In Europe, where some blame a phenomenon of "casino capitalism" that has become deeply engrained from New York to London to Moscow, there is more of a sense of shared responsibility. But Europeans also blame the U.S. government for letting things get out of hand.
You got that last sentence right, Eurodudes. Our inability to get our fiscal house in order remains a huge problem. Maybe we can get the IMF to force the U.S. to restructure its debts just as it did for Latin American serial defaulters. Oops, hold on, the U.S. is the chief funder of the IMF! So much for that idea. Don't worry, our Asian creditors know where to find us, and they won't need any help figuring out what we owe them since their kids are better than ours at math. Lost in the noise is French President Nicolas Sarkozy's call for a new Bretton Woods agreement. The good news is that he's generous enough to come to the U.S. for the meeting. The bad news is that the U.S. will be paying the bill for hosting any such meeting, long into the future.
U.S. national debt: $10 trillion.
U.S. federal gov't unfunded / unfundable middle class entitlements: $53 trillion.
Throwing away global hegemonic status on a debt-fueled consumption binge: Priceless.
