Go back to sleep, things are fine

The monster under the bed

By: MIKE KRAUSS
Bucks County Courier Times

The headlines keep coming about the U.S. economic recovery, the bogus statistics fed by worried leaders to a national media, meant to put an anxious nation back to sleep.

"Now, now. Don't you worry. Mommy and Daddy are here. There's no monster under the bed."

Except there is.

Another tidal wave of home foreclosures is building. One in eight once creditworthy Americans are now behind in their mortgages - a record high number. As states slash spending, more layoffs will follow. Public education will take the biggest hit. U.S.

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan warned that between 100,000 to 300,000 public education positions are in danger.

And that is the estimate from the capital of feel good news.

In a few weeks, the 700,000 census workers hired with stimulus funds will be out of work.

While Whirpool announces another U.S. factory closing, moving 1,100 more jobs to Mexico, there is another wave of outsourcing building, reaching beyond already decimated U.S. manufacturing.

In a new book, Outsourcing America published by the American Management Association, the authors cite a University of California study which concludes that 14 million white-collar jobs are vulnerable to being outsourced.

"These are not only call-center operators, customer service and back-office jobs, but also information technology, accounting, architecture, advanced engineering design, news reporting, stock analysis, and medical and legal services."

Without jobs creation, the U.S. economy will continue to collapse, as massive U.S. foreign debt puts the nation at frightening risk of economic blackmail - if not all out economic war - at the hands of the nation's biggest creditor, China.

That's the monster under the bed. And Mommy Washington and Daddy Wall Street know it. And their plan? A White House/congressional commission to go after what little of the people's taxes that is not spent on Wall Street, the war machine and corporate welfare.

Tough love, Washington style.

"We told you about all those treats you gave yourself - good wages, homes, savings. Now see what you've done! You behave, and go to bed."

"But, Mommy, Daddy! That was my allowance money. And remember that nice man from the bank you introduced me to, with the credit cards? You said it was OK."

"Now that's enough! You do as you're told and right this minute."

But Mommy and Daddy are worried. So are their friends.

At a cocktail party in March with the Moodys ("Wasn't it sad when they got into all that trouble with those 'inaccurate' credit ratings they gave the Morgans and the Sachs?") Mommy and Daddy heard the Moodys say that their friends in the U.K., Germany, France and Spain "are all at risk of soaring debt costs and will have to implement austerity plans that threaten 'social cohesion'."

They put it out of their minds. But then their friends from Greece called, desperate for a loan.

Then they remembered that when they went on vacation to Europe just last year to a castle Mommy really liked ("Maybe next year with your bonus, we can buy a castle like that," Mommy pleaded with Daddy), their hosts at the International Monetary Club and the Bank for International Settlements Club warned of "adjustments of a magnitude that, in some cases, will test social cohesion," and that "violent protests could break out in countries worldwide."

That really worried Mommy and Daddy, but then they talked to that nice couple, the Pentagons, and found out they weren't worried at all.

"Well, they were worried, dear, but they have a plan," Daddy reminded Mommy.

And the Pentagons do have a plan. Turns out they already have their kids in training all over the world - they have a really big family - learning how to deal with undisciplined children.

The Pentagons' cousins at the War College told their grandfather the admiral, "An economic crisis in the United States could lead to massive civil unrest and the need to call on the military to restore order." To that end, 20,000 soldiers are under the U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM), including 4,000 already in the United States "to work with civilian law enforcement in homeland security."

Mommy and Daddy didn't mind that they had to get rid of an old law that prevented U.S. armed forces from deploying inside the United States, or that the president gave himself the authority to take over the states' National Guard units.

"Only those noisy, tea party types worry about the Constitution any more," Daddy explained to Mommy. "That's just a piece of paper."

Mommy doesn't like those tea party people. She read in the papers that most of them are white, older, and have more money and education than many of the other parents she likes now.

"I mean, really! The nerve of those people," she told Daddy.

So Mommy Washington and Daddy Wall Street will do what good parents do and make sure their kids behave, even if it hurts them -the kids, that is.

Go back to sleep. Things are fine.