Long time readers -- and those who have delved into my archives -- know that I was, for a time, a columnist in the Rapid River Literary Magazine. Back when I started this blog (over 700 posts ago), I "introduced" myself by reprinting a few of those columns. Some of them were general, and some specific, and I posted the general ones here for the two people who were reading me back then. If you're interested, you can click on the Tag (AKA Label, AKA Category): Rapid River, and read the ones that I posted. Anyway....
One of them was about the "Impending Doom" of Y2K. Remember that? We were all going to be catapulted back into the Stone Age because computer programmers didn't think ahead back in the 1970's, and only had 2 digits in the year columns. Yeah, that happened. So, the main thrust of that article was... not correct. Part of it, however, has become relevant in today's Economic situation, so I figured I'd post it here (with a couple of word changes in brackets):
A much more likely possibility, in my opinion, is that the giant herd of cattle and sheep we call Civilization will be scared by all this talk of [Economic Disaster and Depression] and will lose its collective shit. You think I'm loopy? That's how the Great Depression [of 1929] started. A couple a guys on Wall Street got nervous and sold off some stock to cover their margins, the people buying those shares did the same and a landslide resulted that threw the entire world into a depression. All it will take is for the herd to lose faith in the dollar and everything will collapse. Life in America will not be like "The Waltons", it will be more like The Grapes of Wrath mated with Red Dawn.
Do something for me. Pick up that dollar you are going to leave as a tip and look at it for a moment. How much is it worth? Why? The answers are, 1) "A dollar" and 2) "Because it says so right on it and we all believe it". Is that gallon of milk at the grocery store, that you will pay [$4.69] to purchase, any different from the gallon of milk for which John Boy Walton would have paid 20 cents at Ike Godsey's store? Not really. I know, I know, inflation is inevitable, blah, blah, blah.
Do yourselves a favor, folks. Start working on a barter network (there are lots around already if you look) and plan an escape route. The Self-Perpetuating End-Of-The-World Government-Promoted ... Thing could hit hard and fast.
By the way, that was part of my very first column (August 1999). And I was asked to keep writing. Heh.
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