Imagine investing in the stock market because you think the economy is going to get worse. And not just worse, but a lot worse. Doesn’t make much sense, does it? Who would even suggest such a silly thing?

Only America’s best and brightest.

By best and brightest I mean mutual fund managers, hedge fund gurus and Wall Street executives. In China and Germany, the “best and brightest” become engineers and entrepreneurs. In America, the top graduates want to be bankers with Goldman Sachs or Lehman Brothers—because that’s where the money is.

Tells you a lot about why some countries are prospering and why others are not. Engineers and entrepreneurs build economies. Bankers often act more like parasites or pawnbrokers.

And now the experts on Wall Street think they have found another surefire way to make money. The bookie’s cut is not enough for them. It’s time for a real killing. Unfortunately for the rest of us, it’s a one-sided bet on America’s demise.

The U.S. economy really is more like a casino than you might think. Consider the words of America’s best and brightest.

Remember back in 2007, when house prices were ballooning across the country, and everybody was happy? Bubble prices were a good thing, our leaders said. It was a sign of the strength of America. U.S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson told Fortune that it was “far and away the strongest global economy I’ve seen in my business lifetime.”

In June of that year, America’s top banker, Ben Bernanke, agreed, even as major hedge funds began freezing up due to bad mortgage investments. The subprime crisis “will not affect the economy overall,” he said. It wasn’t a one-time error in judgment either. “The impact on the broader economy and financial markets [is] contained,” he assured investors.

As subprime foreclosures escalated, most of the Federal Reserve voiced ignorance of the looming disaster. That July, Mr. Bernanke extolled the benefits of giving risky subprime mortgages to people who couldn’t afford regular ones. In his Semiannual Monetary Policy Report to Congress, he even encouraged politicians (like Barney Frank and Chris Dodd) to push more subprime lending to advance policy goals.

Two months later, Ben Bernanke noted that the “Federal Reserve takes responsible lending … very seriously. … We are committed to preventing problems from recurring, while still preserving responsible subprime lending.”

It is hard to know whether to laugh or cry.

Even once the looming subprime-mortgage-induced destruction became clear, America’s leaders acted as if nothing was wrong.

“The long-term fundamentals of our economy are strong,” said Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson, in January 2008. “[W]e believe the economy is going to continue to grow slowly here. This is not an emergency” (emphasis mine throughout).

One month later: “[The economy] is fundamentally strong, diverse and resilient.” Mr. Bernanke agreed: “I don’t anticipate any serious problems of that sort among the large internationally active banks that make up a very substantial part of our banking system.”

Just one month later, 84-year-old Bear Stearns, America’s fifth-largest investment bank, failed!

What did our leaders conclude?

“The worst is likely to be behind us,” said Treasury Secretary Paulson.

In actual fact, it was the beginning of a wave of failures unprecedented since the Great Depression—and America’s top institutions, with all their highly esteemed economists, and their complex formulas, charts and graphs, completely missed it.

As the housing market cratered, foreclosures skyrocketed and unemployment plumed, America’s leaders continued in their blindness. “[The U.S. economy] has a strong labor force, excellent productivity and technology, and a deep and liquid financial market that is in the process of repairing itself,” Mr. Bernanke said.

In June of 2008, it was Ben Bernanke’s turn to tell Americans that the downturn in the economy was most likely over. Despite a recent spike in the nation’s unemployment rate, he said, “the risk that the economy has entered a substantial downturn appears to have diminished.” In July, in reference to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two giant subprime mortgage lenders, he said they were in “no danger of failing” and were “adequately capitalized.”

Everybody remembers what happened next. The federal government put taxpayers on the hook for $5.2 trillion worth of mortgages to prop up the two mortgage lenders. Yes, that is “t” as in trillion.

It wasn’t until 158-year-old investment bank Lehman Brothers failed in September that leaders began to wake up. All of a sudden, America was facing the “most severe financial crisis” in the post-World War ii era, said Bernanke.

But by then it was far too late. Merrill Lynch, Wachovia, Washington Mutual, Indy Mac Bank and aig all collapsed in rapid succession. The rest of the banking sector was almost ready to fail too except that the government suspended accounting laws and created billions of dollars out of thin air to lend to the banks at virtually zero interest.

Unfortunately, our leaders didn’t learn anything from their short-sightedness.

“I think all of our efforts, so far, have produced results. … And I think as those green shoots begin to appear in different markets and as some confidence begins to come back, that will begin the positive dynamic that brings our economy back. … I do see green shoots,” said Ben Bernanke, in March 2009.

The green shoots turned out to be dead weeds.

Why do we even pay these guys money to “manage the economy” in the first place? Why not just roll the dice, or flip a coin. Heads: raise interest rates. Tails: lower them. It would evidently result in little difference because—here is the secret that no one wants to admit—it is all one big casino, and even the house doesn’t really know how it works.

Want proof? The number-one banker in America couldn’t even tell that America had a housing bubble. Don’t even mention that he thought indebting poor people with risky subprime loans was a good idea. Or that America’s banking system—leveraged on debt at 32 to 1 or more—was safe (as was the case with Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers and others). And that Fannie and Freddie were well capitalized. The number-two banker thought that America’s economy was the “strongest global economy” he had ever seen—even as the economy was already headed for implosion.

On October 28, the deputy governor of the Bank of England, Charles Bean, admitted in a roundabout way that central bankers don’t really know what they are doing after all. Their economic models didn’t work, he said, but don’t blame us. “One would need to be endowed with perfect foresight to have been able to predict how the financial crisis would unfold,” he said.

Really?

All this stuff is right in the Bible—and any elementary school child can understand it. Be a good steward with what God has given you. Don’t live beyond your means. Don’t borrow money from foreign nations. Don’t covet (don’t indebt yourselves for things you don’t need). Don’t steal (create inflation to pay debts, print up money out of thin air to give to a privileged few). Don’t lie (rate risky mortgages as prime). Do unto others as you would want them to do unto you (don’t sell garbage products to others under the guise that they are good investments).

The whole mess should have been avoided—and it doesn’t take complex economic jargon to figure that one out.

And the Bible is pretty explicit about the curses that will result if you do these things. You can read about them in Deuteronomy 28 and many other places in the Bible.

Which brings us back to Wall Street gambling on America’s demise.

The stock market has developed an ominous tendency of late. It seems to drop when positive economic news is released, but tends to go up when bad news, even terrible news, is announced.

“The whole investment world has gone a little crazy,” writes Agora Inc.’s Bill Bonner. “It’s all speculation now … speculation on how much new money the Fed will add to the system.”

The economy has degraded to the point where people are just looking for ways to best hide themselves from the ravages of money-printing-induced inflation.

“Investors aren’t buying in anticipation of higher earnings or looking forward to a healthier economy. They’re not padding their retirement nests with great stocks at great prices, or participating in the growth and prosperity of 21st-century America by buying equities. Instead, they’re gambling that the economy will get worse … and that Bernanke will be forced to go boldly where only fools and morons have gone before … that is, on the road to hyperinflation.”

And they are gambling that stocks might provide a bit of an inflation hedge—even as the dollar is ravaged. That is also why investors have bid gold to record levels. And why all kinds of commodities are soaring in price.

It is a bet on the destruction of the dollar.

America is so indebted that investors realize that money printing, or quantitative easing as the central bank calls it, is the only way the debts will be paid. Unfortunately, that means the dollar’s value will be sacrificed.

Wall Street is making the bet—and with such leadership as America has, it looks like eventually it will prove to be a good one.

This may sound depressing for the short term, but the good news is that America’s economic collapse means the country is heading toward a brand new beginning. You can read about America’s bright future in The Wonderful World Tomorrow—What It Will Be Like by Herbert W. Armstrong, and understand why the Trumpet staff is filled with optimists.