Image above: "Wormhole" animation by Eric Lindahl. From (http://www.mnartists.org/work.do?rid=164912).
Now we get to the really fun part of the global unwind where even money flowing into supposedly safe havens turns, presto change-o, into an evaporation of wealth, and all of the lawyer-lobbyists who ever double-parked on K Street in the sorry history of this frantic era will not avail to contain the demons of their own design.
The world is waiting to re-learn an old lesson: that untruth and reality exist in an adversarial relationship. Sad to say, there isn't enough legal infrastructure in the world, nor enough time, to pass judgment on all the lies and misrepresentations that burden the current edition of what passes for civilization. This goes especially for money matters, where currencies, certificates, and contracts actually have to represent what they purport to stand for. When those relationships fail, as they have been doing for some years now, everything falls apart.
This is what comes of evading the enforcement of norms and standards and of running exchanges without clearing operations. The response to this mischief in deeds such as the Dodd-Frank so-called financial reform act only heaps more hyper-complex untruth on the smoldering compost of prior intentional falsities. It all seems so hopelessly abstract that even thoughtful citizens can't muster the means to object until that magic moment when, say, the supermarket shelves go empty or nobody will accept the green paper cluttering up your billfold.
For all the epic volume of blather on the Internet and elsewhere, few have even remarked on extraordinary passivity of the vulgar masses in the face of having their future looted out from under them. The ethos of the penitentiary must have saturated the zeitgeist wherein you are expected to just bend over and take it good and hard where the sun don't shine and then you are rewarded with a baloney sandwich. At least that's been the theme since 2008.
The way things are lining up, though, it might be a whole different story when the two political parties convene this summer for their nominating rigmarole. I remain convinced that these fatuous rites will meet with disruption. Of course, both parties deserve an equal dose of citizen-generated shock and awe. Both parties need to be rebuked, humiliated, and probably dismantled so that this country can get on with the business of trying to become civilized. Charlotte, NC, (the Democrats) and Tampa, FLA, (Republicans) are the venues for these dumbshows. I hope to be there running a pitchfork concession.
Meanwhile, as what many observers call a "global slowdown" reveals itself to be a compressive collapse of faith in a system plagued by deception and pranged by massive cross-defaults, political uproar will rage through Europe and set the stage for emulation in the USA. Angela Merkel made a funny over the weekend: something about constructing a European fiscal union.
That has about the same chance of happening as Mrs. Merkel becoming a pole dancer when her party gets tossed out of leadership not many months down the line. All the nations where people wear clothing are in desperate trouble. Their debt problems are insoluble and they're out of accounting tricks. Events are running way ahead of institutions and personalities.
Speaking of which, what dogs me more and more every day is how come Jon Corzine is still at large six months after mugging MF Global's customers, and what is the status of JP Morgan's "London Whale" fiasco now that the news media have conveniently stopped following the story. Have the losses blown past $5 billion? Or is that just one little tuft of yarn which, when yanked, will unravel the entire skein of world banking?
Well, it's party season in the Hamptons now and the gentlemen responsible for these misdeeds are busy nibbling the sea urchin roe and cucumber tidbits, I suppose, and it would be unkind to ask them to testify before a congressional subcommittee or, jeepers, a grand jury.
Ever wonder what it might be like to live in a world without consequences? Well, you've had a good look at it for more than a couple of years. How did it work out? What did you get away with? And how do you plan to hang onto it?
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