You may have noticed that I haven't spent much time commenting on the impending financial implosion that will wreak havoc across the entire planet. Were I a betting man or a prognosticator, I'd say early to mid Summer should be the center of gravity tipping point for a number of the world's economies. Mexico won't last through the Summer. Eastern Europe (with the exception of Russia) is teetering. Much of Western Europe is wobbly as well. And South America? Fuhgedaboutit!
Who can save us from this dire dilemma? Why, His Eminence, King Obama! A trillion here, a trillion there...pretty soon we'll be talking serious money! But it's going to work. All of the Keynesian economists say so. That Keynesians are pretty much wrong 90% of the time is beside the point...
Okay, Vulture. You've had your little chuckle. Now get serious. Is it really that bad? To be honest, I don't know. I only know what I read. You see, given the location in which I live and the career field in which I'm employed, I'm extremely sheltered from the gyrations of the economy. I'm not saying that so as to brag; on the contrary, my situation makes me even more worried. Things aren't hunky-dorree in these parts; how bad can it be in, say, Michigan or California?
So...is King Obama's "stimulus" going to help? Are you sh**ing me? Of course not! Nor was it ever supposed to be anything more than expensive window dressing.
I'm of the opinion that King Obama would be all kinds of happy if the entire American financial system collapsed. After all, it's only in extreme times that extreme measures (like Fascism and Communism) can be made palatable to the sheeple.
While Obama's reputation is that of a lifelong Communist, his actions belie different leanings; he's a Fascist through-and-through. Lest there be any misunderstanding, by "Fascist" I mean a proponent of the Private/Public ownership of the means of production as implemented by Benito Mussolini. I am NOT using the word in the traditional Leftist pejorative way, which is, as a means to tar one's enemies.
And truth is we've been living in a Fascist system for years. It just wasn't codified until King George the Dim implemented his infamous bailouts last Fall. His bailouts established the precedent that profits belong to the corporations, but losses belong to the sheeple. If that's not Fascism, what, then, is it?
Okay, Mr. Gloom-and-Doom. So what can we do to protect ourselves? How the hell should I know? I'm just an ordinary man who happens to live in extraordinary times. I have no reference point nor sufficient knowledge to have the first idea what we the common folk can do, short of storming Congress carrying torches and pitchforks.
Times are hard, and they're going to get harder. The Russians are fairly certain that we're going to self-destruct.
If you're inclined to believe Igor Panarin, and the Kremlin wouldn't mind if you did, then President Barack Obama will order martial law this year, the U.S. will split into six rump-states before 2011, and Russia and China will become the backbones of a new world order.As much as I hate to say it, if the scenario painted by Mr. Panarin plays out, we will do in 2009 what the mighty Soviet Union did in 1989-1991; we'll splinter into regional factions with an impotent central government trying vainly to hold it all together. Perhaps we'll be as lucky as Russia and manage to hold together enough substance in one of the splinters to serve as a counterweight to the Russians and Chinese. But I doubt it.
Panarin might be easy to ignore but for the fact that he is a dean at the Foreign Ministry's school for future diplomats and a regular on Russia's state-guided TV channels.
Feeling good and depressed yet? Feeling hopeless? Don't. There is One far mightier than those pitiful perfumed princes and princesses who lust after the power to rule over us all. My trust is in Him, though my actions may not always reflect that.
Paul said it best:
For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. -- Romans 8:38-39Amen.
