Last night as I was trying to injest all the different views of what is happening in our present economy and to look at them through the prism of Naomi Klein’s book “The Shock Doctrine” (every adult in the US should read this book) I couldn’t help but visualize in my mind the phrase “Those who choose to ignore history are destined to repeat it.” I’ve been following the stock market’s ups and downs now for over a year and listening to all the pundits is quite entertaining. It just seems to me that there are a bunch of people trying to figure out how to make as much money as possible prior to the inevitable crash of our economy. And the thing that bothers me most, after reading this book, is that I believe there are some “invisible” high rollers that “We the people” have no idea who they are or what their true agenda is, that are licking their chops at the disaster that lies ahead. For them, it is not about my welfare, the welfare of my children, the welfare of their fellow citizens, or anything else but the opportunity to make as much money as possible. I had always believed that this phenomenen began with the Reagan administration, but after reading this book, I now believe the philosophy was conjured up in the 50’s by a bunch of people who were bitter about the New Deal and how it created a broad middle class in America and allowed society to expect more from the wealthy in the form of taxes, etc. I now think their philosophy was behind Richard Nixon’s expansion of deficit spending in the early 70’s which Reagan compounded to my shock in the 80’s and the two bush’s took to heights unimagined by people like me who think the government should live within its means. The great irony in all this is that the republicans have actually convinced the people during this time that they were the party of the fiscally responsible and the democrats were the party of “tax and spend.” Of course Jimmy Carter cut Nixon’s deficit in half during his four years in office only to be voted out in favor of Reagan who promised to “cut taxes and balance the budget.” What a joke that was – but it seems like the memory of our people is very short. Despite Clinton’s budget surpluss the people once again fell for the cutting taxes and balancing the budget from gw bush – although it is apparent to me that bush got into the white house through vote fraud, but that’s a story for another day. Now these Wall Street pundits are arguing back and forth over what will “heal” our economy and what has to happen to get the stock market going upward again with a clear choice between more of the same (mccain) and an infusion of resorces aimed at the middle class (Obama). It is amazing to me that even the republicans can’t see the forest for the trees, so to speak. My major concern is that I believe our economy is to the breaking point. Most of the history I’m talking about here is the 80’s and Reagan, but I believe people need to start revisiting 1929 because I believe a crash of that magnitude is sitting on the horizon, ready to cripple this nation for years to come – and, yes, I believe there are many who are actually encouraging this to happen. Let me give an example of how I believe this works. Take the present “gas crisis.” I’ve looked in many places to try to verify that there is a gas shortage, with no success. Even the Saudi oil minister said that them adding more oil to the market wouldn’t effect prices because there was no demand for it. In other words this “crisis” is the result of manipulation by people with a hidden agenda. The other day I went to buy gas, and it really struck me when my wife said: “Wow, it’s only $3.98 a gallon!” My first thought was that these invisible people have succeeded in changing our mindset. “Wow, only $3.98 a gallon” can you imagine saying that even 6 months ago. The end result is that now the oil companies are using this “shock” to get the oil in the ANWAR wilderness area in Alaska “online” and to get additional offshore oil leases despite the fact they have something like 68 million acres of oil leases that are not being accessed and the fact there is not an oil rig in the country, supposedly, that is available for additional drilling. It’s all a sham to increase their “inventory” before the two oil men are nothing but a bad memory to the vast majority of Americans. The scary part of this is that mccain is trying to use this to his advantage by spewing the nonsense of the bush administration. I really hope he is not able to pull this off, but remember, those who choose to ignore history are destined to repeat it. The thought of a repeat of the bush administration makes me sick to my stomach. I can’t believe the American people will fall for this, but the bigger concern is that if they do, I believe we are destined to repeat the calamity of the 30’s. These “invisible” people who are pushing the “free market” agenda that has destroyed the middle class in many other nations and is trying to do that in our own nation would love to lead us into a depression. They have billions of dollars to use to buy up all the remains of the businesses that will fail and the group at the top of the hierarchy in this country will become noticeably smaller. Having a baffoon such as mccain, who has proven he will say anything to anyone if he thinks it will get him a vote, will play right into their hands. I have hope that the majority of Americans will see past their lies and give Obama a chance to turn this around before the disaster strikes, although I’m not altogether certain that it isn’t already too late. For anyone who might read this I would just say again, those who choose to ignore history are destined to repeat it – we have seen Viet Nam repeated in Iraq with bush and I hope that somehow we can avoid him leading us into a repeat of the great depression.