/billionaire SOB's are hording precious metals, and converting to solar on almost all ther homes.

Expert financial advisors have some gold and silver they want to sell ya.

There are two forces at odds with each other right now.

Bernanke is printing money like a mad man. This is inflationary.

The market wants to correct. This would be deflationary.

Bernanke can only shovel sand against the tide for so long. All the kings horses and all the kings men........

The market will crash big sometime in the next twelve months and it will continue to drift on downward through 2012. Its ready to go right now. Did you see the Yen head right for 70 to a dollar with the earthquake? This does the same thing to the Japanese (they hold close to a trillion in US Treasurys) as it will to the Chinese (they hold over a trillion in US Treasurys). They bought at say 100 yen to the dollar and they get paid back at a major discount, same with the Chinese and every other foreign currency holder of US Treasurys. Between the crash, another round of housing corrections, major defaults on bonds by cities and states and the devaluation of the dollar there is one major result.

A whole lot of debt gets destroyed. It is way over due and has to happen soon. The Obama regime has delayed the day of reckoning so the event will be a little more dramatic.

When it does we will go into a deflationary period. Not a bad deal if you have a job. Course for those who don't it always sucks.

The bigger problem that we face in the US is the overall aging of the population. 10,000 new Social Security recipients a day and this will go on for the next 18 years. I don't personally expect to see a dime of it.

The criminal class has purchased the vote of my parents with my social security money and now the till is dry. Last year the US had to print money to pay Social Security Checks because the amount collected was not enough to cover the outlay.

And I agree with the general sentiment of the posters here. Stop printing money we don't have. It is theft plain and simple.

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Originally Posted by Hoosier

I remember seeing a Google Video posted here a while back, which was Reagan before his Presidential bid waxing on about the horror of national debt. Seems ironic, given the facts.

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Reagan's willingness to live with the federal debt problem is probably the one big hit I have against his administration but put it in context. When Reagan took office, he faced the horror of a Paper Tiger Army. Massive expenditures were needed to fix the problem he inherited from Carter and reinforce our conventional forces so the nuclear option wasn't our only available option to Soviet aggression.

Fact: Reagan's tax rate decreases actually resulted in increases in federal tax collections. The problem was that Tip O'Neill's Congress submitted omnibus budgets that spent $1.87 for every new dollar taken in. Reagan fought those omnibus spending bills but essentially had Hobson's Choice of accepting O'Neill's budgets or shutting down the government and stopping the military rebuild he saw as essential to bringing down Communism worldwide.

Truth to tell, Reagan's submitted budgets weren't balanced either but O'Neill declared Reagan's budgets DOA and they weren't the monstrousities that O'Neill sent back either. Reagan meant what he said about the horror of the national debt but he felt Communism was an even larger threat to the US in the 80s and I would tend to agree given the level of debt in the 80s versus what the Soviets, Warsaw Pact, Cuba et al were doing from '76 onward.

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Originally Posted by Mtn.man

Expert finacial advisers say...Gold, Silver.
stock up on staples as they will be expensive or non existant (see Katrina)
Ammo is probably going to be non existant, so buy when you can.
Doesn't so much matter about the weapon as long as you can do the job.
Start a garden in boxes or small area if you live in urban areas.

Hey there has to be a reason Soros and other millionaire/billionaire SOB's are hording precious metals, and converting to solar on almost all ther homes.

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Precious metals I'm investing in are steel, lead, copper and brass. ;)

Learn to garden -- it's a healthy way to supplement your diet and cut down on your food bills -- but solar is generally a poor investment with roughly 20 year ROI whenever I've looked at it (and that assumes the system won't suffer any major malfunctions over those 20 years).

If you believe in Weimar Republic-level deflation due to increased printing of money then you'll want to stock up on tangibles that hold their value through any kind of inflation (remember the Carter administration?). I personally don't believe we'll get to that level but there are some 14 trillion reasons I could be wrong.

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Originally Posted by Bitter Clinger

For those that don't know, our country was entirely funded by tarrifs for a very long time. Can you imagine no income taxes or fees whatsoever? Yup.

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You just made every politician shit their collective pants.[ROFL1][/quote]


yeah, but people had to work for a living and not get everything handed to them back then you silly goose.

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Originally Posted by Aloha_Shooter

Precious metals I'm investing in are steel, lead, copper and brass. ;)

Learn to garden -- it's a healthy way to supplement your diet and cut down on your food bills -- but solar is generally a poor investment with roughly 20 year ROI whenever I've looked at it (and that assumes the system won't suffer any major malfunctions over those 20 years).

If you believe in Weimar Republic-level deflation due to increased printing of money then you'll want to stock up on tangibles that hold their value through any kind of inflation (remember the Carter administration?). I personally don't believe we'll get to that level but there are some 14 trillion reasons I could be wrong.

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im not a solar fan, but frankly in this instance we aren't talking about return on investment. we are talking about having power when no one else does. return on investment really isn't the major concern

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Sobering thoughts on the national debt

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I'd much rather think about the national debt with a stiff drink in hand

I find it amusing that "the Price of Gold is skyrocketing!"

when in actuality the value of the dollar is in a friggin free-fall.


all about the spin

Unsustainable budget threatens nation

By 10 EX-CHAIRS OF THE PRESIDENT'S COUNCIL OF ECONOMIC ADVISERS | 3/24/11

No "new news" here but I like the message and I like the messengers.

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Divided government is no excuse for inaction.

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Watching this unfold historically, no partisanship here, I'm embarrassed by my country, I am. We're just too good for this.