The Absurd Report

Ancient thinkers from Thucydides to Cicero insisted that money was the real source of military power and national influence. We’ve been reminded of that classical wisdom these last three weeks.

In a manner not seen since the Great Depression, Wall Street went into panic mode from too many bad debts. The symbolic pillars of American monetary strength for years — AIG, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Shearson-Lehman, and Washington Mutual — in a matter of hours either went broke, were absorbed, or were reconstituted. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac collapsed like the house of cards that they were.
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We’ve seen the connection between American economic crisis and world upheaval before. In the 1930s, the United States and its democratic allies — in the midst of financial collapse — disarmed and largely withdrew from foreign affairs. That isolation allowed totalitarian regimes in Germany, Italy, Japan, and Russia to swallow their smaller neighbors and replace the rule of law with that of the jungle. World War II followed.

During the stagflation and economic malaise of the Jimmy Carter years, the Russians invaded Afghanistan, the Iranians stormed our embassy in Tehran, the communists sought to spread influence in Central America, and a holocaust raged unchecked in Cambodia.

It was no surprise that an emboldened Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad once again last week called for the elimination of Israel.

Tags: America’s Nervous Breakdown

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