Officials and Experts Warn of Crash-Induced Unrest

(9 am. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

Officials and Experts Warn of Crash-Induced Unrest

This is one of those entries where I’m going to basically just send you over to the link so you can check it out for yourself.  The site itself has become a daily must-visit for me, and should be for others interested in what’s really going on.   I don’t know who this guy is, but he’s really really good.  

His entries are so chock-full of links that cutting and pasting what he’s saying is almost pointless, unless you include all the links (and if anyone knows an easy way to do that, I’d love to learn it!).

Anyway for all the Larry Summers MORONS out there who think that sunny days of economic lushness are right around the corner, well, this is something of a buzz-kill.   (the same guy has an awesome piece that just DESTROYS Summers).

Anyway, here’s a sample:

Today, Moody’s warned that future tax rises and spending cuts could trigger social unrest in a range of countries from the developing to the developed world, that in the coming years, evidence of social unrest and public tension may become just as important signs of whether a country will be able to adapt as traditional economic metrics, that a fiscal crisis remains a possibility for a leading economy, and that 2010 would be a “tumultuous year for sovereign debt issuers”.

Here’s another:

Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair said:

“The global economic crisis … already looms as the most serious one in decades, if not in centuries … Economic crises increase the risk of regime-threatening instability if they are prolonged for a one- or two-year period,” said Blair. “And instability can loosen the fragile hold that many developing countries have on law and order, which can spill out in dangerous ways into the international community.”***

“Statistical modeling shows that economic crises increase the risk of regime-threatening instability if they persist over a one-to-two-year period.”***

“The crisis has been ongoing for over a year, and economists are divided over whether and when we could hit bottom. Some even fear that the recession could further deepen and reach the level of the Great Depression. Of course, all of us recall the dramatic political consequences wrought by the economic turmoil of the 1920s and 1930s in Europe, the instability, and high levels of violent extremism.”

Blair made it clear that – while unrest was currently only happening in Europe – he was worried this could happen within the United States.

And let’s us not forget this rather unreported little gem:

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff warned the the financial crisis is the highest national security concern for the U.S., and warned that the fallout from the crisis could lead to of “greater instability”.

He signs off leaving a rather large list of people and organizations who share these views, with links provided.

I added this as a comment in Rusty 1776’s terrific essay but thought perhaps it should have its own thread.  

And I have to add the famous JFK quote:

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.

— John F. Kennedy, In a speech at the White House, 1962

What amazes me is how the ruling class seems to think that it won’t happen this time, that somehow the guillotines won’t come out, the ropes and the lamp posts won’t be used, that people will just ignore them …..

It’s not wise to ignore history.