We are about 2 1/2 years into this and things are accelerating. I was born in '33 so I am biased as a consequence of my upbringing. My other bias is that I am oriented to making money from a neutral bias. I've only been in 5 countries over the last year. As a person who has worked at EOP in several regimes and occassionaly bumps into similar folk; it is correct to hold the econometric beliefs that it is not going to work out for the US. The struggle is not among ideas or policy. The heirarchy is money to power to information at the top. As things went sour on the money level, there was no power response by leaders except to not participate responsibly. A leadership vacuum will continue simply because the information supply shut down in the face of no demand. Global information solutions are not possible nor available any longer in the power structure as we know it (or rather you know it). Solutions will only coalesce from an essential information source from the ground up. Making servers energy efficient is just a "fun" thing so to speak. All significant problems will be solved the same way locally and independently in a way that appears to be measles like all over the globe. Simlar worthwhile solutions will come to touch each other as they spread from miriad points of origin. Capital is distributed by global means by taking it away from things that no longer work and applying it in a very decentralized manner to enhance local conditions. Notice the housing and auto industries of the US. If you want to see alternatives look to local entrepreneurs who are independent of those industries. Most people are very isolated from nature and healthy living and wonderful life styles. They are simply ignorant. they will just survive and wait until something of local origin finally reaches them. The elderly, and especially past leaders who have stood on the peaks can see what is going on. As time passes they observe how the surfaces are being turned inside out to let the new independent shoots from seeds finally come into the light. It is not going to be fun for most people for many years. What exists today is NOt going to be turned around; it is going to be replaced with something based upon information that comes from elsewhere. That milieu of information will be grasped by people, individuals, that can mold teams to institutionalize new ways of life, life style and community living solutions. Our earth works as a thin layer like a layer of paint on a balloon. The flora and fauna florish in concert with the Sun and always have. The continents drift. Unsatisfactory relationships emerged; this is going to change. In 1958 the Club of Rome reported out the peaking of satisfaction on the globe. Satisfaction units were fun and running the model in different intellectual centers was fun. The Ekistics of Doxiatis (Athens based) came and went. Barabara Marx Hubbard bore down on Synergistic Convergence and Alexander's Method defined improving organizational structures, processes and their results. And there were the Hudson Institute, the guys around DuPnt circle and Bethesda and Berkley and MIT and the Ivy Leaguers. Hot shots all over the World for a while. So they are repairing the hole in the ground until Spring. I liked the EOP best of all because there was "institutionalization" going on. It has ground to a halt and reversed. I could "feel" PL 92- 500. But air and land didn't emerge. Alcohol did happen as the first biomass alternative but conservation gave up the ghost. We could not make health work no matter what. Illness prevailed and now it will reign for a long long time along with pharmaceuticals. Breaking the back of family life with duty cycles of war, increased job mobility and the demise of pensions and unions and not dealing with global mental health as AIDS prevailed. Sad. The future for talking heads will be very grim for many many years. They do not get paid for anything more than entertainment. There are vineyards in which to toil. Those grasping how to deal with giving children knowledge and health and making family life work out will begin the job ahead. There are five basic things that count. Local people know what they are.
I was a kid during the 73-74 bear that saw the DOW drop 80%. things are worse now, since we are entering this crash so far in the hole, it will take years to climb out. unemployment will likely top out in the low teens hideous, I say
My God. You people sure do paint the picture of hell on earth. I cannot help but wonder that with this much pessimism it resembles eerily the man walking the city street with the "end is near - repent!" sign. If we should buy when everyone is at their most pessimistic, then now begins to look like the time to buy. I mean, what else can possibly happen apart from what everyone in this thread has detailed? The only thing I've not heard was world war, disease and mass population decline. If your scenarios play out, don't you think that happens?
"Globalist (wealth transfer) Games 2008" will go down in history as the start of a very destructive period.
er..um...No. The Dow may drop another 3000 pts and stay there for 5 years. Or...it may not. I'm young...I may live another 40 years. Scaling into great Biotechs, Medical Supply and Life Sciences type Companies at this time seems like the easiest move I've ever made. Of course these aren't flips for me...they're going into my retirement accounts.
Well, we may not necessarily get any of the three you mentioned, but might come close. I will lay money on the USSR being reformed as Russia will reclaim the weak ...a stray bullet towards Putin will delay this from happening. I have suggested for some time ,in other threads, that I believe there will be food riots in SE Asian in the next couple of years. Unemployment will cause a significant drop in the "new found" standard of living in this region,but basic food stuffs will become very expensive and scarce. The slants got used to eating two meals a day and are not about to willingly go back to eating one. Radical religious groups will lend a hand to create mayhem among the suffering, hence food riots. In the US, the private financial structure, as we know it today, will be completely revamped . It should also provide the perfect opportunity to introduce the flat tax policy and become effective in a few years. Health care is going to be an overwhelming disaster world wide. Other than that ," she'll be apples"......