STOCK RESULTS JAN 14,2010

EARTH DESTROYED WITH THE EARTH

GENESIS 6:11-13
11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.(WORLD TERRORISM,MURDERS)(HAMAS IN HEBREW IS VIOLENCE)
12 And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
13 And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence (TERRORISM)(HAMAS) through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

EARTHQUAKES

MATTHEW 24:7-8
7 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.
8 All these are the beginning of sorrows.

MARK 13:8
8 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom:(ETHNIC GROUP AGAINST ETHNIC GROUP) and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines and troubles: these are the beginnings of sorrows.

LUKE 21:11
11 And great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven.

REPORTS HAVE IT 7,000 PEOPLE ARE BURIED IN A COMMON GRAVE ALREADY.FINALLY SOME STATS ARE COMING OUT.

Quake aid starts to arrive for desperate Haitians By MIKE MELIA, Associated Press Writer – 3:30PM JAN 14,10

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti – Desperately needed aid from around the world slowly made its way Thursday into Haiti, where supply bottlenecks and a leadership vacuum left rescuers scrambling on their own to save the trapped and injured and get relief supplies into the capital.The international Red Cross estimated that 45,000 to 50,000people were killed in Tuesday's magnitude-7.0 earthquake.President Barack Obama announced that one of the largest relief efforts in our recent history is moving toward Haiti, with thousands of troops and a broad array of civilian rescue workers flying or sailing in to aid the stricken country — backed by more than $100 million in relief funds.

To the Haitians, Obama promised: You will not be forsaken.The nascent flow of rescue workers showed some results: A newly arrived search team pulled U.N. security worker Tarmo Joveer alive from the organization's collapsed headquarters, where about 100 people are still trapped. He stood, held up a fist in celebration, and was helped to a hospital.There are easily hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of people trapped, living or dead, in collapsed buildings. No one knows for certain. Friends and relatives have had to claw at the wreckage, often with bare hands, to try to free them.Many dead bodies that were recovered still lay in the street, often covered by a white cloth, in 81-degree heat.Some people dragged the dust-covered dead along the roads toward the morgue, where people came to hunt for relatives in a macabre sea of hundreds of bodies just a few feet from where badly injured victims awaited a doctor from the neighboring hospital.Planes from China, France, Spain and the United States landed at Port-au-Prince's airport, carrying searchers and tons of water, food, medicine and other supplies — with more promised the Western Hemisphere's poorest nation. The Red Cross has estimated 3 million people — a third of the population — may need emergency relief.The flow into the capital's damaged airport was so great that the Federal Aviation Administration halted all civilian flights from the United States to Port-au-Prince for a time Thursday because there was no room on the ground for more planes and not enough jet fuel for planes to go back, an official at the FAA said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk publicly. Civilian relief flights were later allowed to resume.

It took six hours to unload a Chinese plane due to a lack of equipment — a hint of possible bottlenecks ahead.We don't have enough handling equipment or the people to run it, said U.S. Air Force Col. Ben McMullin, part of the team handling traffic at the airport.We're trying to control the flow of aircraft.In Geneva, Red Cross spokesman Jean-Luc Martinage said the Haitian Red Cross estimated 45,000 to 50,000 people were killed, based on reports from its volunteers in Port-au-Prince.There seemed to be little official Haitian presence in much of the capital — or at the airport, where the U.S. Southern Command was controlling flights from a fenced-off building at the end of the runway. The facility's usual tower had collapsed.McMullin said about 60 planes carrying 2,000 people had landed between Wednesday, when the airport reopened, and noon Thursday.U.S. military forklift operators helped unload some foreign flights as well as U.S. cargo, and Haitian staff were far outnumbered by foreign aid workers and military. No senior Haitian officials were visible.Since the earthquake, President Rene Preval has maintained his typical low profile, granting only a couple of media interviews and making few public appearances. His official palace and home were damaged in the quake and the Parliament building collapsed, along with some other ministries and departments.State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said the U.S. had been in touch with Preval, and added: We're not taking over Haiti. We are helping to stabilize Haiti, we're helping to provide them lifesaving support.The often-chaotic capital was surprisingly calm, despite the devastation, though journalists occasionally heard the sound of isolated gunfire. It was not clear if it was aimed at people. Even in normal times, guards sometimes fire shotguns in the air to keep people away from stores. There has been widespread looting of collapsed buildings since the earthquake hit, but rarely of undamaged shops, said Matt Marek, Haiti country representative of the American Red Cross. There is no other way to get provisions, he told The Associated Press.Even if you have money, those resources are going to be exhausted in a few days.

But some other aid groups expressed increasing concern about security. It is dangerous at night. Lootings were widespread and some markets were ransacked," Oxfam spokesman Cedric Perus said in a statement. Some people buried loved ones in shallow graves on the side of a road. A woman was strapped to a board and covered with a sheet before burial, as the mourners lit fires to keep away flies and cover the stench. Others tried to carry the dead to nearby hills for burial, prompting Brazil's military — the biggest contingent among U.N. peacekeepers — to warn that the practice could lead to an epidemic. It said it asked authorities to create a new cemetery. The Brazilian military said it also was worried that bodies could be left too long because many Voodoo followers in Haiti do not allow the dead to be touched before all their rituals are concluded. There was damage outside the capital, too. In the port of Jacmel to the south, about 3,000 people forced from their homes slept overnight on the runway of an airstrip, said Yael Talleyrand, a high school student interviewed by e-mail and instant message. I almost cried, because so much people were crying, praying and I had never seen this in my entire life, said Talleyrand, whose parents run an economic development and health foundation.

Aid workers reported confusion over how to cope with the sudden flood of aid from scores of places. Donations are coming in to the airport here, but some are coming without notice from very well-meaning groups, said Save the Children spokeswoman Kate Conradt. There is not yet a system to get it in to those who need it. Obama promised Haitians an all-out rescue and humanitarian effort, including the military and civilian emergency teams from across the U.S., adding that America — and the world — stands with you.As many as 5,500 U.S. infantry soldiers and Marines will be on the ground or on ships offshore by Monday, a Defense Department official said. More than a half-dozen ships were en route or preparing to get under way, said spokesman Bryan Whitman. They included the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson, to arrive Friday, and a hospital ship with 12 operating rooms, the USNS Comfort, expected by Jan. 22. The U.S. Army said more than 100 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division were heading out from Fort Bragg in North Carolina, looking for locations to set up tents and other essentials in preparation for the arrival of another 800 personnel Friday. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said that 91 injured French nationals were evacuated to the Caribbean island of Martinique. About 3,000 police and international peacekeepers cleared debris, directed traffic and maintained security. But law enforcement was stretched thin even before the quake and would be ill-equipped to deal with major unrest. The U.N.'s 9,000-member peacekeeping force sent patrols into the streets while securing the airport, port and main buildings. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said 36 of his organization's personnel were confirmed dead and nearly 200 were missing — 100 in the rubble of its headquarters alone. The State Department announced one American had died in Haiti, saying that at least 164 U.S. citizens have been evacuated since the quake. Coast Guard C-130 planes have airlifted 42 American officials and their families and another 72 private citizens to safety, Crowley said. Another 370 Americans were awaiting flights out, he said. There were about 45,000 Americans living in Haiti at the time of the earthquake. The International Committee of the Red Cross said it set up a Web site to help Haitians find missing loved ones. Robert Zimmerman, deputy head of the group's tracing unit, said people in Haiti and abroad can register missing relatives on the site. Associated Press contributors to this story: Jonathan Katz, Jennifer Kay, Gregory Bull and Tamara Lush in Port-au-Prince; Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations; Frank Jordans and Bradley S. Klapper in Geneva; Jenny Barchfield in Paris; Pauline Jelinek in Washington; Tales Azzoni in Sao Paulo; and Adam Geller in New York.

DOCTOR DOCTORIAN FROM ANGEL OF GOD
then the angel said, Financial crisis will come to Asia. I will shake the world.

JAMES 5:1-3
1 Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.
2 Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.
3 Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.

REVELATION 18:10,17,19
10 Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come.
17 For in one hour so great riches is come to nought. And every shipmaster, and all the company in ships, and sailors, and as many as trade by sea, stood afar off,
19 And they cast dust on their heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, saying, Alas, alas that great city, wherein were made rich all that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness! for in one hour is she made desolate.

EZEKIEL 7:19
19 They shall cast their silver in the streets, and their gold shall be removed: their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the LORD: they shall not satisfy their souls, neither fill their bowels: because it is the stumblingblock of their iniquity.

REVELATION 13:16-18
16 And he(FALSE POPE) causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:(CHIP IMPLANT)
17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.(6-6-6) A NUMBER SYSTEM

WORLD MARKET RESULTS
http://money.cnn.com/data/world_markets/
CNBC VIDEOS
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15839263/site/14081545/?tabid=15839796&tabheader=false

HALF HOUR DOW RESULTS THU JAN 14,2010

09:30 AM -1.21
10:00 AM +7.10
10:30 AM +21.84
11:00 AM +7.71
11:30 AM +4.61
12:00 PM +12.92
12:30 PM +20.33
01:00 PM +23.28
01:30 PM +23.88
02:00 PM +25.47
02:30 PM +29.40
03:00 PM +32.42
03:30 PM +35.59
04:00 PM +29.78 10,710.55

S&P 500 1148.46 +2.78

NASDAQ 2316.74 +8.84

GOLD 1,142.60 +5.80

OIL 79.15 -0.46

TSE 300 11,804.40 -49.20

CDNX 1594.51 +1.30

S&P/TSX/60 690.66 -4.05

NATURAL GAS +266 BCF
DOW,S&P HIT 15 MONTH HIGHS.
S&P UP FOR 8 OF THE 9 TRADING SESSIONS IN 2010.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGzFSajvy1g&feature=player_embedded

MORNING,NEWS,STATS

YEAR TO DATE PERFORMANCE
Dow -5 points at 4 minutes of trading today.
Dow -14 points at low today.
Dow +43 points at high today so far.
GOLD opens at $1,137.60.OIL opens at $79.74 today.

AFTERNOON,NEWS,STATS
Dow -14 points at low today so far.
Dow +43 points at high today so far.

WRAPUP,NEWS,STATS
Dow -14 points at low today.
Dow +43 points at high today.

PERSECUSSION,BEHEADINGS

JESUS PERSECUTED BIGTIME

PSALMS 14:1
1 The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.

ISAIAH 53:4
4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

MATTHEW 9:34
34 But the Pharisees said, He casteth out devils through the prince of the devils.

JOHN 8:41
41 Ye do the deeds of your father. Then said they to him, We be not born of fornication; we have one Father, even God.

JOHN 10:20
20 And many of them said, He hath a devil, and is mad; why hear ye him?

PHILIPPIANS 2:10-11(JESUS GETS REVENGE)
10 That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth;
11 And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.(JUDGEMENT SEAT OF CHRIST AND FOR SINNERS, THE GREAT WHITE THRONE FINAL JUDGEMENT).

WE ARE CHRISTIANS WE WILL BE TREATED THE SAME.

2 TIMOTHY 3:1-5 (WHY WE ARE PERSECUTED BY THE WORLD)
1 This know also, that in the last days perilous (DANGEROUS) times shall come.
2 For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy,
3 Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good,
4 Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;
5 Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.

MATTHEW 5:10-12
10 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.
12 Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.

MATTHEW 24:9
9 Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake.

JOHN 15:18-20
18 If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me (JESUS) before it hated you.
19 If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.
20 Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also.

REVELATION 6:9-11
9 And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain(BEHEADED) for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held:
10 And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?
11 And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellowservants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled.

REVELATION 20:4
4 And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.

Obama Information Czar Outlined Plan For Government To Infiltrate Conspiracy Groups Paul Joseph Watson Prison Planet.com Thursday, January 14, 2010

Harvard law professor Cass Sunstein, Obama’s appointee to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, outlined a plan for the government to infiltrate conspiracy groups in order to undermine them via postings on chat rooms and social networks, as well as real meetings, according to a recently uncovered article Sunstein wrote for the Journal of Political Philosophy.As we have often warned, chat rooms, social networks and particularly article comment sections are routinely gamed by trolls, many of whom pose as numerous different people in order to create a fake consensus, who attempt to debunk whatever information is being discussed, no matter how credible and well documented. We have seen this on our own websites for years and although some of those individuals were acting of their own accord, a significant number appeared to be working in shifts, routinely posting the same talking points over and over again.It is a firmly established fact that the military-industrial complex which also owns the corporate media networks in the United States has numerous programs aimed at infiltrating prominent Internet sites and spreading propaganda to counter the truth about the misdeeds of the government and the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.In 2006 CENTCOM, the United States Central Command, announced that a team of employees would be hired to engage bloggers who are posting inaccurate or untrue information, as well as bloggers who are posting incomplete information, about the so-called war on terror.In May 2008, it was revealed that the Pentagon was expanding Information Operations on the Internet by setting up fake foreign news websites, designed to look like independent media sources but in reality carrying direct military propaganda.Countries like Israel have also admitted to creating an army of online trolls whose job it is to infiltrate anti-war websites and act as apologists for the Zionist state’s war crimes.

In January last year, the US Air Force announced a counter-blog response plan aimed at fielding and reacting to material from bloggers who have negative opinions about the US government and the Air Force.The plan, created by the public affairs arm of the Air Force, includes a detailed twelve-point counter blogging flow-chart that dictates how officers should tackle what are described as trolls,ragers,and misguided online writers.New revelations highlight the fact that the Obama administration is deliberately targeting conspiracy groups as part of a Cointelpro style effort to silence what have become the government’s most vociferous and influential critics.

In a 2008 article published in the Journal of Political Philosophy, Obama information czar Cass Sunstein outlined a plan for the government to stealthily infiltrate groups that pose alternative theories on historical events via chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups and attempt to undermine those groups.The aim of the program would be to (break) up the hard core of extremists who supply conspiracy theories, wrote Sunstein, with particular reference to 9/11 truth organizations.Sunstein pointed out that simply having people in government refute conspiracy theories wouldn’t work because they are inherently untrustworthy, making it necessary to “Enlist nongovernmental officials in the effort to rebut the theories. It might ensure that credible independent experts offer the rebuttal, rather than government officials themselves. There is a tradeoff between credibility and control, however. The price of credibility is that government cannot be seen to control the independent experts, he wrote.Put into English, what Sunstein is proposing is government infiltration of groups opposing prevailing policy, writes Marc Estrin.It’s easy to destroy groups with cognitive diversity.” You just take up meeting time with arguments to the point where people don’t come back. You make protest signs which alienate 90% of colleagues. You demand revolutionary violence from pacifist groups.This is what Sunstein is advocating when he writes of the need to infiltrate conspiracy groups and sow seeds of distrust amongst members in order to stifle the number of new recruits. This is classic provocateur style infiltration that came to the fore during the Cointelpro years, an FBI program from 1956-1971 that was focused around disrupting, marginalizing and neutralizing political dissidents.Sunstein argued that government might undertake (legal) tactics for breaking up the tight cognitive clusters of extremist theories. He suggested that government agents (and their allies) might enter chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups and attempt to undermine percolating conspiracy theories by raising doubts about their factual premises, causal logic or implications for political action, reports Raw Story.Sunstein has also called for making websites liable for comments posted in response to articles. His book, On Rumors: How Falsehoods Spread, Why We Believe Them, What Can Be Done, was criticized by some as a blueprint for online censorship.The Infowars office has been visited on numerous occasions by the FBI as a result of people posting violent comments in response to articles. Since the government now employs people to post such comments in an attempt to undermine conspiracy websites, if a law were passed making websites accountable, Sunstein’s program would allow the government to obliterate such sites from the web merely by having their own hired goons post threats against public figures.The fact that the government is being forced to hire armies of trolls in an effort to silence the truth shows how worried they are about the effect we are having in waking up millions of people to their tyranny.

http://www.infowars.com/if-government-wont-break-up-the-giant-banks-lets-do-it-ourselves/

If Government Won’t Break Up the Giant Banks, Let’s Do It Ourselves
Washington’s Blog January 14, 2010 Giant banks have bought and paid for Congress and the White House.

As everyone knows, the economy cannot permanently recover and truly stabilize until the giant banks are broken up. The top independent experts agree that the too big to fails are a drain on the economy and put the entire system at risk.The giant banks aren’t lending much to the people who need it. Fortune pointed out in February that smaller banks are stepping in to fill the lending void left by the giant banks’ current hesitancy to make loans. Indeed, the article points out that the only reason that smaller banks haven’t been able to expand and thrive is that the too-big-to-fails have decreased competition.

Federal Reserve Governor Daniel K. Tarullo said in June:The importance of traditional financial intermediation services, and hence of the smaller banks that typically specialize in providing those services, tends to increase during times of financial stress. Indeed, the crisis has highlighted the important continuing role of community banks…For example, while the number of credit unions has declined by 42 percent since 1989, credit union deposits have more than quadrupled, and credit unions have increased their share of national deposits from 4.7 percent to 8.5 percent. In addition, some credit unions have shifted from the traditional membership based on a common interest to membership that encompasses anyone who lives or works within one or more local banking markets. In the last few years, some credit unions have also moved beyond their traditional focus on consumer services to provide services to small businesses, increasing the extent to which they compete with community banks.But the government – instead of breaking up the giant banks who aren’t lending to the people who need loans – is trying to prop them up using permanent bailouts. See this, this, this and this.And – instead of separating different business activities (such as depository banking functions and speculative investments) – the government is actually allowing companies to get involved in a wider variety of business activities.

For example, economist Simon Johnson points out that Goldman Sachs recently converted to a financial holding company, allowing Goldman to borrow money from the Fed at essentially no cost, and then invest it in any thing it wants. Johnson gives an example: Goldman bought a large share of the stock of a Chinese automaker. If the investment succeeds, Goldman will reap the profits. If it fails, the American taxpayers are on the hook.And Goldman is apparently profiting from its combination of roles as both an investment brokerage house for other investors and as a large speculative investor itself. Specifically, Goldman apparently delays trades it makes for its clients long enough to use that inside knowledge of who is buying or selling what to make speculative investments for itself, oftentimes taking the exact opposite position for itself and its largest clients as the position it is recommending to its Mom and Pop investor clients.

Why are politicians letting this happen? Could it be because the giant banks have bought and paid for Congress and the White House? See this, this and this.We’ll Have to Do It Ourselves.

If the government isn’t doing anything to fix this dangerous situation, we’ll have to do it ourselves.As a start, if Congress won’t reimplement the Glass-Steagall Act (the Depression-era law which previously separated depository functions from speculative investing), let’s manually separate these two types of businesses.

How?

Simple: let’s pull our money out of the too big to fails and put it into small community banks and credit unions.The giant banks may still make bucketloads of cash on their casino style speculative gambling (for now, at least), but after we’ve moved our deposits to more responsible, smaller banks which don’t gamble as much, then we will have manually separated depository banking functions from the giant banks’ speculative investing.

Get it?

The government isn’t doing the job and fixing the problems which have led to the economic crisis … so we’ll have to do it ourselves.Note: Some people say that moving our money out of the too big to fails will just mean that the government will give them more bailouts. But this misses 3 points:

1. If the deposits are withdrawn, the giant banks will only be speculative gamblers, and at least our deposits will be safe and won’t be mixed with their toxic assets
2. The giant banks and their enablers in Washington will look even worse if they are bailing out companies that are solely and obviously gambling casinos
3. The head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, has warned:

The public will not bail out the financial services sector for a second time if another global crisis blows up in four or five years time, the managing-director of the International Monetary Fund warned this morning.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn told the CBI annual conference of business leaders that another huge call on public finances by the financial services sector would not be tolerated by the man in the street and could even threaten democracy.

Most advanced economies will not accept any more [bailouts]…The political reaction will be very strong, putting some democracies at risk, he told delegates.In other words, the government – fearing revolt – might be more hesitant to give another round of bailouts than people assume.I’m not looking at this with rose-colored glasses, and I realize that the TBTFs will act like the kid who killed his parents and then cries for pity since he’s an orphan.But I think that if the government is not doing its job, we should do it ourselves, and that a focused gesture of taking things into our own hands can only help.

Dollar Crisis Looms if US Doesn't Curb Debt: Experts
Published: Wednesday, 13 Jan 2010 | 6:23 PM ET Text Size By: Reuters

The United States must soon raise taxes or cut government spending to curb its debt, and failure to act will risk a crippling dollar crisis as investor confidence ebbs, a panel of experts said on Wednesday. It has got to be done. It will be done some day. It may be done with enormous pain. Or it may be done more rationally, said Rudolph Penner, a former head of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget office who co-chaired the 24-strong Committee on the Fiscal Future of the United States. President Barack Obama's administration will present his budget for fiscal 2011 early next month amid intense pressure to live up to election campaign promises not to raise taxes on middle class Americans, while confronting a record deficit. As a result, Obama is expected to focus on long-term fiscal discipline, while maintaining policy support for an economic recovery in the near-term as the country rebuilds after its worst recession since the Great Depression. The two-year study by the panel, assembled by the highly respected National Research Council and the National Academy of Public Administration, said that the White House had some time on its side to restore growth, but must then act. In the next year or two, large deficits and more borrowing are unavoidable given the severity of the economic downturn. However, action ought to begin soon thereafter, they said. The national debt has risen above 50 percent of GDP (gross domestic product) from 40 percent two years ago, and within 20 years will blow past a previous record above 100 percent of GDP set after World War Two without stern official steps. Mounting debt could sap investor confidence in the economy, and the nation's ability to honor its obligations, pushing up interest rates and causing a steep fall in the value of the dollar as international creditors seek safer returns elsewhere.

Cut Health Care

The committee identified curbing Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security spending as the top challenge, and had a lukewarm assessment of cost containment in health care reform currently before Congress that Obama hopes to sign soon. Committee co-chair John Palmer said the reforms might lay the foundation for improvements in the future, but he was skeptical about presumed saving levels and said that passage would not change in any substantial way our analysis.The committee, which included three former heads of the CBO, outlined a range of options to lower the ratio of the national debt to 60 percent of the size of the economy. The 60 percent threshold of debt to GDP, a target that is also used by the nations sharing the euro common currency, was a judgment choice, said Penner, who is a senior fellow at the Urban Institute, a Washington think-tank.He said it was deemed to be the most that could be borne without incurring debt levels that would drive up long-term interest rates, and the least that was politically feasible in terms of reductions in government spending. At one end of the options, the committee reviewed a policy mix based on low spending and low taxes. This envisaged payroll and income tax rates staying as they are, around 18-19 percent of GDP, but healthcare and retirement program costs sharply curtailed and defense and domestic spending cut 20 percent. The other end of the scale looked at a high spending/high taxes policy mix that would maintain the projected growth in Social Security and allow higher spending on federal programs.

However, this would see taxes rise above 40 percent of GDP, or in the neighborhood of Denmark or Sweden, in order to hold the national debt to 60 percent, unless a value added sales tax was also introduced to augment government revenue. Between the two were several intermediary solutions relying on a blend of higher taxes and lower spending. The committee made no recommendations but warned there was no time to waste. If action is taken soon, the country has a wide choice of options to help achieve fiscal sustainability. All are difficult; but if action is postponed, the options will be fewer and the choices even more difficult, they said.