"Fiscal Crisis Is The New Normal," Ctd

A reader writes:

The problem with Goldsmith's projection about the deficit and economic melt down is that it assumes we will stay on the track we are on right now.  Had you made similar projections about the future of our economy in the mid to late 1930's, I suspect you'd have come to a similarly bleak conclusion.  Yes, there are a lot of risks to our economy right now, but the reality is that our politics only tends to be good at dealing with imminent crises rather than far off projections. 

Recall that in 1992 we had an election that was largely driven by concerns over the deficit.  It's not unreasonable to think that after a few years of patching the economy back together, concerns about rising deficits will drive our politics again.  Whether the solution will be to cut back government services, raise taxes, or some combination of both will ultimately depend on what political forces come to the fore at that time.  But historically when it's come time to make the hard choices we've always done what we've had to do.