The Decaying of America.

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Oqeima: In the 70s, Emmanuel Todd wrote a book in which he explained where the soviet demographic indicators would go and why and what effects it would have, and things happened as he had predicted.

err, well, I must admit I haven't read the book though...
I should add that, nowadays, he isn't very optimistic for the USA.


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July 26, 2006

SouthAmerica: Yes I did read his book when it was first published on the USA. And I suggest that people read that book because gives you an insight to what is happening in the Middle East that is lacking in the American mainstream media.

I even sent an email to the Charlie Rose Show for him to bring Emmanuel Todd to his program for an interview – but they never did.

Emmanuel Todd’s book was a major bestseller in Europe – but when the book was published in the US the American mainstream media boycotted his book. I understand why – the book provides a lot of answers regarding the Middle East problems that the current Fools running the US government don’t want the American people to know.

I had posted some information regarding his book on this message board, but after 12 months the information is deleted.

But I had also posted some information on the PBS message board – and on their message board the information is not lost since they keep the information available on their message board for a few years.

Here is the discussion on that board regarding Emmanuel Todd’s book. It is obvious that my name in that board is Brazil.

http://discussions.pbs.org/viewtopic.pbs?t=7000&highlight=emmanuel+todd



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Oqeima: Come on, they're well aware of that. Former Number Ones generally know all too well when their days are past - after a while.


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July 26, 2006

SouthAmerica: You took that quote from an article that I wrote a few years ago.

I did not mean to insult anyone when I wrote that article and if you are a British citizen I hope you are not insulted with what I said on that article.

Every Empire goes thru a life cycle – rise, maturity and then decline – and the British Empire did very well for a period of 100 years.


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Saxon:

SouthAmerica,

I'm sure your cousin is a credible witness (being a graduate of a US university and all).

But I must say--having spent the last 50 years living in this country--I see no evidence of an infrastructure meltdown.

BTW...how are the roads and bridges holding up in South America??



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SouthAmerica: This American organization (ASCE) gives you a better answer to your question than I could. But I did post some information on this message board over a year ago regarding this subject, but the information is gone from this message board after 12 months.

But again, I had posted the same information on other message boards including the PBS message board – here is what I posted at that time on the other message board on August 18, 2005:

Quoting from the PBS message board I wrote:

Brazil: Long before 9/11 I have been advocating on my writings that the United States should spend less money in military spending and the money should go instead into building and up-dating the infrastructure of the American economy.

You can read on the following website where, in my opinion, the US government should be investing its scarce resources:

http://www.asce.org/reportcard/2005/page.cfm?id=145

Besides the above areas of investment the US government should invest on a new generation of Shuttles with state-of-art-technologies and know how, and should send to museums the current fleet of Shuttles, because these Shuttles represent technologies of an age long gone.

The US government also should help cities around the country to wire itself with state-of-the-art high speed Broadband technology.

PLEASE stop wasting money on wars that the US can’t win, and instead invest the money wisely in a way that will help many American generations in the future.

REMINDER: As Americans are wasting a ton of money to try to project the illusion of military power around the world – the other major economies around the world are not wasting time and money instead they are investing its resources more wisely to help develop and support their economies of the future.

Note: Today the American infrastructure is decaying so fast that it is like a bad joke.

Here we are in the year 2005, and a little rain in the area 3 days ago, and parts of Bergen County (we are located right outside New York City) and up-scale towns such as Ridgewood, NJ, stayed without electric power for almost 2 days – just like in a third world country.

And power outages are becoming routine in our area.

What is going on?

If this is happening in California and in the New York Metropolitan area, then the infrastructure of the rest of the country must also be going to hell very fast.

This is not an infrastructure of a superpower it is the infrastructure of a decaying Soviet Union!!!!


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I see more illusions of sagacity by sa
In reference to you belief that you alone knew about the USSR's pending collapse I shall cite you to 1986 and and the yearly manuals manuals submitted to Congress on the Soviet economy. Every year Congress was briefed about the weakness in the USSR's economy and was even told that it was on the verge of collapse.

I graduated George Washing univ in D.C. in 1986. Prior to graduating I took a course in Socialist and communist economies. We read the book because my professor edited it.


he mentioned the fact that the population was in one place, the fields in another, the oil in another, no infrastructure to connect them and an expediture of 30 % of GDP on the military.

In short Congress was briefed every year about the Soviet Economy and they were aware that is was likely to collapse.
 
Quote from jem:

I see more illusions of sagacity by sa
In reference to you belief that you alone knew about the USSR's pending collapse ...
More...

Oh, is that another thing that SA is claiming to have predicted?

We should start calling him Nostramerica.
 
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Jem: In reference to you belief that you alone knew about the USSR's pending collapse I shall cite you to 1986 and the yearly manuals manuals submitted to Congress on the Soviet economy. Every year Congress was briefed about the weakness in the USSR's economy and was even told that it was on the verge of collapse.

I graduated George Washing univ in D.C. in 1986. Prior to graduating I took a course in Socialist and communist economies. We read the book because my professor edited it.


he mentioned the fact that the population was in one place, the fields in another, the oil in another, no infrastructure to connect them and an expediture of 30 % of GDP on the military.

In short Congress was briefed every year about the Soviet Economy and they were aware that is was likely to collapse.


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July 27, 2006

SouthAmerica: Four years ago, in September of 2002, my article was published on various magazines and newspapers including Brazzil magazine. As someone mentioned that information on this message board - On that article I mentioned the following regarding the collapse of the Soviet Union.

You can read the entire article at:

September 2002 – “Countdown to Armageddon”
http://www.brazzil.com/content/view/6309/38/



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Quoting from that article – the portion that was mentioned on this message board:


“The Soviet Union Collapse

In the summer of 1986 I was present at a dinner party in my mother's house, and she had about twelve guests at that diner. Among their friends, who were present that evening, there were two couples who came to the United States from Rumania, and they had been living in the U.S. since the early 1970's.

Sometime during the evening the conversation turned to politics and economics. Then I told the people at the diner table that from all the information I had been reading about the Soviet Union for a while, I had come to the conclusion that there was a very good probability that the Soviet Union was in the process of going broke.

Remember this was in 1986, Ronald Reagan was telling everyone about the potential dangers and threats from the Soviet Evil Empire. Our friend from Rumania told me in an emphatic voice "Fifty years from now the Soviets still will be one of the major powers in the world. I lived under Soviet rule, and I know how powerful they are."

I never forgot that evening because I became the joke of that dinner. I was the only person in the world to believe that the Soviet Union was going bankrupt. That evening, everyone had a good laugh at my expense. They thought I was out of my mind—the Soviet Union going broke, what a silly idea. Where does this guy get these crazy ideas?

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989-1990 nobody was laughing at me any longer. About a month ago I went to a party to commemorate the 50th wedding anniversary of that Rumanian friend. I reminded him of that party in 1986. He told me that he still can't believe to this day what happened to the Soviet Union. The Soviets had made such a big impression on him that after all these years, he still is in shock from the Soviet Union's demise.”


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When I wrote the above article I received a ton of email from college professors of major universities, and from a lot of students from graduates schools, and PhD programs plus the other people who liked my article.

I can assure you that there was almost no one talking about the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1986 – if anything “The Russians were coming at that time.”

And during his second term Ronald Reagan did spend a ton of money on defense and during those four years he added almost $ 1 trillion dollars in deficits (approximately the equivalent of $ 2 trillion dollars in today’s money) – to the cumulative outstanding debt of the US government.

If as you are saying - the US Congress and Reagan had knowledge of the collapsing Soviet economy – then why Ronald Reagan pissed away so much money on defense and added so much debt to the cumulative outstanding debt of the US government?

If you go to the magazines of that time and also the major American newspapers then you will see that there was nothing being said about the coming collapse of the Soviet Union – If anything the “Soviet Evil Empire” was coming to get the American people.



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The same way that my friends and family laughed at my expense during that dinner in 1986 regarding the collapse of the Soviet Union – Today if you read my article published on February 17, 2005 - The First Great Depression of the New Millennium – Here we go again…..

When I published this article I got a lot of email saying that I am a complete idiot and many other people laughed about this ridiculous article.

Around the year 2011 if I mention the article published in February of 2005 I will encounter a lot people like most of you – some people will claim that the US government and Congress knew that the depression was coming in the near future and that it was common knowledge around the year 2005.

And some other people will make fun of my article and they claim that I was full of shit and that I never published the article in 2005. They will try very had to discredit my article or foresight of the future.

Right now my article is considered ridiculous by most of you, but in few years people will try to say that I did not write the article in 2005.

Anyway, maybe you will find interesting the article that I wrote about the coming worldwide economic depression.

Published on February 17, 2005 on my blog and also on Brazzil magazine.
“The First Great Depression of the New Millennium” By Ricardo C. Amaral

http://firstgreatdepressionofnewmillennium.blogspot.com

http://www.brazzilmag.com/content/view/1424/49/




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During the Ronald Reagan years the United States wasted a ton of money on defense spending at a time when the Soviet Union was in the process of collapsing economically.


Here is the detail of the additions to the US national debt by president:

Ronald Reagan (8 years in office) added to US debt $ 1.7 trillion dollars.
George Bush Senior (4 years in office) added to US debt $ 1.5 trillion dollars.
Bill Clinton (8 years in office) added to US debt $ 1.6 trillion dollars.
George Bush Junior (first term, 4 years in office) added to US debt $ 1.8 trillion dollars.


US Historical Debt Outstanding – Annual Cumulative Amount

Date…………….. Amount


George W. Bush 2nd term (Jan 2005 – Jan 2009)


09/30/2005 $7,932,709,661,723.50


George W. Bush 1st term (Jan 2001 – Jan 2005)


09/30/2004 $7,379,052,696,330.32

09/30/2003 $6,783,231,062,743.62

09/30/2002 $6,228,235,965,597.16

09/30/2001 $5,807,463,412,200.06


Bill Clinton 2nd term (Jan 1997 – Jan 2001)


09/30/2000 $5,674,178,209,886.86

09/30/1999 $5,656,270,901,615.43

09/30/1998 $5,526,193,008,897.62

09/30/1997 $5,413,146,011,397.34


Bill Clinton 1st term (Jan 1993 – Jan 1997)


09/30/1996 $5,224,810,939,135.73

09/29/1995 $4,973,982,900,709.39

09/30/1994 $4,692,749,910,013.32

09/30/1993 $4,411,488,883,139.38


George H. W. Bush (Jan 1989 – Jan 1993)


09/30/1992 $4,064,620,655,521.66

09/30/1991 $3,665,303,351,697.03

09/28/1990 $3,233,313,451,777.25

09/29/1989 $2,857,430,960,187.32


Ronald Reagan – 2nd term (Jan 1985 – Jan 1989)


09/30/1988 $2,602,337,712,041.16

09/30/1987 $2,350,276,890,953.00
`
09/30/1986 $2,125,302,616,658.42

12/31/1985 $1,945,941,616,459.88


Ronald Reagan – 1st term (Jan 1981 – Jan 1985)


12/31/1984 $1,662,966,000,000.00

12/31/1983 $1,410,702,000,000.00

12/31/1982 $1,197,073,000,000.00

12/31/1981 $1,028,729,000,000.00

12/31/1980 $930,210,000,000.00


U.S. Department of the Treasury, Bureau of the Public Debt

Source: http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdhisto4.htm



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Annual (Deficits) During the Reagan Administration


Ronald Reagan – 1st term (Jan 1981 – Jan 1985)

1981 – ($ 98,519,000,000)

1982 – ($168,344,000,000)

1983 – ($213,629,000,000)

1984 – ($252,264,000,000)

Total Deficit on Reagan’s 1st term = ($732,756,000,000)


Ronald Reagan – 2nd term (Jan 1985 – Jan 1989)

1985 – ($182,976,000,000)

1986 – ($179,361,000,000)

1987 – ($224,974,000,000)

1988 – ($337,092,000,000)

Total Deficit on Reagan’s 2nd term = ($924,403,000,000)


Note: The cumulative outstanding debt of the US government from July 4, 1776 to the end of Jimmy Carter’s administration as of 12/31/80 (almost 205 years) it was $930,210,000,000.00

By comparison Ronald Reagan added to the US government outstanding cumulative debt ($732,756,000,000) on the 1st term of his administration, and another ($924,403,000,000) on the 2nd term of his administration.



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Quote from jem:



In short Congress was briefed every year about the Soviet Economy and they were aware that is was likely to collapse.
More...


In essence you're admitting that Reagan lied to the American tax payer and manufactured the Soviet threat? I wonder who got wealthy on that little lie. Oh wait, the military industrial complex did! Now lets do a little search on who owns the military industrial complex.........
 
It seems that Reagan may have thought up Star Wars on his own after reading tom clancy novels on the way to missle talks.

But it was also his idea that we would be so strong that Russia would not dream of attacking us.

His spending was so opportune because it allowed the moderates in the soviet govt to tell the Miltary officials their way could no longer work.


Once again. I guarantee you that Congress was appraised of these facts. I read the book in my class. It was an analysis of the soviet budget. They figured out the Soviet costs and budgets by calulating the inputs since price was not rally available. It was an interesting read for a boring subject.
 
Quote from jem:

But it was also his idea that we would be so strong that Russia would not dream of attacking us.

More...

This is some kind of American urban legend, that the Russians were ever planning to attack the US as a first strike. Any evidence would be very nice to see. Seriously, what would they have won by doing such a thing?

On the other hand there were several US generals advocating the nuking of the Sovietunion, before they got too strong...

By the way the Star Wars deffense system would have never worked, read on nuclear subs to see why....

Boys, it is really simple: a military contractors needs a giant enemy, otherwise they wouldn't get huge government orders. End of story...
 
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