Silent Treatment

What if President Clinton and other world leaders were to go in front of the TV cameras and say

• We've got bad new and good news.
• A monster comet is going to roar through the solar system in last spring 2003, rearranging the continents;
• moving the poles to the equator so they will melt;
• making all real estate under 675 feet worthless;
• casting the world into a volcanic dust gloom that will last for decades;
• running tidal waves a hundred feet high over the coast lines; and
• reducing the cities to rubble with 15 Richter Point earthquakes.
• There's no escape.
• We can't stop it.
• There will be food shortages for 3 years running going into this. (Sorry, Africa, no more bags of grain and blocks of cheese, you'll just have to starve.)
• Insurance companies will be out of business, and FEMA won't be able to reach you as:
• phone lines will be down;
• power grids will be dead;
• and medical facilities will run out of supplies in a hurry, if they're staffed at all.
• The good news is that odds are you won't live long.

Now, given that announcement, what would happen to the Stock Market or the desire of the populace to pay taxes, or normal daily activities such as going to work? How much loyalty would the populace give to their government or military?

Stock Market

The idea of money or property being "worth" something is ingrained due to the way governments insure stability. The whole structure is based upon the publics confidence that stability will be maintained. Since the 1929 Stock Market crash and the subsequent world wide depression, controls were supposedly put into place to keep this from happening again. The fed imposes higher interest rates to keep inflation from roaring too high. The US loans money to countries in trouble with too much debt to prevent a crash that would ripple throughout the world. Disaster areas get infusions of funds from the federal government or insurance. All this is to give folks the feeling that if they buy a house or stocks, they will have something in the end. Prices may fluctuate, but the thing will still have value. Sure, someone might buy speculative stock or fail to get fire insurance on their home, but their loss is viewed as due to their stupidity.

With a forthcoming pole shift well known, the value of stocks and bonds would drop to zero. Activity on the stock market would to nil, except that everyone would be trying to sell so as to convert to cash and buy something of worth, like shovels and seed. Beyond putting the stock brokers out of business, this would wrap back to shareholders, who are more than just the rich as many insurance companies and now even the social security fund is going to own stock. Corporations routinely put their stash money into portfolios too, as this makes the best interest for this idle money. Where the voice of individual stock holders might be ignored, large corporations and insurance companies might claim bankruptcy immediately.

Bottom line, undeniable news of a forthcoming pole shift would be viewed as leading to another depression.

Going to Work

People go to work primarily for bread and butter money, subsistence, and also for personal satisfaction due to the role they are playing. Imagine if one were not to get paid. How many people would continue in a job that could not meet its payroll? If payment were in vouchers of some sort, due to money losing its value, some continuance might occur, but only if the barter system could be put into place in a locale. Not likely on a worldwide or national level. Roles most valued would be those of the savior, leading to survival during and after the pole shift. Cults would spring up, with leaders promising to care for the members. Militant groups would experience and upsurgence, the shelves in gun stores emptied. Anything but local barter and local leadership would not exist, as corporations run as much by the faithful attendance of their employees as they do on the worth of their stock.

Bottom line, roads would not be repaired, TV stations and power grids would close down, and local fiefdoms would proliferate.

Military Control

The military may have stock supplies, but are forgetting the following.

1. Their own reaction to loss - many of them will go mad or become depressed.
2. Petty dictatorship setting in - generals or folks like Newt Gingrich, power hungry. Internal battles will consume all their time. Remember Haig saying "I'm in charge" on public TV, when the successions following a President’s temporary disability did not put him there?
3. Constant erosion of the ranks - troops and guards just leaving with equipment or food stores, thus leaving entryways open for gangs to come in. What's the motivation for troops on the lower level to stay and be a small fish in a small pond when they can be a big fish, in their own small pond?

Offered by Nancy.