I think it was Bertolt Brecht who said something to the effect of "because things are the way they are, things will not remain the way they are." I've been thinking about this lately while watching the financial fissures grow and wondering if we are witnessing the crumbling of our civilization.
I suspect that maybe the grimness of it all is amplified here in Atlanta by the gas panic. I don't even know if this is being reported by the media outside of Atlanta.
If not, let me tell you: it is bad.
People wait in long, long lines to get the gas as soon as it delivered. When all the gas has been sold they race off to find the next station taking delivery of a tanker's worth of gas. And so on. The lines of cars waiting for gas block traffic and add to the general misery of driving in Atlanta.
I myself am almost down to empty and the prospects for finding gas today are discouraging.
Add that to the bailout mess and oy vey.
I go back and forth on this. From day to day things generally stay the same more or less and odds are that things will make their way back to the norm. But as Brecht cautions, we are foolish to take things for granted. If we look at the bigger picture we can't avoid the conclusion that the end has to come sometime and the ascendancy of civilizations is cyclical and blah blah blah.
If nothing else it's a pleasant confirmation of the Philadelphia worldview.
Just try and tell me things aren't going to hell in a hand-basket. Have a look at your 401K first. And as long as I'm bragging, I'll add that this confirms something I've been whining about for years: we do not live in a free market economy, we live in a corporate welfare state. The game was rigged to allow them to avoid the corrections of the market. The profits were always private but now we are going to socialize the losses. That is not the free market my friends. (Not that I am advocating for a completely free market with no regulation or controls at all--I'm just tired of all the nonsense I've been hearing and reading. We need to name things correctly to the extent that we are able).
On the bright side, it's a beautiful day. So go stock up on canned goods and ammo and remember that when the end comes cigarettes will probably be very valuable.
