According to this article, National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair (a former navy commander, not an economist) says that the economic crisis outranks terrorism as the biggest threat to the US.

How ironic that — after the endless warnings from Bush administration about terrorism and the urgency to fight it “over there” — that the larger threat would turn out to be not only unrelated, but both domestic and entirely self-inflicted.

I just read a good analysis of Obama’s first speech as president called No Time for Poetry. It points out, among other things, that the mess we’re in isn’t due to Bush alone (although he certainly isn’t free from blame.) Many, many people joined in on the spending spree that was powered by a stock and housing boom that now seems completely ludicrous, but at the time seemed merely suspicious. It’s never been more clear that hard times have arrived. And that we haven’t seen the worst of it yet.

It’s certainly striking close to home for me. Lisbeth got laid off last week. She’s on a year of maternity leave and never intended on going back to that job anyway, but nevertheless, it’s scary. It affects both our finances and our psychology. Then a friend of hers lost his job in the publishing industry. And this week Microsoft announced that they will cut 5,000 employees. About 100 of the initial 1400 will be from the Copenhagen office where Lisbeth and I met, and where we still have friends. The specific people that will be jobless are to be announced on Thursday.

My company is suffering as well. There haven’t been any layoffs, but in less than a year we’ve gone from having customers lined up at the door, with projects booked almost year in advance, to being worried about having enough to do for the next three months. Plus several big customers in our London office have gone bankrupt, and so large projects we did for them will never be paid for.

And we haven’t seen the worst yet.