07:54 – Maybe it’s just me, but in the last few months it seems that the world has been slowing down. It’s like kicking over an ant hill or opening a beehive and finding that the insect activity has dropped to nearly nothing. Even my email and comment spam has fallen way off. It seems that no one is actually doing much of anything any more. What new news there is is almost always bad, and it seems that the economy has slowed almost to a stop. I feel as though I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop and things to come to a complete stop. Have the progressives actually won the war and brought all useful activity to a halt?
If that’s the case, we’re in a situation that will require only a tiny spark to set off an inferno. I dread reading the first news reports of an incident that will turn out in retrospect to be that spark. Or maybe it’s just me. Unlike many of my readers, who are expecting an incident that spreads and causes a rapid devolution into chaos, I’m still expecting a gradual slide into dystopia. But I freely admit that I might be wrong about that. The entire country is balanced precariously on the edge of a precipice, and it wouldn’t take much to tip us over.
The consensus seems to be serious concern about the state of things currently and where we’re heading. Many people have left concern behind and now live in outright fear of what’s coming. Not surprising, considering that an outright majority of employed people now earn $30,000/year or less, and that tens of millions not only have no jobs, but no prospects of ever having a job again. Not that long ago, living paycheck-to-paycheck was considered a sign of economic hardship. Nowadays, you’re doing well if you can live paycheck-to-paycheck without going further into debt. Millions of recent college graduates are unemployed or working at menial jobs, crushed under the weight of student loan payments. The vast majority of them will probably never hold a “real” job.
The main reason we’re focusing on relocating is to get away from the city and the underclass before things break down completely and the cities erupt in flames and violence. If we end up stranded here when things really go pear-shaped, we’ll still manage to get by, or so I hope. The disadvantages of being in a suburban setting when TSHFT are obvious; we’re surrounded by the underclass. The advantages are less obvious, but nonetheless real; if there’s a long-term grid-down event or a breakdown in transportation, more heavily-populated areas will have power restored and continuing food shipments before rural areas see any relief efforts.
So, is it just me, or are we really nearing the breaking point?