The Year America Dissolved

I have just been having a feast of "doom" this week.  This is a good article by Paul Craig Roberts, depicting a possible (but for now, fictional) account of the near future, in which America breaks apart into clans due to the collapse of the dollar.  I don't have much to add, it's a brief but informative account of how quickly things could fall apart, and how various factors can converge to form what is called a "positive feedback" loop.  Roberts also explains how, due to these factors, the American empire can collapse quite quickly, while the collapse of Rome took centuries.  In short, when Rome began its expansion, the underlying economic and political structures were fairly strong, with an endless bounty of troops.  When America's empire really came to full tilt, many of American jobs disappeared overseas, and with it came the subsequent (but very predictable) dwindling coffers of our government.  Of course, there are other reasons, but this one sums up well our comparative idiocy to the Romans.