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By Root 1995 0

the credit to run their lives and business; it is not expendable), cooperation (group lending allows lendees can to cover each other and lower default rates), pro-social lending practices (focus not just on absentee exploiters trying to ring every penny out of a business, but on clients and owners themselves providing real services and goods to maintain a modest income which is invested in family and community).

Once again, I list these proposals not as "the answer" per se but to forward the idea that the only "answer" is an informed dialog and exchange of ideas among the citizenry, a discourse and debate which must be undertaken long before the Savior State devolves and collapses in insolvency.

We must be ready to establish the New American State, not with a set of canned "answers" (which smacks of the usual technocrat reliance on ideology rather than practicality) but an engagement of ideas which will form the intellectual framework for a new integrated understanding of limited yet strong governance which protects the citizenry and public trust from exploitation by Elites.

It is not difficult to start with the common ground of the U.S. Constitution and the fundamental rights set down by the Declaration of Independence: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

I cannot predict nor would I dare try to predict the outcome of the coming insolvency of the Savior State. But it is my hope that the citizens of the United States of America do not retreat into fatalism or wallow in complacency, but instead grasp the nettle of self-governance and liberty as laid down by the nation's Founding Fathers.

Charles Hugh Smith, citizen and taxpayer

September, 2009

Further Reading: Books mentioned in the text (and a few other relevant titles)

The Long Emergency: Surviving the End of Oil, Climate Change, and Other Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century James Howard Kunstler

Financial Armageddon: Protecting Your Future from Four Impending Catastrophes

and

When Giants Fall: An Economic Roadmap for the End of the American Era

Michael Panzner

The Future of Life E.O. Wilson

Beyond Oil: The View from Hubbert's Peak Kenneth Deffeyes

Fewer: How the New Demography of Depopulation Will Shape Our Future

Ben Wattenberg

The Coming Generational Storm Laurence Kotlikoff and Scott Burns

The Rhythm of War Terence Parker

The Fourth Turning William Strauss and Neil Howe

The Great Wave: Price Revolutions and the Rhythm of History

David Hackett Fischer

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed Jared Diamond

The Collapse of Complex Societies Joseph Tainter

The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization

Thomas Homer-Dixon

How The World Really Works Alan Jones

The Rich and the Super-Rich, A Study in the Power of Money Today

Ferdinand Lundberg (out of print, but used copies are available)

Tragedy & Hope: A History of the World in Our Time Carroll Quigley

Wealth and Democracy: A Political History of the American Rich

Kevin Phillips

The Power Elite C. Wright Mills

Who Rules America? Challenges to Corporate and Class Dominance

G. William Domhoff

This Land Is Their Land: Reports from a Divided Nation

Barbara Ehrenreich

Planet of Slums Mike Davis

Weblogs & New Media: Marketing in Crisis Charles Hugh Smith

The Long Descent: A User's Guide to the End of the Industrial Age

and

The Ecotechnic Future: Envisioning a Post-Peak World

John Michael Greer

The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal

Jared Diamond

Sociobiology: The New Synthesis E.O. Wilson

Who am I? Steven Reiss

The Fall of the Roman Empire Michael Grant

The Art Of War Sun Tzu

The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference

Malcolm Gladwell

The Decline of the West (Abridged version) Oswald Spengler

Politics of Experience R.D. Laing

Fiasco: The Inside Story of a Wall Street Trader Frank Partnoy

Confessions of a Subprime Lender Richard