California is already there. What happens when all States, or most of them, declare bankruptcy?
What would life be like in the “United States” after it ceases to exist?
I would think something along the lines of the Second American Revolution. But with all the apathy out there, who knows if that’s likely.
Believe it or not, I am looking at Japan, as I’m thinking they will go bankrupt first. I will see a modern, formerly prosperous country go bankrupt before I make any assumptions about the US.
this is a blog by a guy who lives in Argentina. their government basically went bankrupt in 2001. its pretty scary. tent cities, rampant crime, hunger and starvation, breakdown in govt services, massive corruption. one entry describes a cattle truck wreck where crowds descended on the dead and hurt cattle with knifes and quickly butchered all of the cattle. those people ate good that night.
in another entry he describes how he has learned to drive. when someone stands in front of your car, you hit the gas, they always jump out of the way. if a brick hits your windshield, you don’t flinch, you keep moving. stop lights and stop signs don’t mean anything, even if there are cops right there, you always keep your car moving.
It won’t. Nor Japan, Belgium or Italy.
States don’t declare bankruptcy. They just stop paying. Bankruptcy is a judicial procedure to carve up businesses that can no longer pay up their obligations. Obviously the state is the judge, and it won’t put itself through bankruptcy.
Here is how the collapse of the United States will unfold. First, the weakest people are going to stop getting paid, or get paid in worthless money. The choice is between pensioners and soldiers. It is much less dangerous to have unpaid retirees protesting than unpaid soldiers. Those retirees who cannot rely on their families to survive will starve to death. (Happened in Russia.) The money is going to run out for wars, that’s for sure, and so the entire U.S. military will have to be recalled to base in America. Money for military contracts will only be provided if the MIC can directly threaten the government with a coup. It won’t matter anyway, once the retirees have been starved and hyperinflation accelerates, the soldiers are going to become extremely disgruntled about their pay. Then the government might try disbanding the military, or the military might overthrow the government. In the first case, there will be an explosion of crime as trained killers go into business as raiders and kidnappers. The other half of the military will then go into business providing private security.
If a military coup of the government does succeed, then expect a lot of bungling, summary executions, but in the end a collapse of the system regardless. Much like the Roman Empire retreated from its frontiers when the money ran out to pay the legions, the Federal Government will stop enforcing its law on places that have become impossible to govern, like the border with Mexico, or Los Angeles. These will become open territories.
Wouldn’t a wiser move be to keep the soldiers on good pay? Maybe as the whole world collapses offer them food and shelter for loyalty?
Please texas please texas…
I don’t buy into this. When the great depression happened price controls were put in place for everything, and gold was stolen from the populace and business. They didn’t overhrow the government now because of government worship, and they probably won’t do it again in the future. The people back in 1776 are a different breed than the people of today.
The people today are far more fed up than thier 1930’s counterparts. They’ve also been taught to fear and hate such open tyranny. I think that it’s going to be total chaos, anarchy and not the happy fun kind that we want, I mean stereotyped guns in the street anarchy.
I think that if there is hope it may actually be in China, they’ve seen the effects of Lassez-Faire, they’ve seen ther country revoluionized by capitalism and they’ve seen the horrors of a large state and are beginning to be introduced to the idea of freedom.
The Great Depression was an economic crisis, not a crisis of state. The Federal Government was lean and mean at the time, and was thus able to react and seize a lot of power as a consequence.
This time the government is bloated and corrupt. Nothing it does can end well. The only comparison is with Argentina, the USSR or the French revolution.
There is this to ponder. Wiki states his claims are controversial, but I don’t know. Smedly Butler and that was during a time when lots of people thought FDR was grand and the savior of the economy. Re-elected for 4 terms and then the Amendment to the Constitution stopped that from happening again.
Two things:
First, the two term limit was enacted almost immediately after we finally got rid of FDR. Its like changing the locks after your unwelcome guest finally leaves lol.
Second, why would pro-Fascist business leaders want to oust FDR?
TY for the illuminating post.
Time to buy a shotgun etc
This is the event which many Neo-Keynesians saw as the Third World “successfully” breaking away from the stranglehold which Western creditors had tied around their necks. The Third World shouldn’t be forced to pay the money they borrow. Keynesians say the darnest things!
In 1929 U.S. was the creditor, not the debtor.
Interesting topic. First I believe it is important to understand that most (including many on this forum) cannot IMAGINE life without “The Government”. And yet we go day-in and day-out without any interchange with “The Government” (unless, like more and more citizens, they are employees of “The Government”). We are currently forced to use and accept Federal Reserve Notes with pictures of dead government hero’s imprinted thereon “for all debts, public and private”…which will soon become valueless.
Almost all news media focus the majority of their topics on “The Government” – national, state, county and/or city. You and I have been inculcated into the idea that we NEED “The Government” to make us “secure” (in spite of the increasingly disturbing evidence that it is “The Government” that threatens the security of its citizens. “The dog who guarded your gates now threatens your house”…Caldwell, The Earth is The Lord’s, p 442). They would like us to vote – and to believe it is “The Government” who grants us “freedom”. God-Bless-Our-Country, Support-The-Troupes, Driving-Is-A-Privilege-Not-A-Right, etc., etc.
But think about this: “The Government” does not exist! Only employees of government exist. Forget the nicety slogan, “we are a nation of laws, not men!”. Government engendered slogans are lots of hokum. I suggest you look up and read an essay on today’s Lew Rockwell page by Gary North:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/north/north784.html
Today is the final installment of 17 parts of “What Is Money?” and deals with the fact of impending government default on all its liabilities. In about the 2nd or 3rd paragraph there are links to all the other parts, and they open the door to much understanding of what will happen once government goes belly-up.
There are numbers of survival sites cropping up every day on the web. Take steps to protect yourself and your family and loved ones against the time of government “bankruptcy” – certain to come abruptly.
Samarami
Realistically, no government ever pays back the money they borrow. They keep borrowing until the day nobody wants to lend to them. That’s why Argentina went down in flames, and so will every other government.
Didn’t France default on their debts?
I never read his book and I don’t readily know as I made hint of in my post. I stated it was something to ponder as Congress via committee hearings for two months found his claim to be true. I have heard this before but I again never studied it in depth, but socialist by nature are slow in centralized planning. They execute through the existing government and slowly centralize by following the process that the government has, though, they manipulate the process with fraud and other anti-liberty activities as that would be the only way to meet their ends. Notice how socialists in Europe and the U.S. still use the system. People vote. Legislation is passed. Yet all is destroying what was and being slowly replaced with a what will be (world government). That’s their whole point. They love the system, and expand the system. It’s the bigger government idea that socialist believe in. Healthcare reform, cape-n-trade, etc… Fascist on the other hand are more violent and their attempt quickly leads to them declaring a new government often very violent early on, more violent early on than socialism. Yet fascist and socialist are still going for the same goal - power and control.
take what I said with a grain of salt. this isn’t anything I have studied in depth, but have only gathered over the years.
What do you think? thoughts…?
I am with Wanderer here. News from Japan were bad enough at the beginning of the year but have become downright terrifying ever since the last general election: the big keiretsu are all bracing for impact at the moment, just read the news. All of the world (starting with those countries with very high public debts) is looking at what will happen to them.
Of course the US situation is different: unemployment and social tensions (and, may I add, expectations) are much higher than in Japan and this could precipitate the situation well before the US government defaults its debt or is forced into drastic measures to keep up present levels of spending. Why do you think the US military received all that training in crowd control?
Can anyone explain why? I mean that seriously - why should the collapse of a gang lead to this?