The BLUES. To ignore the BLUES is to ignore the voice, songs and sounds of the POOR.

Rap/HipHop are a modern form of the BLUES.

Deadbeat

Unless you are an African American. There are many folk tales of the poor if your Black or aware of Black culture. The problem has always been that the white working class never listen to them because they tend to place race over poverty.

“Civilization is a limitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities.”
Mark Twain

“America is the wealthiest nation on Earth, but it’s people are mainly poor, and poor Americans are urged to hate themselves…. It is in fact a crime for an american to be poor, even though America is a nation of poor. Every other nation has folk traditions of men who were poor but extremely wise and virtuous, and therefore more estimable than anyone with power and gold. No such tales are told by American poor. They mock themselves and glorify their betters.”
Kurt Vonnegut

Of course, the high Euro was a psychological boost but an ecoonomic problem and what has happened i.e. a Euro that soars and then drops is probably the best of all possible worlds from Europe’s point of view. Europeans now see that the Euro is a “real” currency but exporters are not priced out of their markets.

I wonder though if the sudden drop in the oil price and concomitant rise in the dollar isn’t part of an electoral strategy. Create the impression that “the corner has been turned” just before the election, get Obama elected, then pull the rug from under him and let the air out of the credit bubble, blame him for the subsequent economic collapse and take him out in 2012. Whoever is president when the “hard landing” occurs is going to be very unpopular and I would guess that the financial elite (essentially Republican) would probably prefer that a Democrat “took the hit”.

Ambrose and the plague of locusts. In a previous professional incarnation, I once had lunch with Ambrose and he is a total screwball! He assured me (quite seriously!) that LBJ’s Great Society consisted essentially of opening the insane asylums and turning the patients out on to the street so that they could vote! When I suggested that maybe that was how Reagan got elected, he was far from pleased! The fire and brimstone tone of the quote is vintage Ambrose and should not be taken too seriously!

Final point. Don’t ever forget that what is regarded as dire poverty in Europe or Japan or the US would be regarded as great riches by most of mankind. However hard the landing in the rich countries, it’s going to be even harder for the vast majortiy of the human race.