Although I disagree with almost everything else, yes, it’s the lack of money that’s gonna get them. The Left soaked up the peace dividend. They appropriated the fruits of everything they worked so hard not to win. The Clinton years were the key time, when the end of history made is possible to imagine a future where the only things we had to worry about were the Y2K bug and the ozone layer. A huge slug of free energy, like a lottery ticket, made an explosion of fantasy possible.

Winning the lottery often ruins lives. And maybe in this case all the projects which really took off that era — multiculturalism, political correctness, runaway greenism, the proliferation of NGOs and transnational stuctures — and the mood which rose to match — a never ending boom, a future that could be built on credit — this was the lottery that sank the West. It wasn’t the end of history. It was the binge at the moment of a victory they never wanted, but were prepared to exploit anyway.

And now, guess what? The money’s run out. But it was enough to pay for all the state expansion the left craved so much. Now they’re going to have to hang on to this dead weight without the wherewithal to pay for it. In a way they are stuck with their railroad line to Medina. All the leftie programs they can’t roll back. All the free health care they’ve just gotta have, along with the death panels that go with them. The carbon trading industry. The safe schools with perverts in charge of them. The free sex change operations. The sanctuary cities. The handouts for the SEIU. All the junk they bought on credit that they can’t pay for. They’re going to try to hang on to it all. The monkey trap. And like the railway to Medina, the tribes they can’t overawe are going to be galloping up and down the line blowing things up. The Left can’t handle limited warfare. That’s immoral. So they’re going to let things slide until in a panic they get ready to nuke all them flies buzzing around their heads. Islamic extremism isn’t going to defeat the West; but it will force an insane elite self-destruct, like the robot shorting out squawking “it does not compute”.

So look for them to buy more stuff on credit. Look for them to create more “cliff functions” in defense policy. They’re just going to kick things down the road until even they realize they’ve gone over the edge. And when they do it’ll be “help save me!”

But not yet. Until the last hour the party’s gonna rollick on. Folly has always been like that. You drink down the champagne and then when it’s gone you crack the bottle against the edge of the desk and defend yourself with the shards. How does one avoid the fate of Detroit, or Fannie Mae? Improving things each year with a fix until there’s nothing left but ruins? That’s the characteristic of all these hare-brained schemes; the signature of the Ponzi racket. Everything is described as improving and getting better until the hour the whole thing collapses.