The bureaucracies and local governments in the outer reaches of the empire, such as Gaul, the near east, Egypt, kept plodding along with their local governments, taxes and legions, and I think certain states will continue on but yes, big cities like NY and LA are going to collapse, much as Rome did. Things got so bad there they moved the capital of the still empire to Ravenna.
I would rather a quick and clean rebellion than to see America fall into the disrepair of the empire. But I think that there are global interests that would want to keep us "functioning in a diminished way just because we are so large. I do not see a collapse just happening, if we want change we are going to have to make it ourselves.
A "quick and clean" rebellion would be preferable - if there is such a thing. ( I can't think of any rebellion in history that I would regard as such - rebellions be they fast or slow are always messy to my mind) If we loose the "Big Cities" that is fine with me - they are 80-90% leftist moron infested hives of sheltered sheep. We won't miss them.
As for "collapse just happening" - I guess it depends on what you see as "collapsing" - The Dollar MUST.. because MATH. I believe this will lead to the collapse of the Federal government, because "what do you pay your enforcement thugs with?" It will also lead to the collapse of the very, very fragile "Just in time" supply chain our very clever industrial society has worked out - a lot of components of which run on very lean margins and can't withstand long disruptions.
So you either have a concerted effort at forming a Soviet Style Police state in which citizens work as slaves and a lot of people starve, or we have looting gangs and then people starve.
To Glock's point, most of America is now removed from the land - the knowledge is lost to most and I suspect that many have lost the ability to adapt and learn. Ask any millennial anything and get a blank stare. If they are VERY clever, they MIGHT google an answer for you. T
- these people will not and cannot take care of themselves.
The Nation, like Rome, will balkanize because the central authority will have to pick and choose where to project its diminishing power -- and the global interests will be happy to take the reserve currency into their own hands, and to make sure America remains diminished as far as world trade is concerned, and will probably make every attempt to use their superior economic position to loot us of our natural resources, just as was done to Argentina when her currency collapsed. Free Men will not participate, and being still armed, will fight to keep the bread on their own tables vs. the tables of the non-contributing zeros who voted to sacrifice their fellow men and liberty on the altar of their self-serving ideology of envy and greed.
This will not be short. It will very likely be very messy. At this point , it cannot be averted. Plan accordingly.
