AMERICAN GOTTERDAMMERUNG

This post is a Sticky. It will remain here until the alleged bailout by Congress has been approved.

Update, Friday October 3, 2008:

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I’ve seen posts elsewhere by people stating they’d rather see the collapse of the entire economic system instead of having the current alleged bailout go through. They believe they could live through the consequences of that.

They are so wrong.

Get Depression 1.0 out of your head right now.

We are not that people. We are not that population.

A collapse on the scale we are in danger of right now is unprecedented in all of human history. There is absolutely nothing else to compare it to. This is a strange land we have never before visited.

I’m going to take you through a tour of this possible future. I intend to scare the living shit out of you in doing so. I do it not of out some perverse glee. I do it to try to wake all of you up to the very real and probable calamity ahead.

This is some of what we will face. I’m not intending to be comprehensive here. Much more will happen that just this. The longer it continues, the worse it will get. Consider this a glimpse of the opening act.

1) You have no money. You think you do. What you have in the bank is gone. You need to understand this point first and most of all. Your money became collateral. It’s been loaned out easily over one hundred times, most probably even more. For every dollar you think you have in the bank, there’s probably only a penny or a fraction thereof left that you can claim. What about FDIC insurance? Forget it. It can’t handle every bank account. And that’s what’s happening here: total collapse. All money zeroed out.

2) Your cash on hand will not go far. Prices will inflate immediately and ferociously. Food will skyrocket most of all. Because everyone needs to eat — and nobody can eat money.

3) All ATMs will stop working. So that money in the bank you still thought you had? It’s gone. The system is dead. The ATMs were the pulse of the financial circulatory system — and that system has had a fatal heart attack and dropped dead.

4) The initial stupid glee people will feel over their “liberation” from the system will be gone within the first 48-72 hours. Because everyone will be stuck at home. There’s no longer a job to go to. And all you self-employed people? You’re fired too. There’s no longer any market for what you were selling, so save your energy. You will need it to maintain your very existence.

5) You will no longer be able to sleep at night. Because of the sound of gunfire. All those people who have already been worse off than you? Hey, they have kids. And those kids need food. And during this time, a gun has become the new ATM card. Withdrawals will initially take place at night. It won’t only be the sound of gunfire keeping you awake, there will be the sirens too. Police sirens. Fire engine sirens. Ambulance sirens. And the sound of burglar alarms and car alarms.

6) Food will become short. Everything is on a cash-only basis now. You think it’ll be a simple matter of lining up in front a supermarket hours (and it will be hours) before it opens? No. First, most supermarkets will be closed. There’s no staff left. And for the rare supermarket that does open — in the early days — do you think a supermarket manager will be stupid enough to let hundreds of people swarm in all at once? You’ll go in ten at a time. And before you’re allowed in, you’ll be hand-frisked by whatever few staff remains. That gun you brought to keep you safe? It will prevent you from getting food. You’ll be denied admittance. As it is, you’ll pray that a) you’ll get in before they close the doors, and b) that there’s something left to buy. Expect limits on what you can buy — but only after the lucky early ones have grabbed all they can still afford with cash on hand.

7) Lining up at a supermarket will make you a target. Your presence there will announce that you have cash on you. Expect to be shot for your money. You imagine it’ll be one person with a gun holding you up? Have you ever had the experience of opening up a cabinet in a slum apartment? Swarms of cockroaches run out. The cockroaches of society will likewise swarm out to steal from you. There will be carloads of people attacking the supermarket line. You’ll be lucky enough to get away with your life. You’ll never get that food you planned to get.

8) And if you do happen to be one of the lucky ones to get food, expect to never get home with it. If you’re not robbed in the supermarket parking lot on the way to your car, expect to be followed as you drive away. Your car will be rammed and you’ll be overrun by armed thieves who will shoot you first — and they’ll go for your head, so there’s no witness left — and then take your food.

9) Don’t expect electricity. I’m not saying your lights will be turned off for non-payment. That’s naive. I’m talking about the breakdown of the infrastructure. I’ll coin the term you’ll be hearing in this alternate awful future: micro-terrorism. All of you think terrorism means some madman with a bomb strapped to him. That’s the past. Micro-terrorism is this: you live in an area where your electricity and cable TV and telephone are delivered on old wooden posts? Expect bastards to go out there with chainsaws and take those poles down. This is micro-terrorism. An entire town’s or city’s lights don’t have to go out all at once. Terror can be done neighborhood-by-neighborhood. Hardly any of this will be political. It will be criminal. A population kept off balance is easy prey.

10) There will be no gasoline. Gasoline, like food, is delivered by truck. And many trucks will never, ever get to their destination. The highways will become overrun with hijackers. At some point, truckers will no longer move goods. What’s the point? Why should a trucker try to go several hundred miles to deliver food or gas when he can’t get either of those at home, for himself and his family?

11) Police? There aren’t enough police in the entire country to restore order once the rampage begins. In New York City, for example, most of the cops live in the suburbs. Do you think they’ll leave their families in jeopardy to keep order among a population they’ve daily shown contempt and hatred for?

12) You’ll smell smoke all the time. Something will always be burning somewhere. If it’s not an abandoned home, or a fire accidentally caused by candles (remember, no electricity), or people keeping warm with a fire in a metal barrel (hey, this is winter now, right?), it’ll be an outright act of micro-terrorism. Cars, tires, anything that can set alight. Burn baby burn. Burn it all down will be the sentiment.

13) There will be curfews. For you. Not for the criminals who will own the night. They have nothing to lose. They never wanted a stake in this country. They never lived by its rules. It’s open season for them to take whatever they want whenever they want.

14) National Guard? Did you see what happened in New Orleans with Katrina? What’s happened in Houston with Gustav? Those are just two cities. This is now national, every city. You’re on your own. Literally.

15) You’re isolated. No electricity means no Internet, no TV. And if you don’t have a hand-crank radio, you’ll run out of batteries. You won’t know what reality is because you’ve been cut off from the flow of information. You’ll hear nothing but rumor. And lies. None of it will be good and your daily sense of dread will eventually turn to gut-wrenching panic. You will have no rest. You can’t sleep at night. And you need to also be awake during the day to try to connect with people to see if anyone knows what’s really going on.

16) Imposters. That guy coming towards you in a cop uniform or National Guard uniform? He’s neither. He took those off of someone he killed. So you’d be fooled into trusting him. You won’t be able to trust anybody.

Do I need to continue? Is this enough for you to grasp the magnitude of the alternative we face? How many more words must I pour out? This should be enough.

If this hasn’t scared you, you’re not taking the gravity of the situation seriously.

And you’ll probably be one of the first to die.

All Chronicles of Depression 2.0 posts. How we got here.

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