Just saw your comments back (I thought they would get sent to my e-mail as well, but never saw anything). You definetely have some good points that need attention from the U.S. government and the fed. I agree that the dollar is going to loose some of its importance in the world and the U.S. will loose ground on the new economies.

However, on the other hand, still a big part of the U.S. economy is self-dependent, so it will not matter much what the dollar is doing compared to other currencies. Also I believe in the flexibility of the U.S. that will find some way or another to take advantage of an opportunity and take on a challenge and find some way to come out on top.

Good luck with your sessions, it is always good to be prepared for bad times, but use see them as an opportunity too !!

We had the event again last night and several people commented that it was alot more upbeat than the promo’s I had put out. I didn’t mean to give the impression that I’m not excited about these times because there’s going to be tremendous spirtitual implications. So I”m very upbeat about these things. My understanding of these things is very much spirtiual, but I don’t think you believe in that possibility (as I didn’t when we were hanging out), so I’m going to keep this purely economic. When you focus on the economic outlook alone, I’m afraid that it is very bleak. This probably won’t show up for a few months or a year and then the next wave of trouble will come. There will be more waves after that one. Most of our blog posts lately have been about the financial situation so I think those would go futher in answering your question than I can here. However, I’ll address some of what you said…

You are right to some extant that Bernanke has made a life’s study of the Great Depression and he is consumed with making sure that doesn’t happen again. What the US Gov’t is doing is actually the opposite of what happened then. In those days money dried up and there was a great deflation. This year we have actually doubled the number of dollars! (This is counting the big problem of a massive debt and deficit which is a ticking time bomb) So because the dollar is not backed by anything, it is obviously worth half what it was intuitively. However, it’s worth whatever others will pay for it, and up till now it’s been the world reserve currency (for the last 62 years) We’ve only see a 15% drop in what others will pay for it so far, in large part b/c the system still runs on dollars and everyone still thinks they need them. But there are many signs that this is changing. Even if only that change kicks in and the Dollar is worth half what it was (inflation is always a delayed reaction to the government’s machinations), that’s a massive change whereby everything in the world costs double and everyone is alot poorer. Of course many of the countries of the world have their economies based on selling stuff to the US. As American’s can no longer afford to buy from them, they will go out of business or be significantly reduced. So an American problem will be a worldwide problem. Although the effect will be much greater on some countries than others.

But the situation is actually much worse than just this. When the world decides that the US is not prudently caring for their wealth held in dollars and moves out of it…what will we do when some of that $7T comes home? What will we do when no one will lend us money at these tiny rates of interest anymore? While in some ways this has been a problem kicked down the road for decades, our current policies are bringing this to a head. There are signs everywhere of this already happening. One (of many many examples) is India buying $200B of IMF gold while calling the US & European systems corrupt and not wanting to have their money in dollars. China hasn’t made any big moves yet, but they’ve made lots of small moves (and comments) over the last year. We can’t really go on in anything close to normalcy without these countries lending us back the money we send them. It is coming. I don’t pretend to know exactly how it will all go down, but I think we have a very dark decade ahead of us in the economic (natural) world. There will be many things, not just economic, but we tend to talk about economic things alot, so that’s the focus here. Many will learn that their faith in men and governments is unwarranted.

We’ve posted (or will in the coming days I can’t remember what’s gone up and what is yet to go up) about all these things in greater detail (If I remember maybe 13 posts on this topic). I’ld love for you to check them out and let me know what you think. Again, I don’t mean to sound bleak, I’m excited, but I am also preparing and the Lord has been amazing in my life recently. He is good!

You don’t think we have learned some lessons from the 20s and 30s ?

You are right about the dollar losing its value and the U.S. losing its economic strength, but for most people in the U.S. that should not matter too much and eventually the U.S. will turn around its economy as well.

This just all sounds a bit too negative to me. We have managed storms before and will manage this one as well.