The Financial Crisis: What Have We Learned So Far?

The lessons are stunning and they are these:

1) Long the global financial leader and a nation respected all over the world, the U.S. led by its Wall Street firms is now a financial manipulator and is dependent on others to loan it money to stay afloat. Worse yet, those others are raising serious concerns.

The situation is so desperate, the U.S. can no longer borrow enough money and for the last year, it has been heavily running the printing presses, creating money out of thin air. This alone shows us we are on the road to financial ruin.

But as a result, the U.S. is awash in cheap money and the government uses that as a measurement to tell us we are in "Recovery." Recovery from what? We are $13 trillion in debt and it's growing as you read this. It won't be long until we desperately need to borrow money to fund Social Security and Medicare or they will be forced to issue IOU's.

2) The Wall Street caused global financial collapse came from the biggest frauds in history, yet the perpetrators were bailed out at taxpayer expense and no-one has been held accountable. There is no new super watch dog agency, no new rules and it's business as usual on Wall Street including Mt. Everest sized bonuses. This shows us the depth of our corrupted system.

3) Once the mightiest industrial power the world has ever known, the U.S. has sent most of its manufacturing off-shore. 70% of its economy depends on people buying mostly foreign made products they can't afford, which in itself will bankrupt us.

4) Because the U.S. economy is also dependent on military-industrial spending which employs millions of people, all at taxpayer's expense, we are fighting meaningless wars and building vast numbers of weapons we don't need. Nearly all Congressional Districts have these jobs and Congress protects them. Our finances are collapsing yet as we can see, the military spending is endless, and all to protect us from what?

5) We have deluded ourselves to think if only we had the right President, things would be different. But the system is badly broken and there are no easy fixes. Mr. Obama has failed miserably and you and I must get involved beyond casting a ballot if we want to save our system, for lobbyists own both major political parties.

I wanted to offer you solutions but maybe this is no longer a system worth saving. It must and will collapse of its own corruption. This is not a comforting conclusion and if you have a solution to offer, please do so. It is needed and welcome.

Dick