Cluborlov

If you are not familiar with Cluborlov I recommend it. 

According to the latest International Energy Agency projections, the half-life of industrial civilization can be capped at about 17 years: it's all downhill from here.

Orlov witnessed the collapse of the Soviet Union up close and has been pungent about the current situation in the U.S. Referring to Obama he says " we have us a Gorbachev." A New Yorker article on Orlov is linked here. ...recently financial professionals have been bolstering his “gut feeling that the United States is bankrupt.”

If nothing else I strongly recommend waking up to the possibility of a "collapse" a word I am not fond of in our case. Disintegration seems better. The Soviet Union collapsed. Russia did not. It rebooted, causing massive social dislocation and agony. But this may be a distinction without a difference. Whatever word works - I am not looking forward to the next few years. 

Evidence of disintegration is littering our TV sets everyday. A bank holiday or two in the near future would not surprise me in the least.  We are nationalizing the banking system right now. Unemployment is now well past what is being officially reported and set to get worse. Much worse. For what it is worth, we are still better off than Spain and the U.K. 

I don't think Obama's magic money bailout will do much other than momentarily stop the bleeding. But I'm willing to be surprised. He has to convince others to keep investing in us to pull this spending bill off, and avoid the creation of a worthless dollar. (If I am missing something on this point PLEASE tell me. Fill me in on how money that apparently does not exist will re-create the economy.) 

In my humble (very humble) opinion planning for some very rough sledding is in order. In the next four years if everything works out dandy the worst outcome is a few sleepless nights and a pantry full of canned foods.