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April 20, 2009

Exact dates of collapse are impossible to predict. But one of the best known facts about empires is that they do collapse. No exceptions. ~ Dmitri Davydov The best sign at my hometown "tea party" was a giant banner that spelled out in huge letters: $12,000,000,000,000. It took at least ten people standing in a long line along the highway to hold it. The 12 trillion number is new federal obligations assumed since the economy began to unravel in 2008. It's enough money to pay off nearly every home mortgage in America . Here's another number for you: $101 trillion. That's the amount of unfunded Medicare and Social Security liabilities going forward through the end of the boomer retirement (1). Well before the economic crisis was in full swing, Russian blogger Dmitri Davydov put together a presentation about the similarities between the USA now and the USSR as it neared its end. Here were three distinct similarities he cited:

1. Out of control military budgets. 2. Unsustainable deficits and foreign debt. 3. A balky, unresponsive, corrupt political system, incapable of reform.

I'd add two more parallels between the USA now and the Soviet Union then.

4. Rampant government interference in the market economy, causing tremendous pricing and investment errors.

5. A shockingly expensive, unwinnable war in Afghanistan . In 1985, America viewed the Soviet Union as a frightening, formidable villain. That summer, Chevy Chase accidentally started WW3 with a Soviet missile in Spies Like Us. That fall, Soviet monster Ivan Drago killed Apollo Creed with an iron-fisted right hook in Rocky IV. The year prior, Patrick Swayze and Charlie Sheen went guerrilla on the conquering communists in Red Dawn, and the year before that Matthew Broderick came within seconds of torching the earth in Wargames. We weren't aware of it, but by the time Rocky and Drago got into the ring, the countdown to the end of the USSR had already begun. A few months before Rocky IV was released, Sheikh Ahmed Zaki Yamani altered Saudi oil production, turning the Soviet oil machine from a profitable enterprise to a losing one. That same year the Seven Party Mujahideen Alliance formed in Afghanistan . They would soon drive out the mighty Soviet army. Bleeding heavily from oil losses and a bloated military, the Soviet government went deep into debt from 1985 to 1988. By 1989, all available funds were gone. No investor on earth thought it was safe to lend money to Moscow .

At the same time, the dawning of the information age made it increasingly difficult for the central state to prevent outside news from seeping in. Soviet citizens were learning for the first time that the rest of the world wasn't destitute like they were. Pope John Paul II fueled the fire by challenging Catholics in the republics to put God before Gorbachev. As Moscow ran out of funds, it could no longer contain the resentment that had been brewing in the republics.

The entire empire came crashing down in a matter of weeks.

Let's review those parallels between the American empire and the Soviets.

1. Out of control military budgets. 2. Unsustainable deficits and foreign debt. 3. A balky, unresponsive, corrupt political system, incapable of reform

4. Rampant government interference in the market economy, causing tremendous pricing and investment errors.

5. A shockingly expensive, unwinnable war in Afghanistan .

Those five points bankrupted Moscow . They've bankrupted Washington too.

But in order to collapse, the bankrupt central state first had to be abandoned by localities who resented the central authority.

In early 1990, Lithuania held a giant independence rally. 250,000 people assembled to express their anger at Moscow .

I drove to my local tea party last Wednesday more to check it out than to participate. I strongly expected to be disappointed. And while there were lots of people in attendance who didn't get it (one guy had a sign that read "Tax All Imports"), the huge crowd was mostly united in a common message: Washington is out of control and must be stopped.

This is from The Dallas Morning News last week: Rick Perry Doesn't Rule Out Texas Secession:

Texas Gov. Rick Perry fired up an anti-tax "tea party" Wednesday with his stance against the federal government and for states' rights as some in his audience shouted, "Secede!" "If Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that. But Texas is a very unique place, and we're a pretty independent lot to boot." He said when Texas entered the union in 1845 it was with the understanding it could pull out.

Between the communists parachuting onto the high school in Red Dawn and the neighborhood getting vaporized in The Day After, my elementary school classmates and I were convinced the Soviets would invade and kill us all before we made it to our next summer vacation. Before we got out of middle school, Gorbachev had resigned and the Soviet flag was lowered for the last time over the Kremlin. It can happen that fast. Americans have become so accustomed to stability that, even as the future shouts at us with crystal clarity, we refuse to listen. Our government has assumed more debt in the past seven months than can possibly be repaid, and that is before accounting for its existing Social Security and Medicare obligations. Hundreds of thousands of ordinary Americans can't fathom how we might be unearthed from this massive debt, and they are taking their concerns to the street. Thirty-two states have passed "sovereignty statements" in their legislatures. The governor of Texas is speaking openly of secession. How has the media responded? Mockery, ridicule, an adolescent meme about "tea bagging." And Washington ? "The White House says the president is unaware of the tea parties and will hold his own event today," said Dan Harris of ABC News on April 15. One senses that the existing power structure knows something is up, but intends to go on with life in confidence that this will all sort itself out. Maybe it will. Maybe the empire has a few gasps left in its lungs and today's events are merely the beginning of a long, slow decline. Or maybe it will completely unravel within six years. It's happened before, and while the transition was full of pain for the people involved, their world is undeniably better now than it was then. There is a reason that empires always collapse. So, here's hoping for the triumphant return of The Republic of Texas!

Stewart Browne is the initiator of Scarecrow For President, a project that encourages libertarians not to vote.

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