LOL....well, since my portfolio finished up a tad over 5% this month after all of these supposed "crises", maybe a few more will juice things up even more!

You are doing something right to get such a good return in these times, enjolras, good job.

I am under the impression that if one's normally wise stock investment choices are strong in cash stockpiles/cashflow and do not possess off-balance sheet activities, then one may breathe slightly easier. I fear that IF those types of stocks start deteriorating in value, however, that devestating problems are not far behind for all of us.

There seems to be NO safe haven for money now, other than to put it in your mattress (er, um, bank). I have not seen anything this perplexing in my lifetime, save my Depression childhood, when people gladly held onto the money they had and didn't presume to wish it to grow by any other means than simple accumulation of principle (the "a penny saved is a penny earned" days).

How Depressing indeed. This requires a huge change of mindset, and we are nowhere near there yet. However, I have noticed a tiny move in that direction due to the shock of Enron et al and the cryptic behavior of the Dow. A continuation of both behaviors must be what is going to get us to that mindset. Yuck. The won't be pretty, folks.

Barbara---I couldn't agree with you more. Maybe it takes a Silent to remember some of that really bad stuff, which is all but forgotten today. My biggest worry is that what is coming could be even worse.

Well, the history books may record something worse this time around, but I imagine the way it felt going down was/is the same. My older relatives told me plenty about the pre-Crash, Crash and post-Crash days, but I was left always wondering what would make an entire generation of people into the most frugal penny-pinchers ever seen in modern times. They (GI's) taught us to do same and many of us did for a long time, but our hearts were never quite in it like the elders.

I always thought it was because I was a Depression child and not a Depression adult. Now I think it was because I didn't experience the Crash and Burn. I wasn't wiped out, I didn't have to change my mindset about money's value. I'm beginning to understand how people can be thankful they have a principal sum of money and don't care or expect that it grows unearned. I do know that in the 20's, pre-Crash, they very much cared and very much expected the unearned growth, and this is quite similar to our mindset today.

On 2002-02-03 17:14, Croaker'39 wrote:
My biggest worry is that what is coming could be even worse.

Fear the image in your mind, and that image becomes alive. The possibilities are far beyond your and my WILDEST expectations. NO FEAR!

How many times must we go through this, Croaker. Rib-rib-ribbit!

Remember, the height-based "economy" of the age of the gymnosperms (64+ million YBP) was replaced, after the K-T event, by a flower-based "economy" in the age of the angiosperms. I.e., the focus of bio-economic tendencies shifts toward different values. This will happen after the coming event within the human realm. Yes, Sh*t Happens, but afterwards intestines feel oh so good.

On 2002-02-04 12:06, Dave'71 wrote:
Fear the image in your mind, and that image becomes alive. The possibilities are far beyond your and my WILDEST expectations. NO FEAR!

In addition, don't lower your expectations and don't raise your expectations of the coming event. Go Beyond any expectation. Expectations are NEVER fulfilled. Expectancy may suffice, but Hope is even better.

OK, now I'm on board. I sincerely HOPE everything in the world turns out OK. OK?

On 2002-02-03 16:02, Barbara wrote:
You are doing something right to get such a good return in these times, enjolras, good job.

I am under the impression that if one's normally wise stock investment choices are strong in cash stockpiles/cashflow and do not possess off-balance sheet activities, then one may breathe slightly easier. I fear that IF those types of stocks start deteriorating in value, however, that devestating problems are not far behind for all of us.

There seems to be NO safe haven for money now, other than to put it in your mattress (er, um, bank). I have not seen anything this perplexing in my lifetime, save my Depression childhood, when people gladly held onto the money they had and didn't presume to wish it to grow by any other means than simple accumulation of principle (the "a penny saved is a penny earned" days).

How Depressing indeed. This requires a huge change of mindset, and we are nowhere near there yet. However, I have noticed a tiny move in that direction due to the shock of Enron et al and the cryptic behavior of the Dow. A continuation of both behaviors must be what is going to get us to that mindset. Yuck. The won't be pretty, folks.

thanks for the compliment barbara but its simply a matter of keeping your head when others around you seem intent on losing theirs.

as for safe havens for money, well, was there ever really any true safe haven? i have been able to make money during these last two years, even on just my long positions, by simply looking for undervalued companies. they are out there, trust me.

as for the "penny saved is a penny earned" mindset, that's all well and good but think about how little good that did people after the fact. they became conservative savers AFTER the depression occurred when the reward for savings was at an all time low. the real rewards were obtained by those willing to step out and borrow money and take risks as the economy rose from those dark depths.

as i have said on here many times now, we still have several more good years ahead to prepare for some extreme turbulence that is coming in the second and third decades of this new century. but now is certainly a good time to prepare for the difficulties ahead. and make no mistake, they are coming.


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: enjolras on 2002-02-04 18:39 ]</font>

Subject: One Gigantic Enron

The details about the Enron debacle are becoming clearer. The management at Enron piled up a vast mountain of debt "off balance sheet" in order to maintain the company's stock price and reward themselves. They hoped to discount the risk involved with huge derivatives positions. These derivatives positions didn't save them when their off balance sheet bets went south on them. "Investors" (again I use that word advisedly) are crying for their Congressmen to "do something".

In truth the entire United States economy is one gigantic Enron. Our total indebtedness is now 29 Trillion dollars according to the Federal Reserve website. This 29 Trillion in debt is backed up by a fantastic 100 Trillion dollars in derivatives which business leaders lightheartedly hope will protect them if their trades go against them.

Unfortunately there is NO WAY to get rid of the risk associated with these huge leveraged bets. All you can do is shift risk around. You can't get rid of it. I keep wondering who will bail out the US when this huge mountain of debt our economy is built on begins to melt down. The Martians? God? Who?

If you don't believe it can happen just keep watching Japan.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/north/north91.html

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Robert on 2002-02-05 12:28 ]</font>

Remember to wipe the prints off the telephone when you make the CALL.

A possible new economic system.

http://www.perfecteconomy.com/

_________________
Robert Reed III (1982)
---------------------------------------------
"Where they have burned books, they will end in burning human beings." -- Heinrich Heine
"Not to know is bad, but to refuse to know is worse." -- A Gambian Proverb

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: madscientist on 2002-02-11 10:19 ]</font>

Robert,



I hate to break it to you, but the guy who wrote the "perfect economy" tract suffers from the illusion that interest (even if only on money borrowed and not goods) is an artificial construct. That is not the case.



Although the rates of interest may -- and frequently are -- set by artificial means, the phenomenon of interest is a fact of human nature. Interest reflect the preference of each person to have their money now as opposed to later. In order to equalize the value of money now vs money at some time in the future, a time-based multiplier is applied. That is interest.


Think about it, would you rather do an hour's work right now for $20 right now, or an hour's work now for $20 in six months? How about an hour's work now for $200 in six months? The farther away the payoff is from the time you fulfill your side of the bargain, the larger that payoff will have to be for it to be worth your while.


Interest can not (and should not) be done away with. Its level depends on the characteristics of each transaction -- in my example, I offered you a 0%, then a 2000% annual rate; perhaps we could have settled on a reasonabe middle number -- but it stems from the nature of human beings.

Justin,


"I hate to break it to you"...

But I'm the guy who wrote said "tract."

Cute signature and all, but I find your argument totally lacking of content or merit.



Since you care to take up the issue...


1. Can you name a single instance in all history where interest rates are not set up by artificial means?

For instance, ostensibly, Alan Greenspan and the private banker boys who call themselves the "Federal" "Reserve" have regulated interest rates to stave inflation. How much "natural" interest would, does, and has prevented inflation -- by either the traditional definition, "an increase in circulation per goods and services" or the more common later definition, "increased prices/costs of commerce"?

I'd enjoy your answer, and will present further arguments for whatever you answer.


2. I have a few problems with your definitions in the claim interest is a fact of nature. First of all, interest free economies (REAL economies, not subject to deprivation by interest) have existed throughout history. You say, "Interest reflect the preference of each person to have their money now as opposed to later."

How do you think it is your money? The circulation is borrowed into existence, and as such is evidence of a debt. It is not something you own, though of course it may be found in your possession. Every dollar in existence must be repaid to the central banks which issue it, with interest. How do you consider the consequence of that arrangement natural -- particularly if, for a home for instance, I would prefer to trade a measure of work equal to the home to own it? How do you figure it is a natural arrangement that a third party, which contributes nothing either to the creation of the home or the work I should do to acquire it, issue the evidence of my debt to the home builder for a profit?

And if you should answer in the affirmative, how do you weigh, in any natural terms whatever, that what we do pay (in "natural" rates of interest) is justified?


3. Your offhand critique of mathematically perfected economy I note makes no reference whatever to whether in fact the prescribed MPE is a singular solution for inflation, deflation, mutable value, impeded prosperity, and the inherent multiplication of debt by interest. yet you dismiss it offhand?

If inflation and deflation are defined as increases or decreases in circulation per goods and services respectively, and the consequences are recognized to be detrimental, then how do you disagree it is impossible to avoid inflation and deflation, as well as mutable value, unless we maintain a circulation always, at every moment, exactly equal to the current value of goods and services?

This is really not a difficult concept to grasp.

Given no other prescription for regulating the circulation avoids inflation and deflation, then it follows we must pay for our consumption as we consume of it. This does not mean "you cannot have 'your' money now," as you put it. Under both systems, the present, and mathematically perfected economy, circulation is introduced as a debt.

Under systems subject to "interest" it is mathematically impossible to maintain a circulation free to be devoted to commerce, equal to the current value of goods and services, because, merely to maintain a circulation, the subjects of the system must re-borrow payments against principal and interest as subsequent debts increased so much as periodic interest.

To perpetually and irreversibly multiply debt in proportion to commerce has one consequence. Can you tell us what that consequence is, if it is not system-wide collapse under insoluble debt -- and if you say it is not system-wide insoluble debt under your "natural" system, can you tell us exactly how the system can avoid system-wide insoluble debt by perpetual, irreversible multiplication of debt in proportion to commerce?

It is only possible to avoid this multiplication of debt by eliminating "interest." The difference in the systems is, on the one hand, MPE replicates the natural condition of one party's promise to pay being their promise to pay. That is, society cannot benefit, particularly as interest engenders perpetually multiplied cost, by a third party, producing nothing, and "guaranteeing" the promise to pay is any better -- particularly when that third party's unearned "interest" multiplies the commitment of the debtor, and at all times (as all the circulation is evidence of debt SUBJECT TO [FURTHER] INTEREST), there is never so much circulation as sufficient to satisfy the full obligation of existent debt. (None of the circulation is introduced as the interest consequent to all of the circulation -- introduced as debt).

Altering the proportion of circulation free to sustain commerce in relation to the current value of commerce, of course, alters the value of all things. Shall the man who saves be punished? Shall he build a house today (and save so much) only to have it reduced to nothing tomorrow? How is that natural or desirable?

Is it more natural or desirable to pay 10 and 20 and perpetually more times over for a home? Why? Why is the obligation to pay to be multiplied for the profit of a further party which contributes nothing to prosperity?

There is one prescription and one prescription only by which we pay for production with an equal measure of production; where value is not manipulated/altered; where there is no inflation and deflation; and where there is no multiplication of debt by interest. All new prosperity/production is financed by further introductions of circulation. The circulation is paid to the producer and a debt is assumed by the consumer (as is the present arrangement); and the debt is paid at the rate of consumption -- and only to the degree of consumption.

For example, in the case of a $100,000 home with a hundred-year lifespan, the producer of the home is paid with a $100,000 debt assumed by the consumer of the home. The home is paid at the rate of depreciation -- which is the rate of consumption -- or at the rate of $1,000 per year, or $83.33 per month.

Everything you pay above that, and however many times over, each successive time that house is sold, is to a party which produces nothing, and which contributes nothing to prosperity. How do you figure that is natural -- or even necessary?

Such a battle was fought at the establishment of this country. In summarizing his remarks over that contest, Thomas Jefferson said, If the American People EVER allow the bankers to issue their currency, the banks and [bank-owned] corporations that WILL [only] grow up around them WILL deprive the people of all property, UNTIL their children wake up homeless on the continent their fathers established.

There is little wonder what homelessness, bankruptcy, etc. is natural -- for a true sustainable commerce -- how much would it impede prosperity? How instable is a system which truly provides for all accomplishable commerce to be sustained? How natural is it the economies of the entire world can be felled repeatedly by "interest?"

And how intelligent is it for man to suffer those same consequences over and over again, when solution is readily accomplished instead.



Remarkable ditty in your signature.

I got this e-mail yesterday from a woman I used to correspond with about stocks back in 1999 I had sent an e-mail with my views early in 2000 (she knew I was working ona book about the stock market):

Hi, Mike, I still keep your notes and see how would play out. And you are
right, and things coming out with 2 finally and 1 will follow soon.
No matter how you win or lose, your theoritical thinking are still quite
right. Hope you had made good money shorting stock from last few years.


>From: Michael.A.Alexander@am.pnu.com
>To: "Ginn Hua" <greedy_woman@hotmail.com>
>Subject: Re[2]: signalwatch
>Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2000 09:06:24 -0500
>
>
> I no longer form a view on the short term position of the market. I
> made my stand last fall and was swept away. I will never make market
> bets again.
>
> Here is my view of the longer term. We are in a mania. Manias do not
> end spontaneously. They never have and they never will. Only three
> things can stop a mania:
>
> 1. Investors simply run out of money (this is a function of money
> supply, investors will never run out as long as Greenspan keeps money
> easy).
>
> 2. The mania is derailed by some shocking outside influence. For
> example, fraud is revealed by several leading companies who have
> doctored their books to make it look like earnings were still growing.
>
> 3. The fundamentals finally change. If the market keeps rising, so
> will interest rates. Inflation will come back. If it plays out this
> way the NASDAQ could fall 60-80%.
>
> I was acting on (1) last fall. I bet on the short side thinking
> Greenspan was going to reign in the markets (there was a possibility
> of a crash or at least a sharp correction if he tried this). Instead
> he flooded the markets with liquidity in October and I got crushed.
>
> I have no faith in Greenspan any longer. After all if he tries (1) we
> might get a crash and then everybody would blame him. If he waits for
> (3) we might get (2) instead and Greenspan is off the hook. Even if
> we end up with (3), the fall will be caused by the economy not
> Greenspan.
>
> Greenspan is not a fool, nor is he a bad guy. He still hopes that
> this market will spontaneously correct before the economic data forces
> it to (and maybe it will--I hope so). It sure doesn't seem to want
> to, though. It is possible that he was spooked by y2k and that is why
> he flooded the market with cash and crushed me like a bug.
>
> If this is the case he will start hiking agressively this year until
> the NASDAQ corrects hard. But I will believe that when I see it.

[Mike Montague:] Your offhand critique of mathematically perfected economy I note makes no reference whatever to whether in fact the prescribed MPE is a singular solution for inflation, deflation, mutable value, impeded prosperity, and the inherent multiplication of debt by interest. yet you dismiss it offhand?

[Mike A:] Could you provide the precise reference for this MPE singlular solution? I went to your site and saw no formal presentation of the theory.

The relevant section appears to be thus:

Mathematic solution of economy.

Obligatory introductory page proving mathematically perfected economy and its practical application.

Concluding arguments demonstrate "economies" subject to currencies which are interest-bearing debt, ultimately terminate themselves under insoluble debt.

Mathematically perfected economy is the singular solution to the irreversible multiplication of debt inherent to central bank "economies."

Expeditious adoption of mathematically perfected economy is vital to averting not only the incredible toll of oppression inflicted across the world by so-called central bank systems, but the ultimate state of insoluble debt inherent to every such system.


http://www.perfecteconomy.com/princi...d-economy.html

This link just sends you back to the same page. Where is the "Obligatory introductory page proving mathematically perfected economy and its practical application."?

Addressing mike montagne's points:

1. Can you name a single instance in all history where interest rates are not set up by artificial means?



Sure. I once lent a friend of mine $750.00 at 1/2% monthly interest. Now, I didn't ask for periodic payments, because I knew how broke he was, but a year later, he paid me back $796 (I forgave him the 26 cents). No one dictated this rate to us. It's what each of us agreed on in that particular situation.



2. I have a few problems with your definitions in the claim interest is a fact of nature. First of all, interest free economies (REAL economies, not subject to deprivation by interest) have existed throughout history. You say, "Interest reflect the preference of each person to have their money now as opposed to later."

How do you think it is your money? The circulation is borrowed into existence, and as such is evidence of a debt. It is not something you own, though of course it may be found in your possession. Every dollar in existence must be repaid to the central banks which issue it, with interest. How do you consider the consequence of that arrangement natural -- particularly if, for a home for instance, I would prefer to trade a measure of work equal to the home to own it? How do you figure it is a natural arrangement that a third party, which contributes nothing either to the creation of the home or the work I should do to acquire it, issue the evidence of my debt to the home builder for a profit?

And if you should answer in the affirmative, how do you weigh, in any natural terms whatever, that what we do pay (in "natural" rates of interest) is justified?




Alright. To your first point, I say, 'true', but not in the way you seem to mean it. The FRN's we currently use for money are not really money and are not really owned by the individuals who carry them. Let's then remove FRN's from the equation.



We use money as a substitute for directly useable goods. It allows us to trade our goods and/or labor more widely and to accomodate trades of vastly unequal things. I may raise cows, but how likely is it that a car salesman will want to trade his car for cows? Money lets you easily short-circuit the dozens of transactions which might be necessary to trade what you have for what you want. It need not be in the form of FRN's (though it has been for decades now)



Having already agreed that 'my' FRN's are not really mine, I must insist that the items I trade for them (cows) or for which I trade them (car) are, or become mine. If I avoid using FRN's, and pay with salt, cowries, or gold, there is never a 'break' in my posession of the value of my goods.



In short, while I do dispute the power of the printers of FRN's to siphon off some of the value of my posessions (while I keep them in FRN form), that is an issue almost completely outside your MPE.



Finally, with regards to the house-purchasing scenario you outline, I would say: You are trying to trade something of yours (work or money or cows or whatever) for something belonging to another person (a house). Generally a person is going to want to be comensated for giving you their house as soon as they lose use of it -- that is, once you move in. If you don't have the goods to trade at the time of occupying the house, you will need to either get (borrow) them from somewhere, or be able to come to some sort of arrangement with the seller. Interest comes in because you propose to take something now, with nothing to trade for it now.


As an aside, I assume you realize that rates on mortgages are not set by (nor do they frequently follow) the FED rates. They are set by thousnads of private lenders making offers acceptable to them to thousands of borrowers looking for terms they like.

3. Your offhand critique of mathematically perfected economy I note makes no reference whatever to whether in fact the prescribed MPE is a singular solution for inflation, deflation, mutable value, impeded prosperity, and the inherent multiplication of debt by interest. yet you dismiss it offhand?

If inflation and deflation are defined as increases or decreases in circulation per goods and services respectively, and the consequences are recognized to be detrimental, then how do you disagree it is impossible to avoid inflation and deflation, as well as mutable value, unless we maintain a circulation always, at every moment, exactly equal to the current value of goods and services?



All I can say to this is: the value of a thing depends on who own it and who wants it. There is no such thing as an objective price value. Go to an auction to discover this fact.



To perpetually and irreversibly multiply debt in proportion to commerce has one consequence. Can you tell us what that consequence is, if it is not system-wide collapse under insoluble debt -- and if you say it is not system-wide insoluble debt under your "natural" system, can you tell us exactly how the system can avoid system-wide insoluble debt by perpetual, irreversible multiplication of debt in proportion to commerce?



One possible answer is "growth of capital stock". Its one of the reasons why we don't have to hand-forge the nails we use to build things.

<snip the rest>

One question for you.

As I read your post, I began to wonder if we are even speaking the same language. Please provide for me, as concisely as possible, your definitions of these words:

-Economy

-Commerce

-Property

Thanks

Subject: Den of Thieves

Did anybody watch the Senate interrogation of Ken Lay today? It was hilarious! These corrupt, evil old Senators sat there and as much as accused Lay of being a thief. They're just as stupid and avaricious as Lay is. They should be as ashamed as he is. They enabled his perfidy.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Robert on 2002-02-12 18:47 ]</font>

RE: Subject: Den of Thieves

Well, yes they (the Senators) did do that...

Yeah, so what? Do they not yet maintain the upper hand (ie., the moral uprightness of government v. capitalists).

What leg has any man or beast to stand on in front of men whom Mike Alexander, you and the left et al, deem above reproach (insomuch as compared to Microsoft, Big Business, Easy Al, Entrenched Interest etc etc...)

I mean, come come folks. When does the institution of these government jerks and moneied interests and lobbied Big Buckers really make you question the notion of just who has the upper hand...

He who holds a gun (Senator whatshisname), or the con-artist (Gates/Lay)?





<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Marc S. Lamb on 2002-02-12 19:17 ]</font>

Comments at end:

On 2002-02-12 04:54, Mike Alexander '59 wrote:
I got this e-mail yesterday from a woman I used to correspond with about stocks back in 1999 I had sent an e-mail with my views early in 2000 (she knew I was working ona book about the stock market):

Hi, Mike, I still keep your notes and see how would play out. And you are
right, and things coming out with 2 finally and 1 will follow soon.
No matter how you win or lose, your theoritical thinking are still quite
right. Hope you had made good money shorting stock from last few years.


>From: Michael.A.Alexander@am.pnu.com
>To: "Ginn Hua" <greedy_woman@hotmail.com>
>Subject: Re[2]: signalwatch
>Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2000 09:06:24 -0500
>
>
> I no longer form a view on the short term position of the market. I
> made my stand last fall and was swept away. I will never make market
> bets again.
>
> Here is my view of the longer term. We are in a mania. Manias do not
> end spontaneously. They never have and they never will. Only three
> things can stop a mania:
>
> 1. Investors simply run out of money (this is a function of money
> supply, investors will never run out as long as Greenspan keeps money
> easy).
>
> 2. The mania is derailed by some shocking outside influence. For
> example, fraud is revealed by several leading companies who have
> doctored their books to make it look like earnings were still growing.
>
> 3. The fundamentals finally change. If the market keeps rising, so
> will interest rates. Inflation will come back. If it plays out this
> way the NASDAQ could fall 60-80%.
>
> I was acting on (1) last fall. I bet on the short side thinking
> Greenspan was going to reign in the markets (there was a possibility
> of a crash or at least a sharp correction if he tried this). Instead
> he flooded the markets with liquidity in October and I got crushed.
>
> I have no faith in Greenspan any longer. After all if he tries (1) we
> might get a crash and then everybody would blame him. If he waits for
> (3) we might get (2) instead and Greenspan is off the hook. Even if
> we end up with (3), the fall will be caused by the economy not
> Greenspan.
>
> Greenspan is not a fool, nor is he a bad guy. He still hopes that
> this market will spontaneously correct before the economic data forces
> it to (and maybe it will--I hope so). It sure doesn't seem to want
> to, though. It is possible that he was spooked by y2k and that is why
> he flooded the market with cash and crushed me like a bug.
>
> If this is the case he will start hiking agressively this year until
> the NASDAQ corrects hard. But I will believe that when I see it.

Yes, we finally had 2 (911 and then Enron, which you foreshadowed), but didn't the NASDAQ start crashing the ~60% you forsaw back in March 2000? What changed then? Did Greenspan start raising interest rates too quickly back then (case 1) or did the market sense a change in the fundamentals (3)? It's been a while and I've forgotten the details.

Also, didn't the archetypal mania (the Tulip Mania) end when a sailor mistook a valuable tulip bulb for an onion and started to eat it, signaling to all the speculators that the whole enterprise was silly?

I continue to be impressed by these posts. They're deep and meaningful. Where else can you find such diverse interpretations of history and the future? Just one little peep, though:

Mike Montagne--nature does not know PERFECTION, not even MATHEMATICAL PERFECTION. Kurt G?del crushed that notion like a grape with his Incompleteness Theorem: no system of natural laws or numbers can be proved independently from the same system of natural laws and numbers. He was a bad bully, and he was right! Try this out, for example: I?m a T4T chatster, and all T4T chatsters are liars.

Every human construct is self-referential: math, science, religion, tiddlywinks. and the Fed. There is no mathematically perfect economic system?but I credit you for putting out another interesting idea.

I Ching?s ?Grace?: ?The perfection of the heavens has put stars in your eyes.?

I get nervous when any solution to a problem is termed-perfect.

These posts make me wonder if, ultimately, America?s economy will evolve away from capitalism and into some form of extreme socialism, like Denmark?s maybe; or, more likely, we will fight the frontier wars forever, as holy nations do, and become the newest version of the West Bank.

Subject: American Socialism

The United States is already a socialist country and has been since the Roosevelt Administration. No one will admit this, we operate under the fiction that we are a Capitalist country to protect our sensibilities (I call it The Socialism That Dare Not Speak It's Name).

During the next crisis we'll go on to Communism. We haven't tried that yet and that's the next step on the road to oblivion we seem determined to travel. The USA of the 2050's will resemble the USSR of the 1950's complete with secret police and gulags. Read the papers, we're pretty much there already.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Robert on 2002-02-14 11:37 ]</font>

Robert--To a large extent, I fear you're right. Add overpopulation and environmental exacerbations to that, and...Katie, bar the door!

Didn't the old historians like, Toynby and Sorokin, see it as : Monarchy-->Aristocracy-->Democracy-->Anarchy-->Dictoatorship, something like that?

On 2002-02-14 12:17, Croaker'39 wrote:
I fear you're right.

Froggies usually don't follow the fear path, do the?