I'm at a loss. How can one combat a religion like austerity?

You've laid out well how austerity is failing everywhere, including here in the UK. But the political discourse in the UK (see today's Salon) is all about how Labour have to "acknowledge the seriousness of the deficit" - it seems no-one cares about the seriousness of unemployment.

And this metaphor of country debt like personal debt is like some kind of indestructible weed.