On Crystal Balls And Monkeys

15 October 2016 - For publication on 18 October 2016

With mere days left in US Election 2016, we here at Far Side Global Headquarters (FSGHQ) are prepared to issue our predictions for the coming month and beyond.  Brace yourself...it ain't pretty unless you are a political atheist who enjoys watching people's illusions melt in the hands, not in their mouths.

Imagine the 2000 election on steroids.

First of all, Hillary will be taken out of the race in a very public and unequivocal way due to health problems.  This may occur around the final debate or soon after, so that it is quite visible and no one can deny it.

The Party Apparatchiks will quickly replace her with a new candidate.  We don't think it will be Kaine, but rather someone out of left field.  This will cause a rash of problems as the Dark Forces scramble to update all the infrastructure they've put in place to steal the election, including millions of voting machines and the networks that control them.

In part due to Hillary being taken out, and part to Trump already commanding a sizable number of folks, he will win the election on November 8th; however, it ain't over till the corpulent female yodels.  The mess with the voting machines and networks will expose the vast corruption behind the scenes.  The PTB will try to claim that the results are not valid, due to some kind of "interruption" of the voting process and the fact that it wasn't fair for the Democrats to run a campaign less than a week long.

On the other hand, the Trumpians and folks who believe the election is what it is will argue loud and long that "they paid their money and took their chances," and despite the obvious election rigging in favor of Hillary, a win is a win.

But that's not all!

Due to the Trump win, the Globalnuts will immediately start collapsing the economy like spoilt children who don't get their way.  Massive economic disruptions will start within days of the election and continue through the end of the year, at least.  They will also start riots around the country and promote "civil unrest" to show their displeasure with the American electorate.

All of this will cause an almost revolutionary call to dismantle the Federal Reserve and the banking system, but the fever will take on new highs when the election is declared invalid and/or some procedure is invoked to install Hillary in spite of the outcome.

At this point, New Hampshire, Texas, Alaska and Hawaii - and probably a few other states - will begin procedures to secede from the Union.  Texas, already having an independent power grid and large economy of its own with substantial gold and oil reserves, will call for independent-minded folks to move in and help out with the effort.

The media, beginning this week, will be in complete melt-down.  All their cafeful plots and plans will fly right out the window and things will only get worse from there.  During the ensuing chaos, they will try desperately to regain their positions as thought-leaders and gate-keepers, but the masses will simply tune them out.  They will be having complete conniption fits on-air as they try anything to get people's attention, but will find they squandered any respectability and influence in the past year.  For those who like to see pretentious, self-important grown-ups cry, this will be an absolute hay-day!

All power structure at the federal level will collapse.  The Obama administration and Congress will have no power, since the passing of the election will leave them marking time until new folks are sworn in in January.  In addition, the various agencies will polarize, seeing the chaos as an opportunity to express anger over the politicization of jobs they thought were honorable (e.g. - FBI, DOJ, NSA, etc.).  In short, the normal power structure will be unable to respond with either force or coercion, further eroding the image of fear they use to maintain power and control.

There will be a blatant attempt to seat the Democratic candidate as president in January, but this will only enhance the collapse, rather than quell the chaos.  Even die-hard Democrats will not support this person, because the corruption will be so obvious.

Meantime, the economic melt-down will continue apace, in part as punishment for electing Trump, and part because it was the plan all along once the elections had passed.  At some point, it becomes self-sustaining and no one will be able to stop the melt-down, kind of like a Fukashima reactor writ large.

Due to both its internal dynamics, and the extreme forces from outside, the Western banking system will shut down.  Having no weapons left to manipulate with, and having nearly the entire world hammering at it like Visigoths at the gates of Rome, banking corporations will start going toes-up in a domino effect up to and including the Federal Reserve, which will be blamed for most of the problems, economic or not.  Hordes of banksters and financial types will flee the country, while mobs of angry citizens surround their homes and offices demanding justice.

And that's about as far as we can see, since the damn monkey just ran through the hut and stole our crystal ball - cheeky bastard.

At any rate, probably not a bad idea to buckle up and get ready for the ride of a generation or two.  If you are the prepper type, forget it.  If you can't carry it without Atlas Van Lines, you'll just have to leave it.  Work on your brain instead, since no matter how much information you stuff in it, it never gets heavier, and you are highly unlikely to lose it unless you run into ISIS, but at that point, not much of anything will matter.  We prefer good back-packs with a camp shovel, a hammer, a saw, and one of each kind of screwdriver.  If you can't do something with those tools, then it ain't worth doing.  Don't forget your SpaceBlanket (tm) too.

From deep in the jungles of Borneo, this is your faithful correspondent bidding you good luck from the FSGHQ.

Salt And Prepper

Been reading a lot about prepping lately, and naturally, I have a bit of a different take on it.

Before I launch, I should help those not familiar with "prepping" to catch up, which includes most of the world outside the US.  Prepping is the practice of storing food, medicine, water, and tools in preparation for large-scale disasters.  Over the past 25 years, it has gone from a fringe obsession to mainstream chic, with reality shows and so on.

Preppers do everything from store up months-worth of survival rations, to hundreds of gallons of diesel/gasoline, equal amounts of water and filters, and some even go so far as to install elaborate solar and wind electrical systems.

It has become a hobby for many and it can be as simple or expensive as you want, as most hobbies are.  A one-year supply of MREs (meals ready to eat) can set you back more than $5,000.  A good water filter, like the Big Berkey, runs just shy of $300.  Fuel supplies obviously get rather pricey and have limited storage life, even with optional preservatives and extenders, which also are not cheap.

The part where I think everyone goes wrong is the idea that they want to hunker down in one spot, usually at home.  They spend outrageous amounts of money on things that can not be carried easily, and no matter how much you store up, it will run out eventually.

Sure, I have a generator, but I don't anticipate it being useful for more than a month, at most.  At some point, I will run out of gasoline and motor oil.  It is very handy for blackouts and other temporary situations, but as a long-term solution to electricity needs that is portable, it is worthless.

In the world envisioned by preppers, most of what they prep will only extend the inevitable a few days, weeks or months.  If we are talking about the total collapse of society for a decade or more, all the underground bunkers and generators and food supplies will soon become useless.

Having given considerable thought to prepping, and having been through various disasters to test my theories, I have come up with a number of ideas that make a lot of sense.

First of all, I start with the premise that I do not want to be stationary.  That is completely contrary to most preppers thinking.  I assume that I will want to move around due to weather, mobs and other regional problems and advantages.  For instance, it might be nice to be in the mountains during the summer and further south in the winter.  In my case, I live on the equator where it's always high of 90F and low of 75F, with predictable rain and dry seasons.  I have a house in the mountains and one in the city, with some good farm land.

The next problem was food.  Yes, we have a small store of canned foods and such, but only enough to cover the time from planting to harvest, roughly three months.  Instead of storing food, I am storing seeds.  I can put an entire acre of food in my pocket if need be.  I also grow a lot of food now and carefully seed plants that are superior for the next round.

The most important thing in my prepper's arsenal is what's in my head.  I have spent years building up carpentry skills, knowledge on how to build everything from lean-tos to brick houses, and even how to build carts and wagons.  The things I have stored in my head require no extra baggage, are fully portable, and can create necessary items from whatever materials are most widely available wherever I happen to be.

To go with that information, I have collected hand tools.  Saws, planes, augers, and the like would be without price if everything went to hell tomorrow.  They don't need electricity.  One thing I have learned from Indonesians is how to make these tools from found materials, as well.  If I can, then I will carry the tools I have.  If that's not an option, I can make them when I get somewhere I can settle down.

I've even thought about entertainment, and by extension, transferring culture.  I have identified three books that I can't live without.  First is the abridged edition of the Tripitaka.  Second is the collected works of t. s. eliot, and third is Alice in Wonderland.  I chose these volumes because the first is one of the oldest books on spiritualism in the world, the second is some of the finest poetry that uses several European languages, and the last is a fine example of why the world collapsed in an entertaining format.  Together, they cover body, mind and soul in the least amount of space possible.  If electricity is an option, then I have a massive library of film, audio, books, and images spanning the past three millennia, and it's all on a single disk about 3" by 5".

I listen to all the folks talk about prepping, and most of what they say depends on life returning to some sort of normal withing months of a major global meltdown.  I figure if the world gets slapped that bad, we shouldn't be thinking in terms of months, but decades.  Furthermore, we shouldn't be thinking of locking ourselves down in one place, but be prepared to move around quite a bit as events warrant.

My idea of prepping is to get as much into my head and a single, large pack that I can carry on my back.  Sure I've got the sport Berkey filter, but in my head, I have detailed plans for building a sand and charcoal water filter anywhere I go.  I also know how to find water in the desert and get both drinkable water and salt from the sea, solving both thirst and long-term preservation of meat.  I have seeds for medicinal herbs and I know how to prepare a lot of different medicines from them.  And my food supply goes wherever I go with no more effort than carrying a book.

A lot of folks might laugh to see my entire survival kit packed up, since it fits in one and a half cubic meters.  But I will stake my long-term survival on what I have versus a lot of what I see and hear out there.

When I give prepping advice, it is this: stuff as much as you can in your head.  It doesn't weigh anything, requires no extra space to store and pack, and has its own electrical supply built in.  Beyond that, learn how to make what you need from the world around you, and more importantly, be very sparing on what you need.  What you want is a whole different issue.

I don't look like you average prepper because I don't have entire rooms stuffed with things.  What I have fits mostly in my brain and the rest is easily portable.  I'm willing to bet my life that my prepping will go a lot further than a thousand MREs and three drums of diesel.

Noah, Where Are You?

Drinking water?  Check.  Food?  Check.  Beer and booze?  Check.  Ark?  Damn, forgot something.

Here in beautiful west Jakarta, the rains have hardly stopped for four days now.  We got a little break today from about noon on, and blessedly, the flood waters run off rather quickly, so folks have been able to escape flooded homes or make repairs or get some supplies.

What a mess!  Yesterday, the West Canal levy broke and an eyewitness friend of ours working in the UOB Building at Plaza Indonesia reported seeing a "tsunami" rushing through the vast open area around the national fountain.  Cars were swept along and piled up at the downhill end.  At least 12 people are reported dead so far, with more than 18,000 homeless.  Water in some areas exceeded 3 meters/12 feet.

In our area of west Jakarta, we are literally on a peninsula, with only one major road open into and out of the area.  If the rains keep up, we will become an island in a sea of destruction.  Only a few hundred meters south of my house, one family we know spent two days on the roof of their house when the waters rose to the ceiling.

One friend, a British teacher who lives with his family about a kilometer behind us, sent this text, "Totally f#&ked. Water in house at knee level. We're stuck on top floor which thankfully is main part of house.  Still have gas, some food and water but the neighbourhood is up to chest level water..."  We offered to rent a Zodiac boat and come for them, but he waved us off after the waters started receding a bit.

Another family escaped by pushing their motorcycle through chest-deep water with Mom carrying the baby on her head.

The case study here is not the flooding, but the 'normalcy bias'.  People were panicked last night as the rains fell in incessant buckets and lightning split the sky.  By noon, when the rain let up, suddenly everyone went back to business as usual.

The problem is that the forecast is for eight more days of heavy rain, and the real threat is the run-off from the mountains to the south that have already swamped levies and are straining the flood gate system throughout the region.

At some point, flood gate operators are faced with a critical decision: either open the gates or lose them.  Opening them affords some amount of control, however it still releases a mass of water into certain areas and people and things will be lost at that point.

For our part, we've had a chance to put our preparations to the test, and have found some weaknesses that will have to be addressed.  Some examples of what we have done to mitigate our risk in this type of situation:

• 50 gallons of drinking water and 300 gallons of sanitary water stored on a regular basis;
• A healthy stock of rice and dried noodles, along with seasoning packets and other condiments;
• An electrical generator capable of running the refrigerator, a couple of lights and one A/C;
• An extra bottle of propane for the stove giving us about five months of cooking gas;
• Enough sandbags to block the front of the house;
• 10 inner-tubes on the top floor, along with a hatchet, to make a raft and escape through the roof (two tubes would be used to hold 5-gallon water bottles);
• And finally, we chose our house based in large part on a topographical map of the city, showing this area to be one of the highest points.

Most people don't take the time to go to this level of preparation.  In fact, famiy and friends laughed at our inner-tube contraption...until today.  Now at least two families went out this morning and did the same thing.

Our fall-back plan is to paddle like mad towards the mountains and escape to our Far Side World Headquarters - Java Branch.  There, we have a full, working garden complete with bearing fruit trees and a second supply of food, water and gas, as well as clean clothes and a hand-pumped water well offering potable water.  Our farm is not far afield, as well.

Folks who go to this extreme of readiness (though we don't consider it extreme) are often laughed at.  One may recall the parable of the ant and the grasshopper, which I took to heart, even as a young age.  I also like my creature comforts, even in the midst of disasters.

I have always deployed my resources in a manner that offers me the most options for the least cost.  More than a couple of times, that mentality has saved my hide.

I invest a certain amount of time in any place I live to learn every possible route out of the area, including overland.  I don't like being trapped and I especially revel in the ability to skirt around traffic pile-ups and other signs of idiocy.  In some ways, being a mild enochlophobe (or is it misanthrope?) has its advantages.

I don't consider myself a 'prepper'.  A prepper is someone who simply hordes stuff for the sake of lording it over others when the s#&t comes down.  I prefer to think of it as being the one level head in a rag-tag group of panicked humanity who has an actual plan for getting back on track.

It's events like the current flooding in Jakarta that help one to evaluate who can and can't be trusted to act decisively in an emergency.  A lot of people like to think they would, but those are usually the ones sending frantic text messages and leaping out of windows to their deaths.  It is very rare to find someone who is cool and rational in the face of disaster, and who can act deliberately to remedy situations, rather than exacerbate them.

The thing is, most people will never know how they will react until confronted with an emergency.  It is very difficult to react deliberately and rationally when the flood waters are over your head and you're trying to push someone's fat butt through the window so you can live.  It's easy to think of these things in the abstract, but what happens when your lungs are burning, you're three feet under water, you have a large knife in your hand, and the only thing between you and living is that fat butt?

Hopefully, most of us will never be faced with that choice, but it is one to ponder deeply.  After all, is it better for one out of two to live, or both die?

I have long pondered the meaning of being human.  Philosophers have come up with a myriad of answers, from the ability to use tools to the ability to laugh.  I have come to the conclusion that to be human means to maintain moral and ethical behavior even in the face of certain death.  When you think about it, that is probably the most difficult choice any person could ever make, and the result would distinguish a human from an animal.

Emergency situations, such as the current flooding here, leave one with a lot of time to think, if you're not busy trying to survive.  On more than one occasion in the past two days, we've been faced with aiding people whose stupidity and lack of foresight left them very vulnerable, while our planning and deployment of assets has given us the ability to ponder such things.

We could have easily brushed off the other folks and justified it as survival of the fittest, but that is an animal response.  A human doesn't distinguish between stupid and smart.  One simply opens the door to anyone who asks, and shares what they have to the best advantage of all involved.

The global population, according to some soothsayers with fairly good records, may be faced with just these sorts of choices in the near future.  This flood may be a rehearsal for the coming disaster, a way to see who will and won't survive.

Preparedness is not just stocking up on food and water and having backup plans.  Real preparedness is pondering the really tough questions, playing out scenarios, and deciding up-front what your reactions will be when faced with an overwhelming threat.

If and when such things come to pass, will you lead the way to aid, to shelter and to rebuild?  Or will you step on any head to save yourself?  This is the most basic question we, as humans, can ask and answer.  It involves us assessing our place in the Universe and whether we see death as a finality or as the beginning of another phase.  We must decide whether we go out with dignity or survive with shame.

It is the rare person that can live a lifetime without coming face to face with these choices.  Some may face them many times.  How noble or ignoble are we as denizens of Universe?  And what example, what legacy do we leave behind?

Update Jan 19; 6:50pm: A number of people are making money offering raft services.  They will deliver you to a dry spot for about $15, or take orders and run to the store and buy goods for you at a premium.  I'm seriously thinking of buying a Zodiac boat as a business model.  Stupidity does have a price.  Normalcy bias running rampant!

 These are horrible choices to contemplate, and even worse to experience.  How many other lives is one life worth?  Jengis Khan famously said, "Every man must kill another to make room for himself in the world."  There is a perverse logic to this statement, but how willing are you to confront that moment?

If there is some Grand Accounting in the Sky, and like the pharaohs of old, we will stand in the balance with our hearts on the other side, will we pass the test?  And if this isn't the case, what have we gained or lost by being kind and helping others?  Are we truly nothing more than advanced animals?  Or are human beings, like the old stories tell us, something far more interesting?

Think of it this way: you have just survived a disaster and all you know is gone.  All you have is two cans of beans.  A perfect stranger walks up and asks for some food.  Do you freely hand him the second can, or do you kill him so he won't tell others?

It may seem like an abstraction, but it could happen at any time.

It's not enough to be a 'prepper' with your vast stockpiles of food, water, medicine, and the like.  You must also ponder the deeper questions of who and what you are.

This is the road less traveled.

All images from the last 24 hours...

Sliding Doors

I don't know if you've been following the work of Clif High and his Web Bot Project at halfpasthuman.com.  I've been reading the output since 2002, and I have found them to be rather prescient, though not always as advertised.

One of the major events that have shown up repeatedly over the past several years is something Clif calls the Data Gap.  In the past year, he has narrowed the timing for this event down to this spring, with the leading edge showing up around next week or so.

In a nutshell, the Data Gap is a massive turning point in human history, after which life will not be the same for at least half a dozen years (as far as the bots can read out, in other words).  It's enough to have spooked Clif and his commentaries have taken a darker turn.

Certainly, scanning the news headlines this past week would lead one to conclude that such a thing is entirely possible.  Oil and gold prices have shot up, with $6/gallon gasoline a distinct possibility in the States before long.  The saber-rattling over Iran and Syria has significantly ramped up.  The recent US presidential debate took a decidedly nasty turn, though not all that unusual in what passes as public discourse in that country.  The world in general is polarizing  Over all, we can see a fair increase in the amount of tension building at every level.

Whitney Houston died and people got rather testy over who sat where and was allowed in to the memorial service.  Sacha Baron Cohen was banned from the Oscars.  A two-bit actor admitted tooting blow at a White House function.  The Occupiers are threatening armed marches on Wall Street.  Anonymous is making its presence felt at a great number of websites.  Rense and Makow are at each other's throats.  Labor unrest is building in Indonesia.  Greek protests are getting more desperate.  Russia appears to be having some unrest in the ranks.  Germany is dealing with a neo-Nazi dust-up.

Everywhere you look, tensions are building, and this fits quite snugly with Clif's work, which shows a massive build-up to roughly March 1-9, with a blow-off top and roll into release language the likes of which our generation has never witnessed.  One can hardly debate that there are increasingly unsustainable emotional, economic, social, and political bubbles everywhere.  One can imagine them all popping more or less simultaneously, with life-changing consequences.

One thing I've learned about the Web Bots over the years is don't try to come up with a scenario to fit the language.  It is almost always wrong, even though the actual events fit perfectly with what was predicted. 

For example, they predicted a maritime disaster a few years back, and while everyone was watching the shipping lanes, the space shuttle blew up over Texas.  The language had to do with ships and naval terms, which are commonly used in reference to space hardware, as well.

A recent example was language refering to a wreck of the ship of state and hints about Italy.  The cruise ship grounding filled all the descriptors, but folks were watching governments, having wrongly interpreted the variou terms that had come through.

So what will happen in the next couple of weeks.  Well, sorry to disappoint, but as I said, I've given up trying to predict what events will fill the bill.  One thing that can be speculated upon is that the language calls for massive release of tension worldwide involving natural, economic, political, social, and emotional releases.  It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that global events are ripe for something like this to happen.

Things that are implied by the bots include changes in the seas and coastal areas, events in space, earthquakes, an "Israeli mistake," disease epidemics, and the list goes on.  I give it about a 50-50 chance of being right, first because the bots are as much wrong as right (though in all fairness they get the big stuff right), second because timing is not one of the strong points of the web bots, and third because humans can make choices.

Back in 1998, a rather interesting movie came out called "Sliding Doors," with Gweneth Paltrow.  The premise was that a woman's life splits at a key moment that's as mundane as catching a train.  From there, the story splits and shows the outcomes of both catching and not catching a certain train.

The movie points out both the choices we make, and those made for us.  There are always choices.  Often people allow others to make their choices, because they are too lazy or frightened to make their own.

If we suspect impending disaster, we can choose to prepare or not.  When governments get out of hand, we can choose to resist or not.  When personal relationships become strenuous, we can choose to stay in them or get out.

Too often, we choose the devil we know, or the status quo.  For some reason, people fight change, though it is an intricate part of life in every aspect.  We get comfortable in our routines, no matter how absurd, because we've learned to deal with that particular set of variables.  Something new requires us to learn, adapt and adjust.  Most of us don't like that.

In a week or two, we may find that none of the familiar rules apply any more.  Every aspect of our routines will have changed, regardless of whether the new situation is good, bad or indifferent, and we won't like it.  Those who thrive in this kind of situation are the ones who give up the old way of thinking the fastest and look for new opportunities in the jumble of new variables.

When you think about it, 'preppers' are really those who are working the hardest to maintain the old way of doing things.  Rather than preparing to change, they are preparing to maintain.  This can cause people to be much slower at seeing and seizing new opportunities.

When change of the magnitude predicted by the web bots comes along, nothing of the old way of doing things will help in the new paradigm.  The best way to prepare for this kind of change is to let go and detach from current habits and needs, and start thinking along whole new avenues of possibilities.  Those prepared to let go the fastest and adjust to new currents are the ones most likely to come out on top.

Most important to survival is one's mental state.  Those who fear change have already lost the battle.  It's the normalcy bias that we've discussed at length here at LFS.  Most people will cling to what they know and resist change with all their might until it takes more resources than they have to fight it.  By the time these people give up and go with the flow, those who embraced the change are miles ahead.

Regardless of web bots, it is a foregone conclusion that the world is changing rapidly.  Almost nothing in the current regime can be sustained much longer.  We have built our pyramid upside down, and it won't be long before it teeters over and crushes those who are deperately trying to hold it up.

The true 'preppers' are walking away from this losing battle and looking for fresh direction and an expanded horizon.  We have entered an era of inevitable change, and those who recognize it and go with it first will be the ones who profit first.  The Chinese word for 'disaster' is composed of two characters meaning 'chaos' and 'opportunity'. 

When it all comes crashing down, there are those who lament what has passed, and those who see raw materials for a fresh start.  The first direction leads to death, and the second to life.  Choose a path and start prepping.

What if...?

Our thought experiment for the day:

Suppose you woke up tomorrow and the USA had gone the way of the USSR?

It's become fashionable these days to be a 'prepper.'  Folks are stocking up on things they think they would need to get through a couple of weeks or months of disaster.  Storeable food, water filters, generators, even guns and ammo have been on a lot of people's shopping lists lately.  I see this as a good trend.  It promotes self-sufficiency and is just reasonable in the face of Mother Nature's vagaries.

The part of prepping that no one talks about is the mental gaming of various scenarios.  Major militaries have 'war colleges', where the best and brightest gather regularly to ponder the 'what-ifs.'   It's part of being ready for anything.  The reason people panic, or worse, or stunned into inaction, is that something happens that they hadn't considered possible.  Their minds shut down as they try to process the flood of unexpected information.

For those who are serious about prepping, we must prepare our minds as well as our supplies.  To do that, we should take a bit of time once in a while to set up possible chains of events, and then noodle through what we would do it they happened.

It's one thing to plan for natural disadters.  Most of us have been through one or two, so we can imagine certain events and mentally plot out a pllan of action.  But suppose you woke up and your country had collapsed.

The reason I chose the USA is that, 1) it's a very real possiblity, 2) it would affect the entire world, and 3) almost no one is ready for it.

As we discussed last time, most folks have a normalcy bias.  In the face of a disaster, they assume that things will return to normal within a short period of time.  Because of that, they lose valuable time in responding to a crisis.  When there's a blackout, we generally assume that it will be back in a couple of hours or less.  We don't immediately react as if it is gone and may not return for months, or even years.

When the USSR collapsed, no one expected it, at least at the general population level.  We saw the news footage of vast crowds gathered at the Kremlin and Yeltsin standing on the tank leading the charge.  However, it was months before the average Joe began to process the fact that the USSR was gone and not coming back.

At this moment in time, the very real possibility exists that the USA may follow suit sooner or later.  It has run up astronomical debt in trying to maintain its empire (just like the USSR), its currency is in very real danger of collapse (just like the USSR), and there's a growing sentiment among the population at large that things are not right and need fixing fast (just like the USSR).  It stands to reason that some event may trigger a domino effect that could collapse the USA overnight, just like the USSR.

Here's our scenario.  Israel unilaterally attacks Iran, assuming that the USA will jump in, as it always has, to pull its bacon out of the fire (pun intended).  But, when the order comes down from the CIC, the top military brass balks and refuses to engage.  This causes an immediate crisis with certain elements within the ranks surrounding the White House seeking the arrest of the CIC.

Within hours of the news hitting the wire, the general population is galvanized.  Thousands, if not millions of folks converge on city halls, state capitols and DC.  At least one group takes over national media facilities and begins an unstoppable uplink live to satellite and internet getting the word out around the usual 'gatekeepers' filtering the message.

The world at large gets wind of this.  It causes an immediate crisis of confidence in the dollar and dollar-denominated financial intstruments.  In less than 72 hours, the dollar collapses to unheard of lows and Americans around the world can not exchange their dollars or use them to pay airfare, hotels and other needs.  Credit cards are frozen or refused.

In the USA, by the end of the first week, a significant number of people are calling in sick.  Either they are on strike in solidarity, or they are afraid to make the commute through mobs of protesters to get to work.

The CIC barracades himself in the White House, making near round-the-clock appeals on the media outlets that are still listening.  He orders military and national guard to suppress the uprising, but this is only effective in certain limited areas, like LA and New York City.  As locals feed out images on the crack down on the internet, this further enrages the general populace and even fence-sitters are forced to join sides.

By the end of the second week, the power grid is only sporadic, dependent on dedicated skeleton crews to keep it running at all.  Stores have been emptied and are not being restocked, because the truckers and train engineers are either on strike or not willing to risk their lives to deliver supplies.  Around the country, a number of city halls have been torched and several state capitols have been taken over by protesters.

Washington DC is under seige.  Millions of people have literally encircled the city and are backed up by military who are still loyal to their oaths.  There are reports of numerous projectiles of various kinds hitting the White House, and the CIC is trapped in the underground bunker, deperately appealing for order, though by now, most of the media are either taken over or more focused on national and global events to worry about him.

By the end of the third week, local leaders have emerged and taken over the libraries of major universities.  They have set up common law councils to try to re-establish order.  Across the nation, thousands of suburban neighborhoods have sealed themselves off and have pooled supplies and resources with citizen patrols repelling interlopers.  Thousands more people have started squatting in national parks and have set up make-shift cities using the facilities there.

In DC, the CIC has announced that he will resign and surrender to US Marshals, but the Marshals are nowhere to be found.  Crowds have knocked down the fence around the White House and are now literally surrounding the building, though they have no yet breached its walls.  There's also the question of who will take over the CIC position, since most Congress-critters have vanished, and the Veep was captured and is being held in Maryland somewhere.

In Houston, a group of sympathetic refinery workers have taken over several of the refineries and started producing limited amounts of gasoline, but there is no orderly way to distribute it, and it is not nearly enough to supply the overwhelming demand.

Local TeeVee stations have been taken over in nearly every market and are broadcasting patriotic messages and information on groups who are organizing to supply various services, such as medical care, etc.

In NYC, the Federal Reserve building has been completely overrun and gutted.  Dozens of bankster types have been arrested and are being held for trials, though lynch mobs have taken their toll.

Globally, markets have crashed.  The EU is in tatters and international trade is running at a fraction of capacity.  US embassies and military bases worldwide have been looted and destroyed, and hundreds of military personnel, stranded by the sudden collapse, have been taken prisoner in a great many countries.  Media have carried news footage of people burning piles of dollar bills, since the currency has completely collapsed and the paper is worthless.

By week four, the CIC is captured trying to escape wearing an elaborate Hollywood-style prosthetic disguise.  However, at the first sign of trouble, the security around him bolts and he is taken prisoner by the military.j

The entire world is in chaos, since so many markets and international trade operated on dollars.  Practically overnight, millionaires and billionaires lose their entire fortunes.  Commerce grinds to a trickle, causing riots and revolutions to flare up in dozens of countries.  The entire command-and-control structure has nearly vanished in a month leaving the vast majority of folks completely clueless, while handfuls of people are desperately trying to establish some kind of order in various places, but the fever of the immediate situation is too powerful for them to be effective.

On the newly liberated media, scenes of people walking aimlessly through the streets clutching old photo albums or other mementos of their past lives are common.  The stunned look in their eyes says it all.  Even a month into the crisis, they are still unable to cope with the collapse of everything they once assumed to be permanent.

Now, what would you do?  Are you prepared for events on this kind of scale?  Besides mentally steeling yourself to deal with such things, what could you effectively do to safeguard you and your family in this kind of scenario?

To think this couldn't happen is naive.  It has happened, not just in the USSR, but in countless societies throughout history.  When the mighty fall, it is usually swift and decisive.  Certianly, the USA is not stable.  This is one possible scenario of dozens with more or less the same outcome.  It behooves us to ponder such things in the worst case, if for no other reason than to prevent ourselves from panicking and thereby being useful to our loved ones.

How real is this possibility?  One would have to assume that it is inevitable, though when and how are huge variables.  Given the current state of world affairs, though, one would wisely assume sooner than later.

Providence always favors the prepared mind.