Difficilis

1. War in the middle east.
So we're bringing death and destruction to Iraq and Afghanistan. We pubicly back Israel's death and destruction efforts against the Palistinian people and Syria. We're sending commando troops into Pakistan (an ally) without the approval of the Pakistani government. And we're pushing hard for conflict in Iran.
Cheney even suggested having Navy Seals dress up as Iranians and fake an attack against US naval troops to garner support back home for attacking Iran.
And then we backed Georgia's play for South Ossetia, and then confronted Russia when it responded to an invasion of its territories.
It's like we're trying to take everything between the 40th and 80th verticals and erase it from the map.
Wait, isn't that what we claim Ahmadinejad wants to do with Israel? Ok, so instead of erasing it, we'll redraw it to be a huge vertical bastion of democracy on the Asian continent.

This is a problem.

2. The economy.
So it starts simple, right? Investors taking advantage of weak rules in hedge fund and commodity markets to start a gambling process for fast cash. Then all this speculative betting starts affecting the actual price on hedge funds and commodities (like oil).

Add into that a housing market scam by loan companies, where you can borrow home equity at a low rate, but after a set time, it becomes a high rate. Housing investment booms, and then actually goes "Boom" when people suddenly can't afford their mortgage.

Suddenly, the simple house of cards is a complicated mess that will fall if someone breaths on it wrong.
And then somebody breathed on it wrong.

Indy Mac goes belly up. Bear Stearns goes belly up. Merril Lynch is bought out by BofA. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are bought out by the government. Lehman Brothers goes under. AIG goes under.
And the government comes in and starts bailing everyone out (except Lehman Brothers, probably because they would have to choose between them or AIG). Hundreds of billions of dollars given to these companies, not to settle debts, but to keep running.
When the government bailed out Fannie and Freddie, they didn't help people pay their mortgage, they helped Fannie and Freddie continue to offer loans to more people who won't be able to pay their mortgage. That, my friends, is retarded government.

So, our economy sucks, and the people holding the bonds for all our debt are other countries (including all the bailouts). What happens when China and Saudi Arabia stop buying our debt bonds?

And of course, the value of the dollar is dropping against the Euro and Chinese Yen, so it's only a matter of time before the world market stops trading on the dollar.

And this is a problem.

3. Of the two major presidential candidates, only Obama offers a definitive change from the current status quo.
The problem here is, his proposed changes may not be enough.

He supports troop reduction in Iraq, but escalation in Afghanistan. We'd still be keeping major military presence in the region between the 40th and 80th verticals. We need major troop reductions around the world.
We need to cut our military spending budget in half or more. Currently, our military budget is greater than every other country in the world, combined. If we cut it in half, our military budget would still be greater than any other country in the world. Russia's and China's put together, ranked 2nd and 3rd on military spending, still wouldn't match us. Oh, and you know what? Cutting our military spending in half will give us billions of dollars we can use in other places, like, um, the economy. Medicare. Education. Infrastructure.

He also has no plan to raise taxes on any Americans making less than $250 thousand a year, which is 95% of America. He has a careful plan to stimulate the economy, but economic stimulation isn't enough. We're at the point where we'll need economic defibrillation if things get much worse.

Most of my friends see Obama as a great savior, a bringer of change, to America. But right now, the most he can save us from is more Bush style of government. Which America can't handle four more years of, granted. But we need something more than that from him.

Because at this point, it's not going to matter.