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Originally posted by magicmushroom
Illusion, something like 85% of Ameriocans don't have passports
and there are people who live in the South who still hate the Yankee's,
get my drift. Size does matter, when 9/11 happened it had a great impact in certain parts of the country but not in others.
You have very rich states and very poor states.
As the US is in debt up to its armpits what do you think will happen whenit cannot pay the money back.
Even the creator of the GDP Simon Kuznets in a 1934 report to the US Congress acknowledged the GDP's flaws as an economic indicator, "The welfare of a nation can scarcely be inferred from a measure of national income. If the GDP is up, why is America down? Distinctions must be kept in mind between quantity and quality of growth. Goals for more growth should specify more growth of what and for what."
Originally posted by mmiichael
Russia has had a mercurial rise to solvency and belligerence based on oil being the biggest game in the world and themselves having more than anyone else.
The sudden plummet of world oil prices from appraching $150 a barrel to 25% of that in a few months has revealed the shaky gorunds they really are on.
Their military is desperately in need of upgrading, they have virtually no control of their eastern frontiers any more, health and social issues, early death, alcoholism, drug usage, are at disastrous level.
All the oil revenues are skimmed off the top to go into expansionist political programs and influence peddling.
Since then, Russia has grown at a real terms average of 7 per cent a year. In 2007, growth hit 8.1 per cent - higher than the year before, despite the US-originated sub-prime crisis that has hobbled much of the world.
Russia's reserves have ballooned from practically zero in 1998 to $480bn (£242bn) today - the third largest haul on earth. The country is now almost debt-free - with a budget surplus of 6 per cent of GDP, and a trade surplus almost twice as much again.
www.telegraph.co.uk...
The countries financial reserves are dwindling, their stock market has been decimated, their currency is worthless.
Only their natural resources keep them afloat but barely
If any major world player is going under in 2010 it looks like Russia.
Mike F
In his book, Panarin compares president Barack Obama with the lastest Sovjetleader, Michail Gorbatsjov.