PurpleAmerica's Week in Review (12/29-1/5)

The National Debt, Claudine Gay, Tetris, Dogs Pooping Dollars and Pluto all Make Appearances

On Wednesday this week, the Federal Debt rose to a whopping $34 trillion. That’s $34,000,000,000,000. To put that in perspective:

• That’s $101k per citizen, $264k per taxpayer. The US Median salary in 2022 was almost half that at $52k.

• The National Deficit, which is how much debt is accrued in a year, currently stands at $380.6 billion. This is down from the peak during the COVID epidemic when it was well over $1 Trillion.

• The Debt/GDP ratio is now 122%, double what it was in 2000. The lowest it’s been since 1940 was in 1980 when it was a mere 34.48% and not even $1 trillion yet. Over Reagan’s term, he tripled it and we’ve been off to the races since then.

• Just the interest on the debt alone currently amounts to $16k per American adult. That’s 16k per American, per year….for nothing.

• Since 1940, there have only been five years where we had a surplus and accrued no debt. Those were in 1968 under Lyndon Johnson, and in 1997, 1998, 1999 and 2000 during the Clinton Tech Boom. In both 1969 and in 2001, Nixon’s and Bush’s first priorities where tax cuts and the surpluses went bye bye.

• The largest current drivers of the deficit? Bush’s and Trump’s ruinous tax cuts, the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan¹ (for which we are still paying), and a plethora of stimulus spending during and after the COVID epidemic. With interest rates rising as well since then, the cost to borrow new funds has also skyrocketed.

• Another aspect of rising deficits is the aging of the US Population. Baby Boomers are retiring now at a huge rate, and the amount of US workers paying Social Security taxes aren’t covering outlays. This was predicted years ago, and Congress started putting some of those funds away in anticipation. But those funds have dried up and we are reaching a point where either we raise SS taxes or lower benefits. Currently, SS is “off budget” meaning it is separate from the discretionary funding and the debt, but we’re reaching a point it may no longer be, and the more taxes we raise to cover SS, the less we can raise to pay off the debt.

So to put it simply we owe a shit-ton.

Part of what makes the debt so easily manageable though is that the U.S. has always paid our bills. We’ve never once defaulted, despite one party continuously flirting with the idea of doing it.² U.S. Treasuries have been historically one of the best investments one could make. Who makes the biggest investment in American Treasury Bonds? China mostly. It’s worked out well for them too. The more they buy, the bigger our credit limit gets until we get addicted to huge debts.

Why is that a bad thing? During the 2008 Housing Collapse U.S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulsen went to China to meet with their Economic Team and was told that Russia had approached them to coordinate and dump most of the Treasuries on the market at the same time, which would essentially lead to a financial catastrophe even greater than the one we encountered; a Depression but far deeper than any we ever experienced. The Chinese Minister respectfully declined, but you can see the National Security issue here in waiting. Here is a scene from the film “Too Big to Fail” dramatizing the event.

So as the deficits come down from their COVID peak, the inflation that so stymied prices easing, the interest rates stabilizing or even decreasing, and the economy primed for a huge 2024, do not be surprised if we see a huge decrease in the National Deficit, and possibly even a surplus again in the coming years. What will also be an issue is what to do with the money; the prudent thing would be to pay off as much as we can, which would reduce interest on the debt, freeing up more money and creating a golden cycle of economic good fortune. Unfortunately, I suspect both parties would not consider that, and instead either use it to fund more programs or create more ruinous tax cuts.

Let’s not let them do that this time.

PurpleAmerica’s People of the Past Week

The Good

First, this guy nails our AI driven future down pat:

Both the Detroit Lions and the Cleveland Browns qualified for the NFL playoffs this year. These two storied franchises have both amazingly NEVER been to a Super Bowl, despite facing each other in the 1957 NFL Championship Game (11 years before the Super Bowl came into being). I’m hoping for a Lions-Browns Super Bowl just to see one of these franchises get the recognition they deserve. As a quick trivia question, there are four teams never having gone to the Super Bowl— name them. Answer in the footnote here.³

If you’ve ever wanted a goose that layed golden eggs, or perhaps a dog that shit money, this is the story for you. Fair warning though, it may not be what you actually want, but it does make for a hilarious story.

Willis Gibson, a 13 year old in Oklahoma, is the first player to “beat” Tetris. He advanced far enough into the Nintendo version of the game that his score read 9999999 and the screen froze. I loved his response: “I can’t feel my fingers.”

The Bad

Claudine Gay resigned as President of Harvard over a plagiarism scandal. Yeah, bad actors who really don’t care about plagiarism are the ones that caused her downfall, and she did defenders no favors by failing to call out anti-semitism occuring on the Harvard campus. Nonetheless, if you make your name as an academic, you better be ready to pay consequences if some of your academic papers were found to be copies of someone else’s work. Her response? This was an attack on higher education, nevermind that long standing standards for higher education are how she get forced to resign.

Where do you stand on Pineapple on Pizza? Thanks to this chef, we now know how the entire country of Italy feels about it.⁴

I’m never really going to tire of dunking on Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter and rebranding as “X”

The Ugly

Nikki Haley. It’s been over a week since this erupted but since I was out the last couple weeks and it was particularly egregious, I feel it necessary to call it out again. The cause of the Civil War was slavery. Tangentially, it was about states’ rights but the right they were fighting for the states to have was the right to own slaves. If you can’t say that plainly, and honestly, as a matter of factual history, you have zero capacity to be President of the United States. Period.

The court unsealed the list of many of the “John Does” who went to “Epstein Island,” where Jeffrey Epstein trafficked young underage women for sexual purposes. Among those listed were Donald Trump, Alan Dershowitz and Bill Clinton. In fairness to them, just because they went there with a mogul financier doesn’t mean they engaged in sexual malfeasance, and in Clinton’s and Trump’s case the mentions seem somewhat unrelated to what was going on with Epstein. But it sure doesn’t look good of them either, and Dershowitz looks downright criminal.

Bob Menendez just needs to resign already.

Have a nominee for us to consider? Send an email to purpleamericanunity@gmail.com!

PurpleAmerica Pop Culture Random Top Five

This week: The Top 5 Predictions for 2024

With it being the start of the year, as with all years, I thought I would make some predictions about the coming 12 months and at this time next year, we’ll see how I did.

1. Joe Biden will win the White House again. He’ll lose Georgia, but the rest of the map will look the same as it did in 2020. In a tit for tat, Democrats will take control of the House but lose the Senate.

2. The Biggest Film of the Year will be “Beyond the Spider-Verse.” Spider Man is always a huge draw to theaters and if it is nearly half as good as Across the Spider Verse, it will be a huge ending to a fantastic trilogy. Close second? “Inside Out 2.” People don’t appreciate just how much animated family films make, especially Pixar. But the teenage based puberty content will keep some younger families away. What can I say, parents don’t want awkward conversations with 7 year olds. Not to mention, many will just wait for it to be out on Disney+ by September. Nothing else will be even close to those two.

3. The Ravens will win the Super Bowl, the Dodgers the World Series and Bucks the NBA Championship.

4. The United States will win the most medals at the Paris Olympics, including the most golds. The big “heros” of these Olympics will be Katie Ledecky and Regan Smith. Second in the medal count will be China.

5. The economy will have a huge year, with the Dow Jones over 40k by year’s end. Bitcoin will also surge demonstrating that millions of tech bros will spend tons of money on something that provides zero benefit if they have cash and think they can make more money speculating rather than actually investing.

You have any predictions? Place them in the comments or email me at PurpleAmericanUnity@gmail.com

PurpleAmerica’s Subscriber Mail

When we here at PurpleAmerica Respond to the Teeming Millions (well, we’re still working on that first million)

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

—(Numerous subscribers and followers)

Awwwww…..thanks everyone. You too.

Have a question you want us to answer? Email us at purpleamericanunity@gmail.com

PurpleAmerica’s Historical Note from This Week

If you’re a nerd like me you like space stuff. On January 5, 2005 the astronomical object Eris was discovered. It circled the Sun like every other planet, and although it was not the first planet beyond Pluto discovered (that would be Sedna), it was the first to be considered as a planet. Why? Because it was actually larger than Pluto. The discoverers, given the naming rights by the IAU which governs such matters, named it “Eris” after the Goddess of discord. They saw the problems that were going to arise from this before most people.

With this discovery, astronomers essentially had to redefine what a planet was. Despite the sentimentality of including Pluto as a planet, they’ve long thought that given its size, weird orbit that takes it closer than Neptune for a portion, and odd rotation (which is kind of like a dance with its moon, Charon, making it a “double planet” of sorts) it was just inconsistent with the other planets. Nothing drives scientists more bonkers than a level of inconsistency. It had relatively more in common with the eccentric ice balls and outer Solar System objects that comprise the Kuiper Belt.

At a subsequent International Astronomical Union (IAU) meeting, the taxonomy of planets was discussed and Pluto was demoted to a new classification as “Dwarf Planet,” a status also given to the asteroid Ceres, as well as to Eris and other large Trans-Neptunian Objects. As much as I understand the logic, I disagree with the definition they used to get there, which seems designed to specifically omit Pluto as a planet and seems more like intellectual snobbery to me.

So it was with great love when the New Horizons Spacecraft⁵ flew by Pluto in 2015 and shared with us the first color photo of the planet, complete with a heart.

Don’t tell me Pluto’s not a planet. It’ll always be a planet to me.⁶

PurpleAmerica’s Dad/Uncle/Cheesy Joke of the Week

Jupiter, Saturn and Pluto walk into a Bar:

Jupiter says, “I’m the biggest planet, give me a drink in the biggest glass you got.”

Saturn says, “I’m the fanciest planet, give me a fancy drink.”

Pluto says, “They don’t think I’m a planet, but if you could, give me a shot.”

And with that…

Like what you are seeing here at PurpleAmerica? Share and Comment. Let your friends and family know! Repost on Twitter and Threads. Forward us topics you’d like us to discuss! It’s an open community here.

Footnotes and Fun Stuff

1. Interestingly enough, these were funded at a time when interest rates were near rock bottom, so although they were spendy disasters, they don’t necessarily accrue MORE debt than what was already spent.

2. This has actually led Ratings Agencies like Moody’s and S&P to downgrade US debt securities from the AAA+ rating (practically no risk) to AA+ rating (moderate risk, but still pretty good). That causes us to have to pay MORE to borrow, which begs the question why Republicans continue to do this over and over again.

3. The Detroit Lions are the only NFC team never to make the Super Bowl and the Cleveland Browns are the oldest AFC team never to make it. The other two are two of the newest franchises: The Jacksonville Jaguars and the Houston Texans.

4. I have to be honest, I don’t mind it. I like Hawaiian pizza but that’s more because of the Canadian Bacon; the pineapple just kind of tends to fall off, but its not bad.

5. For as much as NASA loves to promote exploration and discovery and send out spacecraft to the further regions of our Solar System, they spend billions of dollars on New Horizons to send it out to Pluto and beyond for what amounted to a week long flyby. If you’re going to spend the money to send something out there, make it useful by keeping it somewhere it can do some good.

6. And there’s no reason not to name Eris or others as planets either. So schoolchildren have to name more than the traditional nine. That’s a good thing. Our world is expanding. Instead, they seem bent on keeping us contained and even shrinking the Solar System down.