@Antony; I agree --- we need to deal with our problems here. But what we also need to do is listen to what others are observing, as these are some clues on how to deal with problems. For starters, we need to leave people ALONE, and not jam down their throat our "financial instruments", and they would be quite happy to build their own roads and plumbing. Friendly armtwisting needs to stop, so that the developing countries do not have to take IMF loans that they do not want. Oh, yes, they are "begging" for those loans. Translate, a crooked elite is always for sale, for as long as there is money --- our money. This is how some are making money, at taxpayers expense. Then we need to remove over 1,000 bases worldwide in over 180 countries. They are there to allow somebody to make a lots of money. And wars are the best money making machines ever invented. For some. For us, it is debt. And in a due course, we will go through inflation, our wealth wiped out. The smart money is already going into safe havens. And what has Honduras or Cuba got to do with it? Not much, other then good examples of what should not be happening. Coup in Honduras done by two guys trained in our own School of the Americas. Cuba is isolated in order to keep the dreams alive of the exiles who still hope to take over by violence. Who cares about their interests, when the interests of the US public are damaged. It costs a great deal of money to run an empire. To fix problems, one will have to first stop the loss of money on all sorts of projects around the world. Whether they are military or civilian, they will have to be first accounted for, and then stopped. Why on earth do we need to finance thousands of NGOs worldwide? While the staff they collect may be well meaning and dedicated, the management of those groups is corrupt and self-serving. They are parasitical, with only one objective --- keep the funding.