July 18, 2011, Numerology? Astrology? Scatology?
S&P, it seems, has concluded there is risk of U.S. sovereign default even if the debt ceiling is raised by Congressional action. Of course, on the debt ceiling issue, most people, according to polls, blame the Republicans.
What does any of this mean? Damned if I know. Precious metals... probably. Canned goods, bottled water, secure farm land, useful social relationships, bicycle parts... for sure. Ammunition? Maybe we've come that far. Let's hope not.
Anyway.
We appear to have a political process that has become a suicide watch... and, because we have a media that is itself dominated by a criminal enterprise, even while it presents us with bread and circuses (and incompetent circuses at that)... it sure does look that way.
OK then. Italy's financial system could be about to blow. Greece, Ireland and Portugal are already zombies... but Italy, the EU's third largest economy, blows the rest away... and Spain, at 12% of the EU's economy, is also in deep trouble... even without the United States, where we have a right-wing Democratic President struggling to slash entitlements and social benefits faster than the Republicans can think of even more right-wing things (but heavens if we cut the military, reduce corporate welfare, or even "increase revenues" a little... as it seems, we have a bipartisan suicide pact... I know what you're thinking-- "the Republicans are worse"... Really? Please tell me, then, why it was so important for Obama to grant the Republicans their wet-dream of extending the Bush tax cuts last year, or retaining Bernanke (not to mention Sec Def Bob Gates and the ever expanding imperial wars) if he weren't really on the same pageas his Republican counterparts?
In short... this "debt ceiling thing" is just another kabuki, like everything else in Washington (home of quite a few cherry trees, another gift from Japan). Just as the threat of financial armageddon three years ago was used as an excuse for the most massive wealth transfer (up... to the financial class) in human history, otherwise known as "the financial bail out", the present "crisis" will be used as a "gun to the head" excuse to do what Obama has wanted to do since he came to office brandishing the "cat food commission"... and, as Bill Clinton "ended welfare as we know it" (and was rewarded with over $100 million in post-presidential emoluments)... that being to slash and burn both the New Deal and the Great Society in one-fell-swoop, all while leaving the military industrial complex fully in place. Just think of the speaking fees and hedge fund deals!
The problem with this Onion piece... is it's not really funny. Is it? Of course, it assumes even a little relevance on the part of my old college classmate Barack... and that may be too much right there.
Crazy times... but don't think that even amidst the [mass suicidal] lunacy... it won't be "bid'ness as usual."