The Bus Bench

Depatterning Societies, Anarchy, Pure Capitalism and The Stench of Semantics

In Naomi Klein's not-so-shocking title titled "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism," the shock is that it seems shocking.
Indeed, one should be shocked that the rest of the world outside the western world, or at least the U.S., wonders why Milton Friedman's desire for a "state of pure capitalism" is merely a gentleman's way of introducing anarchism. To let the market dictate the ways and means would be one hell of a circus about bread, except that the circus-goers tend to pay whatever price those in power advocating "pure capitalism" desire. And it is these same folk what make such a hue and cry about the abominations of violent dictators who wiggle from out of their capitalist control.
To be sure, I am not advocating the abolition of any western government, nor anarchy of any stripe (anarchy, after all, is based in a responsibility to self; "anarchy" is not possible in a western world where even fat crayons are beyond the comprehension of the middle class) or any fashion of new idiocy.
A daily 99¢ burger at the local fast-food joint is a bargain to none other than junkies; the small bit of change saved for the day will be compounded by the dreadful paucity of quickly diminishing health. Milton, were he still alive, would not hesitate to inform such a fool as what thinks a few dollars a day at the local "fry & die" is done in the name of not spending money for "expensive" food, that the health benefits would be well into the red.

Bon appetit.

-BusTard

U.S.A. on Fast-Track to Be Canada’s Bitch

On September 21st, ere the Equinox, Canada celebrated the end of its own long day: the end of the dollar’s dominance over the long-laughed-at loonie. The canadian dollar, which has sat deep in the shadows of the american dollar since 1976, seems to no longer harbour cause for alarm the decades-olde threat of "51st statehood." Now it may be the canadians laughing as the dollar becomes the new "north american peso."
Eleven years after the brief country-wide spate of twoonie-popping (prompted by the easily disengaged centre by merely dropping the damned gaff on concrete or an equally firm surface), the loonie (the basic canadian dollar from which the two-dollar coin took its name) has turned a strong feather and all but eaten the diminishing american eagle. The "parity parties" have only begun to stop. Said soirees might well have continued were it not for the encroaching shopping season that will, I wager, bring canucks streaming south like semi-soused hunters in search of the moose what drank the lion's share of last night's left-over Black Label, eh?
But that is no longer news. What should be news is: why was it NOT news then? The rest of the world knew. Wall Street knew. The Financial Times, the wire services, those with something to lose—they all knew. Hell, pretty much EVERYONE knew—save the U.S.
There is no doubt that with China building its navy in ways that remain unreported in the U.S., the so-called civil unrest in Myanmar (it is not because monks and journalists are being killed; look to the poppy markets in Afghanistan and the oil conflicts round there as well as in east Russia near China) and the on-going money pit in Iraq (who knows if more money is going to Eric Prince/Blackwater/zealous religious right or to the loyal opposition: the equally repulsive albeit brutally effective and no less fanatical facets of islam?) and the financial tide of NAFTA doing what all big waves do (get sucked back out to sea), the U.S. is looking at more fronts than Hitler dared to shake a stick at in 1944 as he marched to Leningrad.
Along with the housing bubble bursting, I can only suggest to those who have not wasted their life savings on the American dream that a small cache of reliable firearms is the best way to defend a large library of good books, decent scotch and any edibles.
After all, you do not want to end up re-living—in real-life—the ending of “A Boy and His Dog,” now do you?

BusTard