The Year of Shortages

Think of this as Volume 11, Number 41 of A-Clue.com, the online newsletter I've written since 1997. Enjoy.

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The year 2008 will go down in history as the Year of Shortages. (Picture from Endrtimes.)

My own story is typical.

• Last year we ran out of water here in the Southeast. I started calling my front lawn a garden. I let it die. I planted a rosemary bush and stopped mowing. No one called me on it. When I go to the bathroom, if it's yellow, I generally let it mellow. But there is a limit. Laundry has to be done, showers have to be taken. Sometimes the water in the tap stops, and what little is there becomes brown and brackish. Then I have to buy water at the grocery to stay alive.
• The energy shortage hit hard. We insulated the house tight as a drum, but it still didn't lower the bills. We raised our summer temp to 77 and our winter nights are at 55. The bills stay high. This summer we ran out of gas. I had been "ready" for this, trading in my van for a Scion years ago. But I do need some, sometime, and weeks ago found myself wandering around the area looking for an open pump. When I found one a line formed behind me. My 20-year old daughter was scared to try and find a fill-up, so she borrowed my car.
• Now comes the money shortage. Half my retirement savings are gone. I'm afraid to use the credit cards. I used to watch bear markets with glee on the TV, and now I can't watch at all. My wife got some stock options from work, they like her there, but they're worthless in the present market. We were going to add to the house and send the kids to college. We have some cash, but the home improvement idea is gone and we wonder, can we still afford to educate the kids?

Check that. My story is not typical. We are very lucky. Very lucky indeed. We weren't hit by the spring tornadoes or the summer hurricanes. We weren't flooded out, and the taps still flow. We have enough gas, and electricity to turn the ceiling fans. We still have cash, my wife still has her job and I still have some money coming in. Compared to the vast majority of people we are in very good shape indeed. We have a roof, we have the Internet, we have one another.

In the years before the year of shortage I was a pessimist. I saw the horrors coming from a great distance away. I didn't know how it would play out, but I tried some scenarios in my head. And I screamed through this blog that the sky was about to fall. Nothing I said did any good at all.

Now the sky has fallen. Good businesses can't get the loans they need. The cost of living is skyrocketing but people are about to lose their jobs. A lot of people. The crime rate is rising, the fear is growing palpable on the streets. Will the schools stay open? Will there be money to pay the cops?

Some years ago technology change took away our little video store. Now the CD store looks about to go, the owner unable to crack the jokes with us he once did. The restaurants are still open but you can get a table at any time, the waiters are a little "too happy" to see us. You can see the fear in their eyes. No one can do a thing about it. No one talks about what they are thinking. They're scared.

All the material shortages pale in comparison to the biggest shortage of all.

Hope.

Hope is what gives a businessman the confidence to hire people and open the doors. Hope is what gives our elders the will to keep living, what keeps our kids moving forward in their classes. Hope is a psychic liquidity the U.S. has always had in abundance, except...

Except at a two times in its history. Read stories from the Civil War era and you can feel the hope drain away from people as they realize the doors of the charnel house are opening for them. Read stories from the Great Depression and you see a people brought to the brink of utter humiliation, and millions pushed over that edge.

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. But fear is a powerful enemy.

Hope is what we need to confront the fear. Confidence. Trust. Faith. We need to believe in someone else again so we can believe in ourselves.

We have no faith in our institutions, none in our President. We see everyone stealing everything from the public and getting away with it. Why should we be honest when dishonesty is all that pays?

You know where this is going.

Barack Obama is not a perfect vessel for hope. He is the first to admit it. The Democratic Party is not a perfect vessel, either. But it's what we have.

We have to believe in both. Vote as though our lives depend upon it, because they do.

Is that an extreme view? Maybe, but have you been to a McCain rally lately, or seen one on TV? You really want to leave our fate in the hands of those people -- not those on the stage, those in the crowd? Racists, bigots of every variety, people who never look in the mirror, who always blame others, who never accept responsibility? My friends, indeed.

Faith is the belief in things unseen. We need faith right now. Because faith leads to hope. It's the individual version of the Treasury injecting "liquidity" into the system. Watch people as they go into a good church on Sunday morning, and the same people coming out. Wry smiles on the white faces, shining sweat on the black. Maybe it is the opiate of the people, but it works for most.

Faith leads to hope, hope leads to confidence, and confidence is the only force that can end the cash shortage, and get us back on our feet again. Hope is the only force that can banish fear. We can argue about how we got here later. For now...

Believe.

Believe in the new leaders. Believe in yourself. Believe in mankind. Believe that peace is possible. Believe in tomorrow. Believe in technology. Believe in solar power, and the connectivity that has brought us here, you and me, to this page together.

Celebrate loud, long and late November 4, but be ready to get back to work November 5. It's just a ray of sunshine, but that brings with it the hope of a sunrise, if you believe it can happen.