What is the sound of the first shoe dropping?
- Thursday, August 04 2011 @ 03:56 PM CST
- Contributed by: filbert
- Views: 2,446
Sounds like a 500 point, 4.3% drop in the Dow Jones Industrial Average in one day. As Ace points out, the Dow is down 6% since Tuesday. Thats . . . um . . . three days ago.
What could possibly have happened--say--last weekend, perhaps--to tip the applecart over at just this exact time?
The only good news coming out of today is that -- for now -- the world's investors have (improbably) flocked to U.S. Government securities as the only remaining relatively safe refuge. So it's possible that the other shoe may not drop immediately.
But look at the cash burn rate of the Federal Government. Look at the unfunded obligations of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid in the next few years. The other shoe is dropping. It is dropping NOW. And thanks to Obama, the Democrats, and yes the Republicans in Washington, when the other shoe hits the American public on the head, it is going to hurt.
A lot.
The Federal government's budget needs to be balanced. Not next year. Not in ten years.
Tomorrow.
Half-measures and politically-determined tactics designed only to win the next election won't cut it any more. But nobody in Washington, D.C. seems to realize that. And what's worse, it seems that most people outside Washington don't realize it, either.
But reality has this really nasty habit of whapping inattentive people upside the heads, and doing it very, very vigorously.
What could possibly have happened--say--last weekend, perhaps--to tip the applecart over at just this exact time?
The only good news coming out of today is that -- for now -- the world's investors have (improbably) flocked to U.S. Government securities as the only remaining relatively safe refuge. So it's possible that the other shoe may not drop immediately.
But look at the cash burn rate of the Federal Government. Look at the unfunded obligations of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid in the next few years. The other shoe is dropping. It is dropping NOW. And thanks to Obama, the Democrats, and yes the Republicans in Washington, when the other shoe hits the American public on the head, it is going to hurt.
A lot.
The Federal government's budget needs to be balanced. Not next year. Not in ten years.
Tomorrow.
Half-measures and politically-determined tactics designed only to win the next election won't cut it any more. But nobody in Washington, D.C. seems to realize that. And what's worse, it seems that most people outside Washington don't realize it, either.
But reality has this really nasty habit of whapping inattentive people upside the heads, and doing it very, very vigorously.