The Second Great Depression

by on April 25, 2018 at 12:01 am
Posted In: The Book of Civilizations

I know people who lived through the years leading up to the Second Great Depression. They’ve told me what it was like back then. They had access to the best technology ever invented. They could talk to anyone in the world via electronics designed in The West and built in Asia. And Western vaccines had erased many of the worst diseases mankind had ever known. They were on top of the world in many ways, with the best living conditions ever enjoyed by mankind. But not everyone had it so good. I know people whose company’s shut down because they couldn’t compete with foreign sweatshop construction. High-paying jobs were hard to find, and people worked longer and longer hours to take care of their families. They lost the houses they’d owned for decades or longer, and some cities even began tearing the vacant houses down to fight the rising crime and poverty levels. The gulf between rich and poor had never seemed so vast. That’s part of what drove us to the edge.

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The Second Great Depression

by on April 24, 2018 at 12:01 am
Posted In: The Book of Civilizations

Many people called it the Second American Republic at the time. The result of the Civil War. Most historians call it the Third Republic. The result of Roosevelt’s New Deal. America’s been through a lot of changes over the centuries, echoed or begun by both the culture and the government. Southerners rebelled in the 1860s. Civilization hung by a thread in the 1930s. Hippies checked out in the 1970s. Everybody was checking out by the 2010s. The Culture Wars were hitting their stride and America was on its way to becoming at least two entirely different peoples who really didn’t like each other. There were actually three, or more major cultures at the time, but the noisiest two were the ones that got the news and the network ratings. And most of the history books. It was flash points like the 2010s that serve as warnings that the cultural differences between two or more groups are becoming critical. We saw them in the 1760s, the 1850s, the 1920s, and the 2190s as well. I really wish more people had listened before things got worse. Worse like the Second Great Depression.

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I Don’t Want To Grow Up

by on April 23, 2018 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

I’m a Toys “R” Us Kid.

I grew up when Geoffrey the Giraffe opened stores catering to every toy a kid could want in towns near and far. I remember the awe I felt when I walked into a store filled with nothing but toys.

This weekend, I walked into two of them with bittersweet memories. I’ve never stopped going to them, but their prices have risen so much that I couldn’t justify buying stuff there when I could get it several dollars cheaper at Target. I’ve gotten stuff when it went on sale, and I’ve gotten the exclusives, but main line stuff I just had to shake my head at.

And this weekend, while walking through those stores I saw the end of what that meant. They priced themselves out of the market, and now the childrens’ palace of my youth is fading away.

I felt sorrow this weekend as I looked upon the piece of my childhood that the children of our future will never see again.

I’m not going to grow up. But soon there will be no more Toys “R” Us to be a kid in.

🙁

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The Second Great Depression

by on April 22, 2018 at 12:01 am
Posted In: The Book of Civilizations

Most American citizens did not care when the American government stopped paying the interest on certain foreign loans. They did begin to care when the Chinese raised their prices and cheap Chinese goods became expensive Chinese goods. They cared even more when China began shipping American crewmen home, with only the clothes on their backs, after impounding their ships in the South China Sea. The news carried stories of them being unable to find new jobs after companies stopped shipping anywhere near China, and the people lost their last vestiges of faith in America’s ability to defend them beyond our borders. When the people lost faith in the government’s wish to defend them inside our borders, it was the beginning of the end of what many called the Second American Republic.

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The Second Great Depression

by on April 21, 2018 at 12:01 am
Posted In: The Book of Civilizations

The Fall of Japan and Taiwan. The Korean Unification. The Invasion of the Philippines. I’ve talked to people who lived through all of it. The funny thing is, most of them never even knew it was happening. America had her own domestic difficulties after the American government began to fail. Many State governments collapsed under the dead weight, and the fall of law and order in their own backyards is what most people noticed. But I’ve also talked to people who lived in those other nations when it started. People who came to America as refugees looking for a new home, only to find us in nearly as bad a shape as their homes had been. The difference was that we were far enough from China that we had time to rebuild. And with a whole new pool of Asian refugees to draw workers from, we had the people to do it with. It’s a matter of faith to them that they built the Republic of California. That without them, the entire West Coast would have collapsed into an apocalyptic wasteland of civilization. I’ve played more than a few games that started with that scenario. It’s scary dark, let me tell you.

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