[okie01]

The Cold War killed one great power and mortally wounded the other; the Soviet Union is dead and gone, and the United States is exhausted and near bankruptcy.

The Cold War had nothing to do with the United States being "exhausted and near-bankruptcy".

To blame the Cold War for our current malais is to irresponsibly overlook the past six years.

[Always A Marine]

That is very true, but I would include the last twenty years and not just the last six. Instead of recovering from the indebtedness we incurred to win the Cold War, we spent and borrowed even more and exhausted our military and our creditworthiness with needless wars and out of control social spending. If our countless enemies decide to challenge us at once, we’ll be out of Schlitz.