When the radicals descended on Washington a year ago, few realized how quickly they would trash what was once the most powerful freedom-loving country on the planet.

Occasionally an enlightened voice makes itself heard above the Babel of the chattering classes which all appear so blind to the current state of the nation, and the grave risk this poses to world peace. At the end of July, one such voice rang loud and clear above the fray in an attempt to inject some sanity into the intelligentsia, so oft guilty of slavishly toeing the liberal party line. It was a British voice, and it sounded off in one of Britain’s remaining dominions, in Sydney, Australia.

The Age newspaper summarized British historian Niall Ferguson’s recent address to an eminent gathering of academia for his John Bonython Lecture for the Center for Independent Studies under the headline, “Decline and Fall of the U.S.”

The edited version of Ferguson’s dramatic speech began with these words (emphasis mine throughout):

In the history of empires the end is abrupt, and those that rely on them need to be ready.All empires, no matter how magnificent, are condemned to decline and fall. We tend to assume that in our own time, too, history will move cyclically—and slowly. Yet it is possible that this whole cyclical framework is, in fact, flawed. What if history is arrhythmic—at times almost stationary, but also capable of accelerating suddenly, like a sports car?

Then, borrowing a phrase from the greatest prophet of all, Ferguson challenged his audience with the question, “What if collapse comes suddenly, like a thief in the night?”

Alarmist? No! Just a sane, sound assessment of the history of empires of the past. This is a true realist speaking, a man with a sound grasp of the trends of history that he sees very clearly pointing to the demise of a once and singular superpower of our age, the United States of America.

After listing a number of empires that fell suddenly, Ferguson goes to the empire that disappeared as suddenly as it had arisen, the greatest of them all, the British Empire:

The sun set on the British Empire almost as suddenly. So, what are the implications for the United States today?The most obvious point is that imperial falls are associated with fiscal crises—sharp imbalances between revenues and expenditures, and the mounting cost of servicing a mountain of public debt.

Ferguson is, of course, not the only astute commentator to see America’s drastically ballooning debt posing the greatest of gambles on the future of this once singular greatest nation on the planet. There is an increasing number of sensible, concerned and common-sense observers of America’s demise who are speaking out in grave warning as to the impending crash of the U.S.

A former Washington bureau chief for Forbes and Financial World magazines, James Strodes, writes in the current edition of the American Spectator, “[T]hings may be worse than we know. … [T]here is good reason to worry that the federal government faces a far greater deficit burden than most Washington officials will admit to. … American Social Security and Medicare health insurance schemes (whose trust funds are currently empty) balloon that debt overhang to $70.7 trillion, close to five times gdp” (July-August 2010).

Niall Ferguson reminds us, “[H]alf the U.S. federal debt in public hands is in the hands of foreign creditors. Of that, a fifth (22 percent) is held by the monetary authorities of the People’s Republic of China” (op. cit.).

This is a terrible strategic challenge for the United States. Of what use is American military power when its economy is so powerfully leveraged to a nation that has publicly declared that the U.S. is its number-one enemy?

James Strodes points, in addition to the federal deficit, to the dangerous condition of the finances at state level in America: “More than 30 of the 50 state governments are in severe deficit.”

Ferguson and Strodes agree completely on one aspect of this unsustainable course of the current spend-spend-spend U.S. administration: It is inviting catastrophe of the worst order—the imminent collapse of America as a nation.

Niall Ferguson rightly points out that “The fiscal position of the U.S. is worse than that of Greece. But Greece is not a global power. In historical perspective, unless something radical is done soon, the U.S. is heading into … postwar Britain territory.” He then equates the situation in America to another globally historic moment, of which Sir Winston Churchill famously said, “all the alternatives have been exhausted” (op. cit.).

Ferguson’s observation that “the U.S. is on an unsustainable fiscal course, with no apparent political means of self-correcting,” equates with Strode’s observation that the great and foolish gamble the current U.S. administration has taken is that of a gambler at the blackjack tables in Las Vegas who is playing the gamble of his life—what is known as a “double down.” In this play of plays, “After drawing their two cards they are allowed to double the size of their bet if they will take only one more card in their quest to get closer to 21 than the dealer. It is a high-risk bet ….”

How high are the stakes in Washington’s great gamble with the U.S. economy? “[A]ll the alternatives have been exhausted. … [T]he U.S. is on an unsustainable fiscal course, with no apparent means of self-correcting.” The current U.S. administration has simply bet the house on that one card against the very real prospect of a double-dip crash in the economy of irreparable proportions. As Strodes muses, in relation to the impending fall of the U.S., “There is another blackjack phrase that comes to mind. It’s when the next card drawn to your hand takes you over 21. You are ‘busted’!”

For decades, through the economic cycles of boom and bust from the end of World War ii to his death on Jan. 16, 1986, Herbert Armstrong used not gambling language, but rather the language of inerrant Bible prophecy to declare that the global financial system would collapse and trigger a third round of world war. This is America’s current great gamble. America is, in reality, gambling against the prophesied odds stacked against it. It’s a lose-lose situation! There’s no way out. It’s just a matter of time before Niall Ferguson’s headline is fulfilled and we see the sudden decline and fall of America! And that time is fast running out!

Get yourself acquainted with reality! Read our exposé of today’s world conditions as prophesied in your Bible. It’s titled He Was Right. It contains verbatim declarations by Herbert Armstrong as published and broadcast for over 50 long years detailing multiple prophesied events way in advance of their actually happening today! In fact, it is a powerful endorsement of the accuracy of Bible prophecies for our day, many of them written thousands of years ago.

Only the truly blind-minded will refuse to admit to the precision with which Herbert Armstrong prophesied the major world events we are living through today, most particularly the failure of the global financial system and the earthshaking events that will trigger.

If you are one with an open mind who aches to understand the reasons for the current great global disorder and wants to know what to do about its effects on your life, you really do need to read this booklet. It may just change the whole direction of your life so you can truly rise above the impending catastrophic events this world faces and begin to realize just what is your incredible human potential, and how to go about fulfilling it! In fact, why not request a copy of our book, gratis, The Incredible Human Potential and gain a firm grasp on your life and, even among the increasing tumult of today’s global disorder, begin to enjoy your life to the full! It truly can be the most amazing experience, if it is lived the way your Creator designed it to be!