with interest

  And so, another bank has failed, and JP Morgan Chase picks up a bargain. Biden is on television saying he has taken measures, given instructions, and not to worry our banking system is safe. The federal government needs to borrow some more money, or it'll be broke by June, but not to worry. All of this is nothing to be concerned about. 

 I am, by no stretch of the imagination, any sort of financial person. I like money, I spend money, and I always want more money, but know little about financial markets. I do know this, you can't borrow money to get yourself out of debt. That is what the feds have been doing for a long time now. It was in 1835 when Andrew Jackson paid off the national debt. The United States of America was debt free for about one year. The Panic of 1837 followed that. It was a depression. Whatever the reasons and causes were the United States has been in debt ever since. The reason is simple. You can't borrow your way out of debt. The only way to do that is to reduce spending. 

 Now this latest bank, the first republic bank had assets of about 92 billion dollars. The experts on television say it failed because of bad investments on the part of the board of directors. They were investing in high risk products of some type. Like I said, I don't know much about any of that kind of stuff. The feds seized control of the bank and promptly sold it to JP Morgan Chase. I'm not sure how that works but apparently the federal government just took the business away from one party and sold it to another. Did the fed get a broker fee? I know that this isn't the first time something like this has happened, but it gives me pause to think. Who is regulating the regulators? How was this allowed to get to this point? Call me a conspiracy theorist if you will but it all looks a little fishy to me. Perhaps it is an attempt by the feds to get all those eggs in one basket! Yes, it would take a long time to do that, unless a crisis can be created. Is there some looming financial crisis? 

 Sustainable debt. It's an interesting concept, isn't it? How long can you keep making the payments. That is the question being asked with that plan. Almost as though being in debt is a good thing. We even keep score on that, your creditworthiness. You can't borrow money unless you have a score. No score, no prior debt, it's going to cost you. Been carrying a debt for years, sustaining that debt, that's great here's some more, keep up the good work.

 It's the normal thing that much is certain. It's true with individuals and with governments. Individuals carry life insurance to pay their final expenses. You hear that on the television commercials all the time. Your final expenses. Do you know what they are? The cost to dispose of your body, that's the final expense. You don't have to pay that either, you're dead. But you don't want to leave that expense to others, so you buy life insurance. Maybe you buy a little extra a sort of going away present. But the truth of the matter is this, unless someone co-signed for your debt no one else is responsible for your debt. 

 Can debt be the cause of death for a nation? The answer is, yes. If a nation defaults on their debts several things will happen right away. A run on the banks may occur bringing on a crash of the stock market. Unemployment will skyrocket, hunger begins, and other nations raise interest rates on any loans they make to us. All of that will cause civil unrest, civil disobedience and perhaps the collapse of government altogether. Yes, when the bills are due and can't be paid it's a very bad thing. A financial collapse is as bad as a civil war. The federal government only insures your deposits up to 250,000 per depositor, per bank. But that insurance fund only has about 41 billion dollars in it. That is far less than the number of deposits being insured. But don't worry, they have a 100 million dollar line of credit with the treasury. Opps, the treasury doesn't have the money either. So, yes debt can kill a nation. 

 What happens then? Someone has to take control of the purse strings. It's an emergency and emergency powers can be used. With those powers the rules can change dramatically. You're hungry, broke and homeless what are you going to do about it? Nothing. Think about that. A cashless society where the government controls it all. Nothing is made, bought, sold or bartered without government intervention. And the reason for this is sustaining the debt. How can we do that? Borrow more money. That's the only plan being offered. Spending cuts? No, the current administration say that isn't an option until after the money has been borrowed. That's like the bank telling you after you borrow the money, they will tell you what to spend it on. You have a thousand dollars in the bank, but you have to use that to pay back the money you just borrowed. Oh, with interest by the way.