WE'RE HEADED FOR ANOTHER RENDEZVIOUS WITH DESTINY

Un-refinance-able global sovereign debt and mortgages seem to be bringing the world financial system closer to collapse, uncontrollably.

The so-called Arab Spring seems to be revealing itself to everyone as a reactionary wave of uncontrollable jihadist violence.

These forces - as Northern Seer suggested in another comment thread - seem like an out of control speeding locomotive about to go off the rails - just as it approaches a dilapidated trestle - spanning a chasm of infinite depth, and there are suicide bombers on board who have also booby-trapped the brakes!

What - if anything - can possibly stop what seems like the inevitable impending economic crash and clash of civilizations? Is there a person anywhere who can stand athwart these twin crises and wrestle the conflicting and destructive forces and impulses and bring us sanity, dignity, peace, prosperity and justice? Or is the impending horror something must we travel through in order to... learn our lesson... once and for all?

More and more it seems like the latter.

And for the second time today, I must cite this:

... The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

I think all we need to do - each of us - is to find once again the courage to defend and employ our first principles.

Like the Maccabees.

Like the Minutemen.

Like the heroes in our current war - from the folks on Flight 93 to the elite members of our Special Forces.

They didn't retreat from their principles despite the odds. All won despite the costs - and in so doing bequeathed us a better world.

Sigh.

If this commitment and courage fails to stop the impending catastrophes, then at the very least they will be what empowers us to rebuild a better world.

Still, I long for a global Judah Maccabee-George Washington-Todd Beamer all rolled up into one to rally us to be our best.

Reagan seemed to have what what it takes:



Obama doesn't.

On the world stage, I think Bibi Netanyahu does. And Geert Wilders. Two enormously brave leaders from two tiny countries barely in control of their own destinies.

No leader in any major nation today has what it takes. There's no Churchill. Not even a Thatcher. No Reagan.

Or is there?

Maybe we will only find out who has what it takes AFTER the shit hits the fan...

Sigh.