The Clusterfuck Nation Chronicle

Commentary on the Flux of Events

It seems to me that the next week or so could be a turning point in US (and global) economic circumstances. Yesterday, with confidence sagging in American economic leadership, the dollar fell to near parity with the euro. When it reaches parity (1 dollar = 1 euro), and then passes it (1 dollar = 1+x euros) then the outflow of foreign investment in US securities turns into a hemmorhagic fever, and the world heads into a terra incognita of extreme financial and economic turbulence. Global trade relations fall into disorder, a tidal wave of defaults flushes through the sewer of bad loans (especially in the cloaca of home mortgages), more companies evaporate, pension funds go up in a vapor, standards of living crumple, institutions and governments totter. This is all apart from the potential aggravations of our War Against Terrorism (and Terrorism's War Upon US).

What I'm describing is a possible severe acceleration of trends that have, until now, been happening in slow motion -- the fall after the long wobble. The unwinding in the US is liable to be especially severe, since American misbehavior, greed, and economic recklessness are behind the misallocation of global resources that demands now to be corrected. It seems to me that much of the wealth left after the workout will end up in Europe.

Europe is in a position to remain civilized in the 21st century. Europe did not destroy its cities. Europe has excellent multi-modal transportation systems. Europe still has appropriately-scaled food production and industrial enterprises that operate with a sense of social responsibility.

America may not know what hit it. The US has been sleepwalking into this clusterfuck in a rapture of infotainment and recreational shopping, and it will be disoriented when it wakes up in the howling storm. We will find ourselves stranded in a dysfunctional infrastructure of unaffordable and unsustainable suburbs, with cities that don't work, without a workable public transport system, with an angry population of foreclosed house owners with gun collections. Duck and cover.