The 'World is Flat' Emperors of the Universe-types of their day were preaching with Messianic certainty that the trade and financial interconnections were so broad that they mitigated against any possible disruption.

They were utterly and absolutely wrong. Their modern successors are even more delusional.

The current structures are so mutually contingent and so dependent upon the absurd assertion that risk can, if passed around and around sufficiently, simply be made to vanish from the world of the possible. It's all a dangerous illusion.

The slightest ripple does indeed have the potential to become a tidal wave.

Remember Robert W. Sarnoff's classic definition of finance: 'Finance is the art of passing currency from hand to hand until it finally disappears.'

"Day by day, thousands of grifters are making huge digital dollar profits on abstract financial plays in a global virtual casino. None of these plays has much to do with anything of real and enduring value. They're just scoring points on consolidations of ailing industries, on turns of the interest and currency differentials wheel-of-fortune, abstruse shorting strategies, and similar non-productive shenanigans." - James Howard Kunstler

more than one star?

Bravo, sir.

"Biodiversity and human well-being just cannot be separated."

Dr Kaveh Zahedi, World Conservation Monitoring Centre

I remain unconvinced that humanity has ever come close to achieving civilized societies.

Or ever will.

"The discovery of America was the occasion of the greatest outburst of cruelty and reckless greed known in history." Joseph Conrad.

Certainly we have remained true to our founding principles.

that there's any discussion of raising memorials to him in Chile.

'The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.' - John Kenneth Galbraith

And Milton Friedman provided the blueprint.

Well, gee...

'It is unclear how much longer the world will trade Americans real goods for pieces of paper that the US economy cannot redeem with tradable goods and services.'

Paul Craig Roberts: 'Artificial recovery, real job losses'

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=27414&mode=&order=0

See also:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/28/business/28tax.html?ref=business

’04 Income in U.S. Was Below 2000 Level

By DAVID CAY JOHNSTON

Published: November 28, 2006

'Still, those very top households, which include about 300,000 Americans, reported significantly more pretax income combined than the poorest 120 million Americans earned in 2004, the data show. This was a sharp change from 1979, the oldest year examined by the I.R.S., when the thin slice at the top received about one-third of the total income of the big group at the bottom.'

who vote for progressives should just curl up and die?

You have a 'Progressive Relocation Program' for us?

And to think I quite literally risked life and limb to campaign for George McGovern and civil rights.

What was I thinking?

than to be allowed to go about my normal daily life without grossly snarled traffic, stores full of anxious, over-stressed and irritable to the point of explosive rage shoppers, and the bizarre expectation that one has some obligation to be jolly regardless of one's personal circumstances.

I'd like to find one of those peace symbol wreaths though. Although I am an atheist, I subscribe to the belief that 'Peace and Goodwill' is a worthy and humanistic aspiration whatever the season.

'If Christ were here now there is one thing he would not be - a Christian' - Mark Twain

the vast degradation of lakes, streams and oceans due to petrochemical runoff from modern industrial farming. The dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Oregon are huge and growing. Where is that costed in?

As to this:

"There is plenty of evidence that human population growth rates slow when countries develop and that family size is inversely proportional to the social, educational, and economic status of women."

That does seem to be in touch with the reality of current immigration patterns in which the tendency of developed countries to limit their fertility rates is completely overwhelmed by mass immigration of high fertility populations utterly opposed to higher social, educational and economic status of women.

That there will eventually be widespread violent social, economic, and political strife over already overburdened resources is a given because we're on a trajectory of population growth which is simply unsustainable.

"The foreign investment community is fickle; it exhibits all the composure of a starving cat hopped up on crystal meth."

Well and vividly said, sir.

That's the tiny fragment of amusement to be found in wildly accelerating rate at which we are all being ushered into financial panic hell.

The Chairman of Goldman Sachs has his $53 million bonus and may deign to wave to us as he passes in his limo on the way to his private jet.

Emerging Markets Turmoil

The 15% meltdown in the Bangkok bourse following currency-control measures highlights the volatility of developing markets as the dollar swoons

by Brian Bremner

http://businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/dec2006/gb20061219_925267.htm?

chan=top+news_top+news+index_global+business

http://www.rgemonitor.com/blog/setser/169100

Brad Setser's always excellent blog. |

Sorry 'bout that.

I confess I don't click every link.