• REBOUNDING THE U.S. ECONOMY

The solution is infinitely complex and infinitely simple. STEP 1: Get out of Iraq. Now, not next year.

Some estimates place the cost of the Bush misadventure into Iraq at over $3 trillion dollars. The full cost will take years to fully conceive and appreciate. By any perception and judgment this is aberrant. Endless analysis and debate over democracy in the Middle East or whether there will be a complete breakdown between all factions in Iraq or even whether Iran and the Saudis will more directly get involved, is extraneous to America’s priority – stop the hemorrhaging. The U.S. treasury needs some respite. U.S. taxpayers, their children and grandchildren are going to bear an already oppressive burden.

You cannot help your neighbor if your home base is unstable. Retrench, recoup, take a year or two off from foreign battles requiring more than 10,000 troops. Reestablish international confidence in the U.S. as the world leader with some vision tempered with occasional wisdom.

Other countries will be forced to enter the frey in the Middle East in a more serious way to fill the void. Even Russia isn’t so sure anymore that it wants its neighbor Iran sitting on nuclear arms.

Paying attention to the home front will also rebuild any deterioration of foreign confidence that might have eroded the dollar’s strength. Return to confidence and ignore the machinations of multiple heads of state clamoring to denigrate the image of America and deface its currency. There is ample reason for Europe to be concerned with the rapid rise of the Euro and the resulting impact on its exports. Russia which has shifted away from its momentary pretence at democracy, is now taking aim at the dollar through the Euro. Could we suspect that the Rubble is the world’s reserve currency of choice in Putin’s fanciful long term dreams. Dream on. Nor is any other country likely to become a safe haven for the world’s cash.

Since WWII the U.S. has been the safest and most stable place to store capital. The world acceded for 3 generations. The U.S. hasn’t just been a military power, it has been respected and admired for its form of government and its technological prowess. Some of that respect has only been temporarily tarnished by a misguided administration, driven with a dogmatic determination that debt was its right.

OK, so STEP 2: Tighten the belt. No, really, really tighten the belt and promote more tightening. Forget about spending that tax rebate as Bush suggested. Do without where possible.

STEP 3: Save. Reverse the trend of the past decade and put away those nickels and dimes. They add up to dollars, eventually. They’ll ultimately accumulate to a return of Confidence. We’re dealing with a change in general attitude here. Let’s energize a broad reversal of disposition, and a reversal of “fortunes”.