We face a projected budget deficit of $1.4 trillion in 2030, the year when baby boomers start to weigh heavily on government services. We have a national debt that is ballooning out of control and eating up our capital in the form of payments — largely to foreign investors and nations, especially China. The middle class is slipping downward; the poor are growing and stuck in an economy where there are fewer jobs for the uneducated.

Our leaders have let us down with overly grandiose schemes of what government can do for individuals and doing so on borrowed money. Our leaders have also, frankly, sold us out to huge companies that have gradually moved all the good jobs overseas to get that $1.00 an hour max labor.

We used to have a strong economy based on consumer spending, because when people spent, it created jobs and prosperity for American factories, stores and businesses. Now consumer spending and tax cuts largely stimulate jobs and growth in China. That’s where tax cut dollars now go.

We hear that trade protectionism is bad. So then, what is going to be the future foundation of the U.S. economy?

Economists told us that it would be the “knowledge” and “service” economy, which was to follow the industrial and manufacturing, and farming, economy. Looks like the economists were wrong again. The post-industrial economy is no longer driving U.S. prosperity. The Indians, Chinese, Koreans and many others can produce “knowledge” and “smart people” — like engineers — just as easily as we can. But, they also now make the cars, electronic devices, clothing, food, plastics, consumer goods and just about everything else Americans buy — much of which used to be made in the U.S.

The service part of the post-manufacturing U.S. economy is also not the magic bullet because now English-speaking workers in Jamaica, India, Ireland, Nigeria and other low wage places can do most of the customer service and other service work. They even tutor our students online with live video from India.

The other service industries — banking and insurance — have become predators who have American consumers trapped with bad corporate investment decisions, high credit card charges and penalties and skyrocketing insurance rates.

The biggest engine that drives our economy, private home and business ownership, was effectively destroyed by very, very evil — or stupid — people who made mortgages toxic and then proceeded to destroy confidence in property owner rights. Private property is the core foundation of capitalism. By basically stealing people’s properties with foreclosures and evictions that did not follow the rights of owners, the very bedrock of confidence in capitalism has been dangerously shaken.

So how optimistic am I about where all this will end up?

I think it will drag out until a mass of the middle class of Americans rises up and says “no more” and basically turns this country around. I happen to think neither the Democrats nor the Republicans are capable of doing that because they have been bought and paid for by powerful special interests.

So that large number, now probably a majority, of Americans who want real change may need to invent a new political party based on honesty and concern for the vast hurting middle class of Americans. A new party that will stay away from divisive and toxic social issues and let people resolve those privately. A party that will refocus what government can and should do to a realistic proportion. The number of people not working, on welfare and other programs for several generations is unsustainable for any economy, and we need to find a smart solution for that. We need a new political party that will restore confidence in the American political system, the American dream and turn around that abysmal 17 percent approval rating of Congress and the sliding approval of the president.

Until the donkey and elephant monopoly is seriously challenged, they will continue to drive the nation in a downward spiral that is unacceptable and dangerous. It is the current generation of students and young people who have the most to lose from staying on this catastrophic course. It is the current so-called “Millennial generation” together with Generation X and Y who will need to stop screwing around with Facebook and get involved in politics!

Until they rise up and start leading, please put your seatbacks and trays in an upright position and fasten your set belts. It’s going to be a very rough ride.