Plant a garden, be as free of debt as you can...trade and barter with your friends.....drive a vehicle that gets the best mileage possible for your lifestyle...give up your TV....store food and water....read.....

This upcoming week the Americans living in Poverty count is to come out.

The first report since before the Bush Administration and pre-release information from many sources indicate this report to be close to devastating. Individuals have reported that there may be a 5 to 7% rise in the number of citizens and children living below the poverty line in the United States. This may be one of the governmental reports that is released and disappears on the same day without attention. You can't expect the mentally deficient Jabba the Hut type creature that is the American Public to pay attention to information like this?

Those of us who do pay attention to societal trends will be disturbed by this information. It is nothing that we do not know...but facts that you inherently know or obtain by private observation take on a different reality when displayed as solid, governmental statistical analysis. That is when, what you have held as your own private beliefs, become, well, scary.

This has been done to America.....our descent into poverty is no more of an accident than invading Iraq was...we have witnessed the greatest theft of wealth in history, and the destruction of the largest middle class in the world----by the unending greed of the American Rich and their purchased, satanic, lap-dog politicians.

The problem the rich have is that no fortified mansion, no armored limo, and no amount of bodyguards can protect you from a hungry, angry, populace. The Rich will be pulled from their places of business, their homes and their automobiles and strung up by the mob.....it has happened over and over and over again in history. Unfortunately you cannot ask Czar Nicholas how he felt or obtain the benefit of his experience since he and his whole royal family were executed by a firing squad of the little people.....ask Mussolini, ask Batista, ask the Shah of Iran...they all believed in trickle down economics, fuck the poor, tax breaks for the rich, and were comfortable with their boot on the neck of their citizens. Look what happened to them, what they considered to be an impossibility happened overnight. They all in one way or another will wind up hanging by their feet in the public square.

My two homemade worm farms are doing very well. In October i am planning on emptying their compost into the gardens along with a few worms, and purchasing the above pictured 5 story worm condo for the urban homestead. Supposedly the worms do better when they are required to travel up to obtain their food once the paper and so forth has been rendered into compost...this 5 level condo allows for that and the ongoing recovery of compost without disturbing the worms themselves. Plus this will be warmer for the worms over the upcoming winter...as compared to my homemade single story worm box.

Zero History by William Gibson---what can i say that has not been said before about Gibson---you get him or you don't....the man who believes that the present is now more interesting than the future. If you know him you already have this book....excellent as always.

A recent purchase not started yet--- Black Earth by Andrew Meier. Subtitled a journey through Russia after the fall it is a reporting of Russia after it's economic collapse of the 1990's--I am reading this book to possibly learn something that might help during our crisis...and will advise.

Last week the disgusting payday loan sharks and the growth of that business were the indicator of America the 3rd world. This week street food vendors, street peddlers, and used clothing stores are the evidence. Unlike the payday loan sharks I find nothing distasteful about any of these merchant processes involving peddlers or the sale of used clothing...hunting a deal is always what one wants to do. I also believe peddling, street food vendors and used clothing stores to be not only providing a needed service, but proof of the desire to be your own boss.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with this other than "street business" appears to be right now our only business, the only sign of economic life in our country...and in my area this "here today gone today capitalism" is all that is noticeably active. Regular clothing stores fold for lack of business but the vacant store front is soon filled by a resale shop. My little downtown has 6 resale clothing shops, usually 2 food vending trucks and a daily exhibit of 4-5 traveling parking lot peddlers of chili's, car floor mats, melons and so forth.

Like I say more power to the citizen independent merchant---but......This has been all there is---no grand openings of anything----just closings and peddlers---closings and peddlers----how can this style of capitalism help the country get better? It won't because We are beyond getting better. Our future United States is a third world nation selling taco's in a parking lot, while wearing someone else's clothing......

Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
Anton Chekhov