The US is replicating Japan and its 20-year stagnation. Our housing lobby (realtor and mortgage and construction and state and mayor associations, among others) matches their cartels. Public works is graft with kickbacks. The Fed has already matched the zero-interest policy. Failure to make the banks mark down their bad debts occurred in Japan too. The government is now buying stocks outright, and that too was done in Japan. We match their corruption fully when rapacious executives who have driven their banks and insurance companies into the ground while making themselves rich are left in place or graduate to government. Our 2-party rule is no better than their 1-party rule.