Wren Nesting In Ponytail Palm

When your government and your economy are addicts and can't seem to stop their habits, borrowing against limited collateral, where do you send them for professional help?

Ask an expert about the symptoms, first:

Stockman [former Reagan administration budget director] explained that before 1980, it took about $1.50 of new borrowing -- public or private -- to generate $1 of GDP growth. By the mid-1990s, it was $2.50 or $3 of borrowing for a $1 of GDP growth. By 2007, before the big collapse and meltdown finally came, $7 of public and private debt was added to the national balance sheet in order to get $1 of GDP growth.

"When you get to the point of $7 of borrowing to get $1 of income, you're obviously on an unsustainable path and pretty close to hitting the wall, which more or less we have," he said.

"So the addicts in Washington are now unfortunately terrified to stop all this borrowing whether it's for guns or butter for fear of the economy will collapse.... That's why we're just at the beginning of solving this massive financial collapse we had in 2008 and not in the process of healthy recovery as some of the pals in the White House or on Capitol Hill or on Wall Street would have you believe."

Where do we get a second opinion?

Should we keep drawing from the well just because it hasn't run dry?

I'm not worried about the rhetoric inciting divisive opinions.  I'm concerned about finding at least one courageous group of people willing to say, "Stop the Insanity!"

Or should I not worry and, like Tajikistan, just cede some of my sovereignty without blinking an eye?

We're a global village and all that now, right?

You know what?  I'm not going to think any more about the government that makes the laws under which I try to be a good citizen.  If the majority of people don't care if their cash cow is getting close to cashing out, then I won't, either.

I have to keep my eyes on the big prize - getting our species living permanently, securely, happily in more than one solar system - and on the little prize, opening the eyes of those wanting to be enlightened about the concept of reality.

The rest is just a poor filter level setting letting the random bleetings of the noise floor get through.