The One-Hour Meltdown...credit to FLARPH for the article

The One-Hour Meltdown Copyright © July 22, 2009 by Robert Wayne Atkins, P.E. Introduction The following is just my opinion. It is nothing more than my opinion. I have nothing to substantiate or prove any aspect of my opinion. My opinion is simply the logical conclusion of a law-abiding sixty-year old Christian grandfather who has both an engineering degree and an M.B.A. degree and who has seen both good times and hard times during his life. The Current Situation: At the present time every nation in the entire world is facing serious financial and social stress. If only a few nations were involved then it might be possible to contain the upcoming meltdown to a few specific geographical areas. This has been successfully done in the past. However, since the entire world is currently on the edge of the cliff, when the meltdown begins it will impact almost everyone on the face of the earth. Unless God chooses to intervene, the meltdown is no longer avoidable. Our governments and our financial institutions are no longer in control. However, to keep the system working just a little longer they must maintain the illusion that they have the system under control. But the system is broken and it can't be fixed. There are two reasons why the system can't be fixed: 1. It has grown beyond its own capacity to support itself. 2. It has become so complex that no one can do anything significant to fix it because it is hemorrhaging in too many different places. The average person in every nation on the face of the earth knows the meltdown is coming. The wealthy people know it. The poor people know it. Nobody wants it to happen. But almost everyone is just patiently waiting for it to begin and at the same time hoping that it doesn't begin too soon. Nobody knows when the meltdown will actually start. It may begin one-month from now. Or a year from now. Or three-years from now. But almost everyone knows that at some future date the meltdown will occur. This widespread knowledge of the impending disaster is the reason that when the disaster begins it will quickly and completely spiral out-of-control in one-hour or less. In my opinion, most people do not seriously believe it could happen this quickly. Most people expect a more gradual meltdown. They may be right because nobody can predict the future, and that includes myself. The One-Hour Meltdown However, my personal opinion is that once the meltdown begins then in less than one-hour it will quickly escalate far beyond anyone's ability to control or manage it on a worldwide basis. The five basic assumptions that cause me to believe in my "one-hour meltdown theory" are as follows: 1. Banks: The financial institutions around the world cannot withstand a full-scale worldwide bank run. Therefore, they have already made plans to immediately shut down the instant they are told to do so. Within minutes, all across the globe, all the ATM machines will be offline, all credit card and debit card verification transactions will be halted, and all banks will have their vaults locked and their doors locked and their building emptied of all personnel, except perhaps for some special security guards. All high-level bank executives will immediately disappear to a wide variety of remote safe unknown locations. All telephone call inquiries to any of the financial institutions will be automatically answered by a computer with a pre-recorded message similar to the following: "Our system is currently experiencing an extremely high call volume and therefore we are unable to answer your call at this time. Please try again later when our call volume returns to normal." 2. Governments: The vast majority of our government leaders all over the world are relatively intelligent individuals. They completely understand the ramifications of a "bank holiday" in our computer controlled financial economy. Therefore, all government offices will also be immediately shut down, and they will empty their buildings and lock their doors. Any transaction in progress, including any trials in progress, will be immediately halted and postponed until some future date. All high-level government officials, including all judges and tax officials, will immediately disappear to a wide variety of remote safe unknown locations. 3. Retail Businesses: Since they will be unable to process even simple transactions, all retail establishments, both large and small, will immediately lock their doors to prevent anyone else from entering. If possible, they will complete any transactions for customers already inside their building if those customers have enough cash to pay for their purchases. Any customers wishing to pay by check or credit card or debit card will be told that the verification system is down and their transaction can't be completed. All customers will then be immediately escorted to the doors and the doors will be briefly opened and then immediately locked after they exit. In addition, in a manner similar to what happened during the World Trade Center meltdown, each store's management may demand that their employees remain at their stations until further notice or they will lose their jobs for leaving without management's permission. But most of the more intelligent employees will leave at the same time as the store's last few remaining customers. The store's special security guards may or may not remain behind in order to protect the store with their lives. Since most of these special security guards are not paid exceptionally well, a large number of them may decide that they should return home and protect their own families instead. 4. Criminals: Anyone and everyone who has any criminal tendencies and who has been patiently waiting for this to happen will immediately see it as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to improve their financial situation. More than likely the vast majority of these criminals have already made very detailed plans that includes exactly which businesses they are going to rob first, second, third, and so on. Any business with a reasonable level of cash-on-hand will be very high on every criminal's list. Every jewelry store and pawn shop that has any type of silver or gold jewelry, or precious stones (diamonds, rubies, emeralds, etc.), will be very high on everyone's list. The warfare that breaks out at these establishments between competing criminals will not be pleasant. 5. Normal People: Normal average people will begin looting. Grocery stores will be broken into and they will be completely emptied from wall-to-wall, including the rear storage area, in less than one-hour. Stores that have firearms, ammunition, appliances, clothing, shoes, or anything else needed by the average citizen will be emptied in less than one-hour. In skirmishes over the few remaining resources, normal average people will begin killing one another inside the stores, and in the parking lots outside the stores, and on the streets as these fully loaded vehicles try to escape with their loot. The above events will all happen simultaneously during the first one-hour of the meltdown. After that first hour has passed, things will really begin to get nasty. Everyone will quickly realize there are not are not enough law enforcement personnel to protect everyone and everything. Although the military will probably be ordered to protect specific high priority establishments and resources, there will simply not be enough military personnel to protect individual civilians or businesses. Events After the One-Hour Meltdown Almost everyone who has lost their jobs, their vehicles, their homes, and their life savings will now have nothing more to lose by seeking some form of retribution against the society that took everything away from them that they once "partially" owned. Anyone who has received a minor speeding ticket in the recent past and who honestly could not afford the fine will be in a very unpleasant mood. Everyone who has had their property taxes increased at the same time their income decreased will not be in a good mood. Everyone who has had their credit card interest rate increased at the same time their employer was reducing the number of hours they worked each week will not be in a good mood. Everyone who has been reduced from a two-family income down to a one-family income will not be in a good mood. Everyone who lost their job because their employer went bankrupt will not be in a good mood. The vast majority of these individuals will have been just barely surviving in a situation where they were living hand-to-mouth on government welfare or the charity of the local community (unemployment checks, welfare checks, food stamps, food pantries, etc.). The instant they realize there will be no more government welfare or charity, then these individuals will have no hope for survival unless they are able to immediately acquire the food and other resources they need before it is all gone. Anyone who tries to stand in their way, or who tries to reason with them, will have a life expectancy of less than three-seconds. After the stores are all emptied, and there is nothing ...

CASH FOR CODGERS

Legislators, realizing the success of the President’s "Cash For Clunkers" rebate program, have revamped a major portion of their National Health Care Plan. President Obama, speaker Pelosi, and Sen. Reed are expected to make this major announcement at a joint news conference later this week. I have obtained an advanced copy of the proposal which is named… "CASH FOR CODGERS" and it works like this… Couples wishing to access health care funds in order to pay for the delivery of a child will be required to turn in one old person. The amount the government grants them will be fixed according to a sliding scale. Older and more prescription dependent codgers will garner the highest amounts. Special "Bonuses" will be paid for those submitting codgers in targeted groups, such as smokers, alcohol drinkers, gold bugs, dollar shorts, persons 10 pounds over their government prescribed weight, and any member of the Republican Party. Smaller bonuses will be given for codgers who consume beef, soda, fried foods, potato chips, lattes, whole milk, dairy products, bacon, Brussel sprouts, or Girl Scout Cookies. All codgers will be rendered totally useless via toxic injection. This will insure that they are not secretly resold or their body parts harvested to keep other codgers in repair.

RON PAUL ON HEALTHCARE DEBATE

LewRockwell.com Healthcare Plan Based on Economic Fantasy by Ron Paul As the healthcare debate rages on, there is one reality that even the proponents of this hostile takeover of healthcare by government cannot ignore – and that is money. The government simply does not have the money for a new, expansive, public healthcare plan. The country is in a deep recession that will deepen even further with the coming collapse of the commercial real estate market. The last thing we need is for government to increase and expand taxes to pay for another damaging, wasteful program. Foreigners are becoming less enthusiastic about buying our debt, and creating another open-ended welfare program when we cannot pay for what is already in place, will not help. Champions of socialized medicine want to tax the rich, tax businesses that already cannot afford to provide health plans to employees, and tax people who don’t want to participate in the government’s scheme by buying an approved healthcare plan. Presumably, all these taxes are to induce compliance. This is not freedom, nor will it improve healthcare. There are limits to how much government can tax before it kills the host. Even worse, when government attempts to subsidize prices, it has the net effect of inflating them instead. The economic reality is that you cannot distort natural market pressures without unintended consequences. Market forces would drive prices down. Government meddling negates these pressures, adds regulatory compliance costs and layers of bureaucracy, and in the end, drives prices up. The non-partisan CBO estimates that the healthcare plan will cost almost a trillion dollars over the next ten years. But government crystal balls always massively underestimate costs. It is not hard to imagine the final cost being two or three times the estimates, even though the estimates are bad enough. It is still surreal that in a free country we are talking only about HOW government should fix healthcare, rather than WHY government should fix healthcare. This should be between doctors and patients. But this has been the discussion since the 60’s and the inception of Medicare and Medicaid, when government first began intervening to keep costs down and make sure everyone had access. The result of Medicaid/Medicare price controls and regulatory burden has been to drive more doctors out of the system – making it more difficult for the poor and the elderly to receive quality care! Seemingly, there are no failed government programs, only underfunded ones. If we refuse to acknowledge common sense economics, the prescription will always be the same: more government. Make no mistake, government control and micromanagement of healthcare will hurt, not help healthcare in this country. However, if for a moment, we allowed the assumption that it really would accomplish all they claim, paying for it would still plunge the country into poverty. This solves nothing. The government, like any household struggling with bills to pay, should prioritize its budget. If the administration is serious about supporting healthcare without contributing to our skyrocketing deficits, they should fulfill promises to reduce our overseas commitments and use some of those savings to take care of Americans at home instead of killing foreigners abroad. The leadership in Washington persists in a fantasy world of unlimited money to spend on unlimited programs and wars to garner unlimited control. But there is a fast-approaching limit to our ability to borrow, steal, and print. Acknowledging this reality is not mean-spirited or cruel. On the contrary, it could be the only thing that saves us from complete and total economic meltdown. Find this article at: http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig3/riggenbach3-1.html Copyright 2009 LewRockwell.com