Jimmy takes a shot at Krugman and NASCAR in one article. I agree that Japan is going to be the catalyst for the next leg down in this Fourth Turning. One thing about Fourth Turnings – they never peter out. They build to a crescendo.
Let’s All Go Medieval
By James Howard Kunstler on May 27, 2013 9:34 AM
That voice! All a’quiver with the dread of self-knowledge that it is confabulating a story, much like the “money” that his Open Market Committee spins out of the increasingly carbonized air. His words fill the vacuum of the collectively blank American mind, where hopes and dreams spin like debris in an Oklahoma twister, only to fall incoherently on a landscape of man-made ruins. If Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke were hooked up to a polygraph machine when he made a public statement — such as last Wednesday’s testimony before congress — I bet the output graph would look something like a seismic record of the 9.0 Fukushima megathrust, all fretful spikes and dips.
When historians of the future ponder our fate around their campfires, they will marvel that this society invited such a temporizing little nerd to act as its Oracle-in-Chief… that he made periodic visits to sit before the poobahs of the land, and issued prophesies that nobody could really understand — and that the fate of the people in this land hung on his muttered ambiguities. Let’s face it: people need oracles when they don’t know what the fuck is going on.
What’s going on is as follows: America’s central bank is trying to compensate for a floundering economy that will never return to its prior state. The economy is floundering because its scale and mode of operation are no longer consistent with what reality offers in the way of available resources at the right price, especially oil. So, rather than change the scale and mode of operations in this economy — that is, do things differently — we try to keep doing things the same by flushing more “money” into the system, as though it were a captive beast receiving nutriment.
One problem with that is that the “money” is no longer money. That is, it’s not really an effective store of value, or pricing reference. It remains for the moment a medium of exchange, but the persons exchanging it grow suspicious of what this “money” purports to represent. Does it stand for promises of future repayment? Hmmmm. Those promises are looking sketchy lately, especially since this is an economy that does not generate enough new real wealth to make the interest payments, let alone manage to pay back the principal. Is it a claim on future work? Some are afraid that the future work deliverable will be less than they expect. Whatever else it is, does it find respect in other societies where different money is used?
These questions are making a lot of people nervous these days. Of course, a time will come when all matters concerning this particular incarnation of money will be seen as strictly ceremonial. Ben Bernanke, we will understand, was not stating facts before congress but rather singing a song, or rather chanting in a low, repetitive, tedious way in the primal manner of a frightened person trying to comfort himself with reassuring sound — that is, prayer. You’d be surprised how well that goes over in a place like congress, which is stuffed with prayerful characters, people who exist in a religious delirium. These are not the people who are nervous, by the way. The nervous tend to be more secular, and inhabit the margins of life where unconventional thinking thrives weedlike at a remove from all the mental toxicity at the center.
These nervous ones are looking ever more closely these days at the distant nation of Japan, where an interesting scenario is playing out: the last days of a giant industrial-technocratic economy. The story there is actually pretty simple if you peel away the quasi-metaphysical bullshit it comes wrapped in these days from astrologasters like John Mauldin and Paul Krugman, viz. Japan has no fossil fuel resources. Zip. You can’t run their kind of economy without the stuff. And they can’t. Japan is crapping out, as they say in Las Vegas. Tilt! Game over. As this happens, Japan issues a lot of distracting financial noise that involves evermore “creation” of their own “money,” and the knock-on effects of that, but it’s all just noise. Japan’s only good choice is to go medieval, that is, to give up on the rather hopeless 150-year-long project of being an industrial-technocratic modern super-state, and go back to being an island of a beautiful artistic hand-made culture. I call that “going medieval,” though you could quibble as to whether that’s the best word for it, since I’m not talking about cathedrals or crusades.
One of Japan’s other choices is to “go mad-dog,” something they actually tried back in the mid-20th century. It didn’t work out too well then. The Japanese leadership is making noises about “re-arming,” and a nice state of conflict is already simmering between them and their age old rivals-victims next door in China, a country that has lately enjoyed the upper hand in the industrial-techno racket (though it will be faced with the same choices as Japan not too many years hence). Do the Japanese start another world war on their side of the planet? Let’s hope not. Let’s hope they lay down their robotics and their nuclear reactors gently and go back to making netsuke. Just give it up and do things differently — after all, that’s what all the human beings on the planet have to do now.
For what it’s worth, Japan’s stock market has tanked a hearty 14 percent in the past five days, if that means anything, and I’m not sure it does considering the aforesaid “noise,” but there you have it. Our own stock markets are mercifully closed this holiday, having given American worriers an extra day of anxious reflection on the state of things out there. My own opinion is that we’re all going medieval sooner rather than later and the big remaining question is how much of a mess we’ll make on the journey to it.
Also, personally, I don’t like these manufactured holidays when the landscape is cluttered with morons enjoying motorsports. I’ll be working today, and grateful when it blows over.
Bernanke is little more than a theatrical false prophet for those to whom money is their god – and those people DO know EXACTLY what is going on in this country. As long as the church of money is open for business, nothing substantially good will ever be allowed occur. If one views these politicians and bankers not as our “elite”, but as the delusional religious fanatics they really are, all becomes a bit clearer. They will never willingly relinquish oil (hydrocarbon combustion, more generally), they will never accept any opinions but their own, they will never recognise the legitimacy of their opponents views. They are no different than the terrorists we so claim to despise – only their impact is orders of magnitude worse for everybody.
He isn’t Benny and the Inkjets, he’s just a more successful Benny Hinn Ministry.
Like it, one of JK best. When historians of the future are sitting around their campfires discussing what a nerdy turd Bernanke was and Japan was toast in 2014.
How will Japan “go medieval” with 120 Million people?
This is the ugly reality of post-peak-resource life- that all the developed nations have swollen populations about 10X the size that could be supported at any level in a pre-tech society.
I love that title. I’ve been ‘going medieval’ for years now. Nothing like the feeling of being able to impale someone on your blade after a rotten day at work. Or bludgeon them if that’s your thing. http://www.sca.org
When resources decline, populations decline, as Japan’s only growth industry is black hair dye. Japans only plentiful resource presently is thousands of square miles of radioactive sea water.
They will probably go “mad dog” before they go medieval. I’ve been watching for the signs of it. War is a known technique for population control…that and famine.
When I saw “Going Medieval” I thought of Pulp Fiction. I can think of a few people I could go Medieval on.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uA1CBHebCeo
let’s imagine that japan is a foreshadow of things to come. it led the first world into the tank. from economic powerhouse to stagnation and now an object of derision, “Japan’s only growth industry is black hair dye…”
my point is that japan’s self absorbed yutes have lost the work ethic of the previous generation. fortuna’s wheel of fortune is about to go down. bad news for the western world since it has been following japan’s script for years.
smug folks in the west will say that the same thing can’t happen here because they are chinks, but fortuna is no respecter of color. (i use fortuna as thunderbird uses the term ‘higher mind’.)
A variation on Morris Berman’s theme that the Japanese will be the first to culturally revert to their heritage, except to date none of the behaviors they are exhibiting in aggregate indicate that is very likely.
On a cultural level it does seem possible that the Nips will have fewer issues rapidly decreasing population, I could easily see the Leadership deciding Mass Sepukku is in order and asking half the population to Slit their Bellies.
RE
Kunstler saying the same thing week after week with a little Bubbles Bernanke thrown in for good measure.
Once again he neglects the elephant in the room. Obama and his evil minions, whom he supports by way of commission (and omission). It must take a tremendous amount of mental energy to neglect the criminally impeachable activity of his progressive gods. Maybe Kunstler is a “progressive chauvinist” and thereby righteously ignores the wire taps, the IRS witch hunts; the DHS gestapo thugs, after all, they were directed at Kunstler’s “corn pone nazis”, and are therefore justified.
His diatribes are getting a little old and used up. After the coming economic collapse, Obama and his minions have set up the martial law, dictatorship, totalitarian regime scenarios. It’s already in place, all nice and legal. They’ll be in their government-made 1000 person bunkers issuing edicts to the military and DHS after all hell breaks loose (after the FSA and the corn pone nazis “go medieval” on each other). By then it’ll be too late for Kunstler to realize what he and the liberals have wrought, but at least they won’t be surprised.
Chicago999444 says:
How will Japan “go medieval” with 120 Million people?
This is the ugly reality of post-peak-resource life- that all the developed nations have swollen populations about 10X the size that could be supported at any level in a pre-tech society.
……………………………………..
The answer is Doom. Doom by several different or combined paths. Doom means 90% or more will perish. Just the same as Doom will deal with everyone else. Doom will descend upon us all. Few will survive it. No one will escape it.
“they will marvel that this society invited such a temporizing little nerd to act as its Oracle-in-Chief… that he made periodic visits to sit before the poobahs of the land, and issued prophesies that nobody could really understand”
lol..a self-portrait, then ?
James Kunstler: How bad architecture wrecked cities
Bruce-How will Japan “go medieval” with 120 Million people?
Really, Japan embarked on an invade/occupy quest for resources starting in 1937 because of
lack of natural resources and the Nip population the was only 70 million..what were the nips thinking , they shoudla’ just went medieval..a la’ island state medieval England …right ?
“Really, Japan embarked on an invade/occupy quest for resources starting in 1937 because of
lack of natural resources and the Nip population the was only 70 million..what were the nips thinking , they shoudla’ just went medieval..a la’ island state medieval England …right ?”-Flash
In fact Japan TRIED to stay Medieval with their Isolationism during the Colonial years from 1500-1850 in the Shogun Era, They were FORCED out of it by Commodore Matthew Perry and his Gunboats in the 1850s. Industrialists wanted access to the Asian Markets, and Japan was the way to get it, as an Island Fortress to build on modelled on England and from there control the real prize, China, utilizing Trade and Naval Superiority..
The Japanese Elite hadda either Play Ball and Join the Club, or they would have been wiped off the face of the Earth by superior weaponry. It all backfired of course several times, and the Japanese have generally been pretty big losers ever since, except for taking over Manchuria for a while and leaving the Chinese none too happy with them since.
RE
John Mauldin may be an astrologaster, but he´s real good for “beginners”, I think, and the people he invites to write are also really good for “beginners”, mostly. By the way, he was one of the first who seriously gave up all hope on Japan and called it “a bug looking for a windshield”…..
Conflict is mankind’s consistent footprint for 10,000 plus years. This will not change. Gang thugs vs. “corn pone Nazis”? It should be quite a shootout. Meanwhile. Get out there, enjoy life and hobkob with your friends. NASCAR: what a buzz!
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LOL, NASCAR made an appearance withactually him writing that.
Anyway. I can see Japan reverting to the bushido culture, it won’t be ‘differently’ but back to their cultural tradition — even as the rest of the world goes medieval. Or Mad Max.
JHK doesn’t have much cognizance of that mid-20th century real history. It’d probably keep him up at night. Back in that day, Japan’s Prime Minister Konoe was a moderate, trying to balance the internal factions, namely their army and naty having hissy fits at each other. Konoe made several attempts for talks with FDR, who was happy to ignore that as it did not fit his agenda. Subsequently, Konoe was replaced by Tojo …
Sadly, despite the fact that we humans can certainly thrive in our current (large) numbers without much difficulty (and without the crony-capitalist, buy-now-pay-later fraud that has arisen these past decades), such will not be the case.
Booms and busts are part of the cyclical nature of humanity.
It is further evident that human social behavior produces a fractal pattern of smaller boom-bust cycles within larger boom-bust cycles, within even larger boom-bust cycles. This is akin to (but not quite the same as) the Fourth Turning stuff on this website.
We’ve had a boom, at the end of a boom, at the end of a BOOM. If Charles Mackay were alive today he’d be adding this period after the chapters on John Law’s Mississippi Scheme and the South Sea Bubble.
We are clearly living in a period of Extraordinary Popular Delusions (and the Madness of Crowds). We’ve just got a really big Crowd to be Deluded.
Now it’s time to fall down and go boom.
I’m willing to bet a younger Kunstler had a field day with Dick Nixon back in the day. Yet, he gives our mulatto president a pass even though he’s much worse than Nixon. That’s the definition of being a hypocrite. All liberals are hypocrites.
dc is correct, the bigger the boom, the bigger the bust. This bust is going to be epic.
Kunstler can rest his douchebag for change, as it looks like global warming was nothing but a falsetto alarm..seems like the 70’s prediction of a coming ice-age is more accurate…I can’t hardly wait to build my summer igloo..
http://www.forbes.com/sites/peterferrara/2013/05/26/to-the-horror-of-global-warming-alarmists-global-cooling-is-here/
The Little Ice Age, following the historically warm temperatures of the Medieval Warm Period, which lasted from about AD 950 to 1250, has been attributed to natural cycles in solar activity, particularly sunspots. A period of sharply lower sunspot activity known as the Wolf Minimum began in 1280 and persisted for 70 years until 1350. That was followed by a period of even lower sunspot activity that lasted 90 years from 1460 to 1550 known as the Sporer Minimum. During the period 1645 to 1715, the low point of the Little Ice Age, the number of sunspots declined to zero for the entire time. This is known as the Maunder Minimum, named after English astronomer Walter Maunder. That was followed by the Dalton Minimum from 1790 to 1830, another period of well below normal sunspot activity.
The increase in global temperatures since the late 19th century just reflects the end of the Little Ice Age. The global temperature trends since then have followed not rising CO2 trends but the ocean temperature cycles of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). Every 20 to 30 years, the much colder water near the bottom of the oceans cycles up to the top, where it has a slight cooling effect on global temperatures until the sun warms that water. That warmed water then contributes to slightly warmer global temperatures, until the next churning cycle.
Those ocean temperature cycles, and the continued recovery from the Little Ice Age, are primarily why global temperatures rose from 1915 until 1945, when CO2 emissions were much lower than in recent years. The change to a cold ocean temperature cycle, primarily the PDO, is the main reason that global temperatures declined from 1945 until the late 1970s, despite the soaring CO2 emissions during that time from the postwar industrialization spreading across the globe.
The 20 to 30 year ocean temperature cycles turned back to warm from the late 1970s until the late 1990s, which is the primary reason that global temperatures warmed during this period. But that warming ended 15 years ago, and global temperatures have stopped increasing since then, if not actually cooled, even though global CO2 emissions have soared over this period. As The Economist magazine reported in March, “The world added roughly 100 billion tonnes of carbon to the atmosphere between 2000 and 2010. That is about a quarter of all the CO2 put there by humanity since 1750.” Yet, still no warming during that time. That is because the CO2 greenhouse effect is weak and marginal compared to natural causes of global temperature changes.
At first the current stall out of global warming was due to the ocean cycles turning back to cold. But something much more ominous has developed over this period. Sunspots run in 11 year short term cycles, with longer cyclical trends of 90 and even 200 years. The number of sunspots declined substantially in the last 11 year cycle, after flattening out over the previous 20 years. But in the current cycle, sunspot activity has collapsed. NASA’s Science News report for January 8, 2013 states,
“Indeed, the sun could be on the threshold of a mini-Maunder event right now. Ongoing Solar Cycle 24 [the current short term 11 year cycle] is the weakest in more than 50 years. Moreover, there is (controversial) evidence of a long-term weakening trend in the magnetic field strength of sunspots. Matt Penn and William Livingston of the National Solar Observatory predict that by the time Solar Cycle 25 arrives, magnetic fields on the sun will be so weak that few if any sunspots will be formed. Independent lines of research involving helioseismology and surface polar fields tend to support their conclusion.”
That is even more significant because NASA’s climate science has been controlled for years by global warming hysteric James Hansen, who recently announced his retirement.
But this same concern is increasingly being echoed worldwide. The Voice of Russia reported on April 22, 2013,
“Global warming which has been the subject of so many discussions in recent years, may give way to global cooling. According to scientists from the Pulkovo Observatory in St.Petersburg, solar activity is waning, so the average yearly temperature will begin to decline as well. Scientists from Britain and the US chime in saying that forecasts for global cooling are far from groundless.”
That report quoted Yuri Nagovitsyn of the Pulkovo Observatory saying, “Evidently, solar activity is on the decrease. The 11-year cycle doesn’t bring about considerable climate change – only 1-2%. The impact of the 200-year cycle is greater – up to 50%. In this respect, we could be in for a cooling period that lasts 200-250 years.” In other words, another Little Ice Age.
Japan had 22 major famines between 1400 and 1800, and to this day food (and the celebration and thankfulness for it) remains a significant cultural issue (and expense) in Japan. That is what “going medieval” will mean, massive population reduction and then living within naturally imposed (via environmental resource constraints) limits to growth.
There is no way I can get the information and knowledge that I need to be informed from MSM every night @ 6:30 PM. Too many commercials! ☺
I really appreciate what TBP offers. I know people are putting valuable time and thought into the posts and just as important into the commentary. I appreciate it. I have tons yet to read and about as much still to learn.
A few years ago I tried to check out The Long Emergency by Kunstler at my library but they didn’t have a copy so I settled for his World Made by Hand: A Novel I was glad I read it but there were things I didn’t like – too many Bible passages for me. Amazon reviews give it an average of about 3.5 stars. You can read the first few chapters on Google Books for free if you’re interested.
I liked this essay “Let’s All Go Medieval” with its power packed vocabulary. It flowed for me like white water rafting reading and I wasn’t sure what was coming next. The title is spot on with my perception of the Dark Ages look and feel of humanity. It seems to be the theme of the day. The world does seem small these days. People are losing the ability to take pride in their work for many reasons. Some are just exhausted and bored; they are collapsing under capitalism. You can’t take pride in your work if you can’t even get a decent job.
I don’t get the Mad Dog vibe from Japan but Pyongyang isn’t really very far NE. Google Map China, Korea and Japan If I lived in Japan and I lived that close, I’d be nervous. Maybe that’s all they will be is nervous and just go Dark. But they may have enough $$$ in reserves to defend. They always seem to get slammed. If it’s not one thing, it’s another.
I’m not an expert on Japan by any means, but I came across the subject of Japanese Hikikomori which is extreme social isolation where the person never leaves their home or bedroom. It was interesting to read Shutting Out the Sun — How Japan Created It’s Own Lost Generation by Michael Zielenziger (2006).
Amazon reviews only give it about 3.5 stars avg.
Here is an excerpt from the dust jacket: (This is old from 2006)
… its failure to recover from economic collapse of the early 1990’s was unprecedented, and today it confronts an array of disturbing social trends. Japan has the highest suicide rate and lowest birthrate of all industrialized countries, and a rising incidence of untreated cases of depression.
They’ve had trouble over there for a long time.
I really meant – Pyongyang isn’t really very far North West from Japan. Got my directional wrong yesterday!