If you ask most people they will say that Iran, Al Queda, Russia or some foreign nation or movement would be the biggest threat to national security. However, as we keep spending and not trimming our budget, the debt monster gets worse by the day and so does the damage that will most assuredly occur when we cannot pay anymore.
The US already has decreasing education levels, a crashing middle class and permanent wars which are having a major emotional effect on Americans. What would be the effect of a major decline in the economy which would result in a Greek type debt and employment restructuring?
Debt, whether personal, business or government, is very negative when it exceeds the ability to repay it. When income is reduced, debt must be reduced. Unfortunately, when it comes to recent history, US debt has been escalating out of control without any plan to get it under control.
If there is a lesson from Greece, we see how other nations namely Germany and France, dictated the terms and the Greeks had no choice to accept, otherwise a national bankruptcy was the only unacceptable choice. How would you like to see debt cut by three quarters along with similar cuts in salaries? Most of us would not!
However, in deference to Greece, it's debt was tiny in relation to ours. Its debt was 160% of GDP while ours is around 100%. Ours is the largest economy in the world and therefore, the largest debt. Should we have a problem what would other nations do? Would our "friends and enemies" take advantage of the situation and demand conditions we normally would not accept? What might they want?
Other than repayment of the debt, foreign affairs would definitely be impacted. Could Mexico demand California? Could Russia demand the removal of all troops from Europe? Would Saudi Arabia make demands on us regarding our relationship with Israel? What other impacts would you think there might be?
Whatever might happen, it will not be pretty and we fear how it will effect Americans when we realize we are no longer the big dog but just another soon-to-be third world.
Conservative Tom
The US already has decreasing education levels, a crashing middle class and permanent wars which are having a major emotional effect on Americans. What would be the effect of a major decline in the economy which would result in a Greek type debt and employment restructuring?
Debt, whether personal, business or government, is very negative when it exceeds the ability to repay it. When income is reduced, debt must be reduced. Unfortunately, when it comes to recent history, US debt has been escalating out of control without any plan to get it under control.
If there is a lesson from Greece, we see how other nations namely Germany and France, dictated the terms and the Greeks had no choice to accept, otherwise a national bankruptcy was the only unacceptable choice. How would you like to see debt cut by three quarters along with similar cuts in salaries? Most of us would not!
However, in deference to Greece, it's debt was tiny in relation to ours. Its debt was 160% of GDP while ours is around 100%. Ours is the largest economy in the world and therefore, the largest debt. Should we have a problem what would other nations do? Would our "friends and enemies" take advantage of the situation and demand conditions we normally would not accept? What might they want?
Other than repayment of the debt, foreign affairs would definitely be impacted. Could Mexico demand California? Could Russia demand the removal of all troops from Europe? Would Saudi Arabia make demands on us regarding our relationship with Israel? What other impacts would you think there might be?
Whatever might happen, it will not be pretty and we fear how it will effect Americans when we realize we are no longer the big dog but just another soon-to-be third world.
Conservative Tom
The biggest threats to U.S. national security are the nation's domestic policies and not Iran, China, North Korea or Russia says Richard Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations.
"What we do to improve our schools, our infrastructure, what we do to reduce the budget deficit…this is going to be critical in years and decades ahead," Haass says in an interview with The Daily Ticker. "The most important national security question for the coming year is actually the domestic set of issues that involves the economy."
A Council on Foreign Relations Task Force released a report last month that found the nation's ailing public school system "threatens the country's ability to thrive in a global economy and maintain its leadership role" and "educational failure puts the United States' future economic prosperity, global position, and physical safety at risk."
Haass says these policy failures and intransigence by lawmakers to seriously and vigorously tackle the looming budget crisis portends a weaker U.S. in an increasingly competitive global economy.
"The United States right now has put itself in a position of some vulnerability," he says. "We're vulnerable to the inflows of dollars, we're vulnerable on the energy front, and the challenge for the United States in the national security realm is to do things that reduce our vulnerability to the decisions and behaviors be it foreign governments or markets."
Entitlement reform, typically a "third rail in American politics," will be the top priority after the November election, regardless of who wins the White House, says Haass. The nation's current fiscal situation cannot be reversed without changes to these entitlement programs, but it's "unrealistic to look to campaign positions as a serious guide" to how the 2013 White House will fix these critical budgetary obstacles.
Budget proposals put forth by both President Obama and Republican Congressman Paul Ryan address Medicare and Medicaid spending. But there "has to be bipartisan governance moving forward" for any reform to happen, Haass says.
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