Paul Rosenberg at OpenLeft points us to and elaborated on analyses about what's really causing the deficits and what's behind the Catfood Commission and other austerity measures.
http://www.openleft.com/diary/21051/the-real-budget-deficit-comes-from-outofcontrol-oligopolies-not-middleclass-entitlements
http://www.openleft.com/diary/21128/austerity-narratives-from-real-economists-debunked
Just pasting in the links now so I can read them later, and since they mesh well with how I understand what's going on now. It seems like the US economy is dominated by players profiting from economic inefficiencies who then use that money to buy political power to preserve those inefficiencies against the popular will. Not sure how to get out of this bind, and things will likely get much worse before we do. Ian Welsh even advocates getting out of the US if you can.
