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U.S. Better Wake Up

America is in serious trouble. The national debt is $13.6 trillion. The unemployment rate is 10%. The “war on terror” is in its 10th year, with no end in sight. The value of the dollar is falling fast. And the government continues to take away what few freedoms we have left.

In fact, things are even worse than this, but this is the worst that the government and their corporate mainstream media would have you believe. Real U.S. government debt – including unfunded liabilities like Medicare and Social Security – is much higher. Boston University economist Laurence Kotlikoff says it is 14-fold higher – $200 trillion – making each citizen’s share of the debt just under $650,000. This doesn’t include credit card debt and student loans.

The real unemployment rate is also actually much higher than 10%. The “official” government unemployment rate of 10% that is parroted unquestioningly by the media leaves out: people that have given up looking for work and part-time workers that want to work full-time. When these people are included the unemployment rate is closer to 20%.

The war on terror is really in its 10th year, but the U.S. government has been occupying, waging war, and intervening in the Middle East for decades – invoking hatred and provoking retaliatory terrorist attacks (what the CIA calls blowback). In 1953, after the democratically elected government of Iran had nationalized some of its country’s oil resources from England, the CIA assisted the British government in overthrowing Iran’s democracy. In its place, they installed and supported a dictatorship that spied on, tortured, and executed dissidents. Iranians overthrew the dictatorship in 1979, out of which came the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The U.S. government also helped bring Saddam Hussein and his party to power in Iraq and supplied him with funds and weapons in his war against Iran (1980-1988). He then invaded Kuwait, after the U.S. government gave him the go-ahead. Perhaps power, and not security, is why the U.S. has over 700 military bases in over 140 countries? There are many more examples of the U.S. government’s interventions around the world which don’t help to keep us safe, prosperous, free, secure, or at peace. In fact, it does just the opposite.

U.S.
U.S.

The government’s foreign policy, empire, and wars are one of the biggest causes of the loss of the dollar’s value. Economist Thomas DiLorenzo notes why governments prefer this method of financing unpopular things (especially wars of aggression) saying:

“By printing money, the cost can be delayed and hidden, sometimes for years, before the new money circulates and loses value.”

This is known as the inflation tax – unconstitutionally brought to you by the U.S. government and its partner in counterfeiting, the Federal Reserve! The Fed, America’s central bank (1 of the 10 planks of Marx’s Communist Manifesto – obviously not a free market institution) manipulates interest rates and has a monopoly on money, which it has created so much of that it has destroyed over 95% of the dollar’s purchasing power since being created in 1913.

Hard to believe? Well, believe it. Everyone knows governments don’t tell the truth. So we should not be surprised that public (government) schools teach (indoctrinate) us to believe anti-liberty, pro-government propaganda.

The U.S. is on an unsustainable path; if we do not have real, substantial change we could very well see economic and even societal collapse. As the great 20th century Austrian economist, Ludwig von Mises said:

“Everyone carries a part of society on his shoulders; no one is relieved of his share of responsibility by others. And no one can find a safe way out for himself if society is sweeping towards destruction. Therefore everyone, in his own interests, must thrust himself vigorously into the intellectual battle. None can stand aside with unconcern; the interests of everyone hang on the result. Whether he chooses or not, every man is drawn into the great historical struggle, the decisive battle into which our epoch has plunged us.”

Join the intellectual battle with the help of the thousands of free articles, books, mp3s, and videos at Mises.org, the website of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, the world center of the Austrian school of economics (the only school of economic thought to predict and explain the Great Depression and the bursting of the housing bubble).

If we want to have liberty, peace, and prosperity rather than tyranny, chaos, national bankruptcy, and hyperinflation, we had better wake up before it is too late.

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