Over the past few months, when the food stamp data was released, “Tyler Durden” over at Zero Hedge would squeal with glee like a little girl and throw up charts within seconds. But not today. Today, “Tyler Durden” didn’t have anything to say about the latest food stamp data.

Let’s see if you can guess why. Here’s a clue:

You have to squint at the right-most bar because it’s just a sliver. For the past two years, we have been adding hundreds of thousands of people to the rolls every month, and today’s release of the February data showed that only 11,517 were added. And that’s great news. But not for “Tyler Durden” and his philosophy of perpetual impending Armageddon.

Think about it. “Tyler Durden” is a man who denies the existence of the business cycle. Things can’t ever improve; not even cyclically.

That’s just plain retarded.

When last month’s data was released, “Tyler Durden” said: “…there is no way to spin this.” I said that there was:

“Keep in mind that the food-stamp data is reported with a two month lag. The economy created jobs in both February and March, so it is conceivable that the food-stamp rolls are already in decline.”

OK, there was no decline, but there was a dramatic plunge, so I got it more right than “Tyler Durden” did. Way more right.

I post up-to-date food-stamp charts here each month, unlike “Tyler Durden” who only posts charts when they agree with his bias.

Update: Zero Hedge posted a food-stamps chart about 30 hours after I posted this. I forced them to barf it up just like Donald Trump forced Obama to barf up the birth certificate.

While the USA is still the world’s only super power, we are also now what you might call a “super banana.” The number of Americans receiving food stamps is now 43.2 million, and that is double the combined total populations of the two classic banana republics: Guatemala and Honduras (click chart to enlarge):

Guatemala has a population of 13.3 million, and Honduras, 8.3 million. Combined total: 21.5 million.

The USA’s food-stamp population would rank at number 29 amongst the world’s nations, as we have just surged ahead of Sudan’s 43.2 million population. By landmass, Sudan is the largest country in Africa, and the tenth largest in the world.

The next chart compares our food-stamp population to selected countries:

Africa is famous for its starving masses, but our food-stamp population exceeds not only Sudan, but Kenya too. Canada is a G7 nation and the second-largest by landmass. We could blanket it with starving people.

President Obama is working hard to put even more people on food stamps with his South Korean trade deal, and his new Mexican trucker initiative. If he is successful, then we just might be able to move up three more notches, passing Columbia, Ukraine, and Spain in the 46 million area.

Note: See the long-term food-stamps charts here.

The USA is famous for innovation, and we have now done the impossible: we have invented the formerly mythical free lunch. Think about it: we have 42 million people who eat for free. Is that not a miracle?

It is, in fact, a libertarian free-trade utopia as described by Walter E. Williams, professor of economics at George Mason University. In this fabulous vision of the future, we throw our borders wide open, allow mercantilist powers to eradicate all of our industries and jobs, and then just sell them pieces of paper (dollars and treasury bonds) forever:

“We’d be on easy street having a few Americans printing up dollars whilst the rest of the world sends us cars, computers, coffee and other goods in exchange for them.”

Williams argues that our trade deficit doesn’t matter because it is automatically balanced by an equal amount of capital flows. If we buy $250 billion worth of goods from China this year, and they buy nothing from us but treasury bonds, the books balance.

But does that really make sense? Imagine that all of our jobs are offshored and all of our remaining factories are shuttered. Each day, a fleet of Chinese freighters arrives at the Port of Los Angeles and unloads everything we need: clothes, prefabricated housing, food, medicine, gasoline, etc. In return, we load some freshly-printed treasuries onto one of the ships, along with some new dollars to pay the interest on the previously issued treasuries.

It’s a utopia, right? But what happens next, Dr. Williams?

Relieved of the need to work, Americans forget how to make things, grow food, and drill for natural gas. Then one day, the Chinese freighters open their doors, and instead of cell phones and iPads, tanks roll out. And we can’t resist because we have nothing but old, shuttered factories and a population of un-skilled, un-knowledgeable nincompoops.

Of course, the Chinese would be justified in invading. After all, those dollars and bonds we shipped to them were actually more than just pieces of paper. They were, in fact, promissory notes. And if we lose the productive capacity to make good on our promises, then what happens? Bankruptcy, liquidation, and a transfer of assets to creditors.

Williams is actually arguing that if a foreign nation offers to put us on welfare, we should accept the invitation.

Aren’t libertarians supposed to be against welfare?

I became a libertarian in 1980 and remained one for over 25 years – until I figured out what was really happening: libertarian free-trade ideology was being used by the multinational sweatshop cartel to crush the American Middle Class. I am now revolted by libertarian economists who are really just apologists for offshoring.

Is it possible that libertarian economists are not familiar with the theory of global labor arbitrage? Maybe, but I doubt it.

There are huge profits being made in offshoring jobs, factories, and entire industries to low-wage nations like China, Mexico, and India. Libertarian economists are just PR flacks for this historic evisceration of the USA.

42 million people on food stamps is not a utopia. And it isn’t entirely attributable to an out-of-control welfare state. The runaway expansion of the rolls (see chart here) is a direct consequence of libertarian-endorsed labor arbitrage.

If you say to me that 42,000 factories can be exported with no harm done to the nation, I say that you are a charlatan, at best.

The private economy has created a modest number of new jobs every month this year. However, it has not been enough to compensate for population growth. As a matter of fact, the number of people receiving food stamps is still soaring. Here is a weekly chart (click to enlarge):

The permanent home for this chart is at DailyJobsUpdate.com, where I also have a chart going back 35 years. That annual chart shows exactly how appalling this 41 million number is.

As a nation, we have decided that wide-open free-trade is the most fabulous economic strategy ever invented. And since we are so committed to exporting jobs on a mass scale, we must now ask: is it time to shut down our population growth?

Isn’t it time that we take down the Statue of Liberty, expel all non-citizens, and adopt a Chinese-style one-child policy? Shouldn’t we be reducing head-count, just like Corporate America has done during this recession?