"There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as the result of voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved."

Ludwig von Mises from "Human Action" (1949)

We are illustrating what von Mises predicted 60 years ago. G.Brown began to run budget deficits from 2003, and it suited him to keep interest rates as low as possible. (He kept extending the cycle over which he was to balance his books, to avoid having to end his splurge.) Assets bubbles of various kinds were created by the credit expansion, and left unchecked, - he and we were living as if there was no tomorrow.

He may wish to blame the greedy bankers or Americans, but his low interest rate policy and burgeoning pubic debt put us on the path which von Mises indicated.