Mediacology

With the sound of the other shoe dropping, i.e. the subprime mortgage market collapse, we can now see that chances are very strong that the US Empire will be disintegrating very quickly. People seem to forget that they are spending something ridiculous like a billion dollars a day on Iraq, so we have to wonder, who is going to pay for it? You guessed it. Anyhow, the chorus of Rome and US comparisons is hitting a feverish pitch. Here is just one snip of many flying through cyberspace these days, this coming no less from the US Inspector General (Congress’s autonomous watch-dog organization):
FT.com / World - Learn from the fall of Rome, US warned:

The US government is on a ‘burning platform’ of unsustainable policies and practices with fiscal deficits, chronic healthcare underfunding, immigration and overseas military commitments threatening a crisis if action is not taken soon, the country’s top government inspector has warned.

Drawing parallels with the end of the Roman empire, Mr Walker warned there were “striking similarities” between America’s current situation and the factors that brought down Rome, including “declining moral values and political civility at home, an over-confident and over-extended military in foreign lands and fiscal irresponsibility by the central government”.

With the comparisons between the fall of Rome and the dire situation the US finds itself in, I think it would be wise to study history, indeed, but I would liken the situation closer to the fall of the Spanish Empire. There was a time when Spanish currency was the gold standard of the world, but the ruling elite became decadent (surprise!) and the Empire found itself importing more goods from France than they were producing at home. To this the French King said something like, “Let the Spanish spend their gold on our goods!” Perhaps the Chinese are saying the same thing.

But more importantly is the manner in which Spain digressed into its own Dark Age with the Inquisition and purge of its business and intellectual class through the expulsion of the Sephardim jews. Here is where the parallel is dangerously close. The recent anti-immigration fervor is nothing but coded racism, and with little else to latch onto, I predict the Republicans and the desperate Right are going to go all out with semiotic race war. And it won’t just target Latin Americans, but anyone who no longer fits the 1950s fantasy of white American society. The brain drain is on as technical jobs, and even CEOs are being farmed out of the States. The US is in grave danger of a racist purge, so please keep your eyes on the ball folks and make sure this doesn’t happen, because there are desperate people clinging to an outmoded reality, and that usually is a bad recipe for social harmony.

There is an upside to this, but this certainly is one that comes along down the line. As someone who lives in a formerly ruined empire, the nice thing you learn from being in Rome is that life goes on, even after 2, 500 years of a rise and fall of human fortunes (Mexico CIty has a similar fate). You have no idea what a relief it is to live in a place that is NOT an empire. It’s like having a dark gray energy bubble cleansed and released. The burden of Iraq, the stress of war, the faltering economy, the rise of the national security apparatus with the legal blessings of Congress, and the paranoid delusion and paranoia of the “others” is wearing people down. It’s a sad time, but also a moment to completely reevaluate the priorities and decisions of our society. I truly hope that this becomes a sobering moment, as in when the alcoholic finally bottoms out. It’s time to acknowledge that the “powerholic” has finally hit the floor, the face going splat. I just wish there was AA for people addicted to war.