Meanwhile, it looks like the Baltic state of Latvia is on the brink of joining Iceland and Ireland in economic collapse, and possibly going beyond that to a political collapse as well. So who gives a shit about Latvia? Regional banks, including those of Sweden and Germany, and the IMF, too. I wonder what the Russians are thinking; the sizeable Russian minority of unemployed youths in Latvia will be the ones to watch.
There is much talk of the death of the dollar, especially since the meetings among China and Russia and Japan with a coalition of Arab states to replace the dollar as a conduit for the international oil trade. India and Brazil are very much in favor of it; nobody seems to give a damn what the United States thinks.
Our national unemployment rate is pushing 10%. I personally turn away several prospective applicants a day at the business I manage. I don't even give them an application any more, or tell phone inquirers that we are only taking applications; I simply tell them, bluntly, "We are not hiring." No sense giving them false hope, especially when it will lead only to futile follow-up phone calls that distract me from tasks at hand.
So what am I doing, aside from enjoying the fall? Buying silver, still. I also put in 8 blueberry bushes over the past month, which will constitue the only viable agriculture that my mostly forested acre and a half will support. I've also pressed on with a poultry yard, despite the wife's stance firmly against having chickens. She did not say, "Do not build a poultry yard," so I will prepare for a time when she is more receptive to the idea.
What do I think is going to happen? In short, America will continue its long, slow slide down. Much of the country will continue to turn a blind eye and deaf ear, while real unemployment levels off at a permanent 20%, credit continues to be reined in, the deficit spirals onward and upward, and the dollar drifts down the abyss. The current market bubble will pop, the gold bubble will pop; silver will press onward and upward. Oil will rise as China's demand increases, the dollar's value decreases, and world supplies shrink as we slide slowly, inexorably off the Peak Oil plateau.
Circle the wagons, friends.
As far as I know, Outlander went straight to DVD. It's "Beowulf meets Predator," according to the coverbox art, and that's a pretty accurate label. I usually hate those kinds of labels, but here it's perfectly applicable. Good casting, with Jim Caviezel as a kind of Space Marine-slash-planetary colonizer, John Hurt as the Viking cheiftain (who'd make a magnificent Gandalf!), and Ron Perlman playing one of the meanest Vikings you'll ever see. The special effects are good, with a couple of exceptions; and the script is straightforward, lean, though a little overly sentimental at times. The great thing about this film is the plot itself; it's so well-thought-out, and the story so well-executed, that it almost cannot help but be a good movie, casting and special effects aside. The worst thing was some of the character naming... "Boromir?" I mean, really.