You’re Being Deceived by the Media and Your Government: Here’s How to Become Better Informed! (+3K Views)

While most Western countries have serious debt problems none of them has a fiscal crisis as bad as that of the United States. In spite of that, however, the U.S. corporate-controlled media has been obsessively shining the spotlight on the so-called “PIIGS” of Europe rather than on the staggering financial crises facing America. If that weren’t bad enough, it has become impossible to trust the few economic statistics that are “fed” us. Frankly, there is a conspiracy of silence about the truth but there are ways to become better informed. Words: 868

So says Jeff Nielson (www.BullionBullsCanada.com)  in edited excerpts from an article* which Lorimer Wilson, editor of www.munKNEE.com (It’s all about Money!), has further edited ([  ]), abridged (…) and reformatted below  for the sake of clarity and brevity to ensure a fast and easy read. Please note that this paragraph must be included in any article re-posting to avoid copyright infringement. Nielson goes on to say:

We are Being Fed Misinformation
It has become impossible to trust U.S. economic statistics, whether we are talking about jobs reports, estimates of GDP, or the numbers the government uses for its “official” national debt and “official” deficits. As an example, during the eight years of the Bush regime, “official” deficits totaled $2.3 trillion, while the “actual” increase in debt was $4.5 trillion – nearly double the “official” totals.

In the first year of the Obama presidency, the “official” deficit was reported as ‘only’ $1.4 trillion but the “actual” increase in debt was close to $2 trillion. Put another way, the gap between the “official” deficit of the the U.S. last year and the “real” deficit was roughly equal to the entire national debt of Canada and in absolute terms, it was an even bigger lie than those of the eight years of the Bush government.

There is a Conspiracy of Silence About the Truth
Given the above mentioned dramatic discrepancies between the “official” and “actual” numbers they beg the following questions:
1. Why aren’t U.S. politicians (of both parties) alerting their constituents to the continued reporting by the government (and the media) of totally fictional numbers for the debt problems of the U.S.?
2. Why is the U.S. media failing to expose such ‘in-your-face’ discrepancies as occured throughout the Bush Administration and continue with the Obama government?
3. How can the mainstream media not notice a $500 billion discrepancy in one year’s budget at a time when the U.S. government is generating the most-massive deficits in the history of humanity?

The fact is that you will never see any U.S. politician, or member of the mainstream media questioning the legitimacy of the “official” U.S. deficit. Some may argue that the deficits are “too large” – but no one ever questions the legitimacy of the calculation itself.

The “official” U.S. deficit is only the tip of the iceberg, however. When it comes to the insolvency of the U.S., the real story occurs with respect to its “unfunded liabilities” and its total debt – the real total. To put things in perspective, as of today, U.S. unfunded liabilities of $70 Trillion are greater than global GDP. Put another way, in order for the U.S. to ever meet those obligations, the entire world would have to devote their economies to pay for their liabilities. In that light it is obvious that the U.S. government can never meet their obligations.

Here is How to Become Better Informed
So, where do I get my information on the U.S. economy? There is a growing “army” of individual bloggers and smaller web-sites (such as BullionBullsCanada.com and munKNEE.com) who are committed to presenting an uncensored examination of the global economy (especially the U.S. economy), and who discuss facts and issues which you will never see in the coverage of the large, mainstream (corporate) media.

A couple of examples of such sites are Michael Hodges’ “Grandfather Debt Report”, and John Williams’ Shadowstats.com – which provide many of the numbers included in this presentation. The content of these sites is implied by their titles.

Mr. Hodges’ site has compiled a large collection of statistics on U.S. debt. “Shadowstats” mission is to calculate current government statistics using the same methodology for calculations which was used thirty years ago (and in the decades prior to that). Thus, John Williams’ site produces real, accurate comparisons between current and previous economic conditions.

If we were to compare Shadowstats’ “numbers” with official, U.S. government statistics, we find there is no comparison. Virtually every, major U.S. economic “statistic” has undergone numerous revisions in how they are calculated. Thus, even if you subscribe to the belief that the U.S. government is trying to honestly present data on its economy, the numbers it uses are not comparable to previous calculations – and thus none of the comparisons by the U.S. government of the economic conditions now versus prior periods are valid.

Quite simply, “official” U.S. economic statistics bear no resemblance to the official stats of previous generations.

*http://www.bullionbullscanada.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=11900:debt-denial-and-default&catid=64:presentations&Itemid=141