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| Peorians rise up |
Peorians are up in arms and taking to the town squares and the streets. They are taking out their anger and frustration on the political, corporate and social elite. No, we are not talking about that Middle West Peoria, Hollywood's favorite movie thermometer. We are talking about the fictional country called Peoria, deep in the heart of the Middle East.
Several decades ago, Peoria took a look around the world for a model on which it could build itself for the future generations of Peorians. They looked at the USSR (now Russia et al), England (now UK), France (still France, are you kidding?) and other countries. Finally, they hitched their wagons (real ones, not just metaphorical) to the American Star. Peoria became the cultural equivalent of a Fund Of Funds, tracking American business, politics, and society and reflecting those trends in its own way of life.
It must have seemed like such a good idea at the time.
It was "Morning In America" then and
the Evil Empire was crumbling, stunned by the sledgehammer of Capitalism. The hostages had returned from Iran. The Gipper faced down the Traffic Controllers' Union. Suddenly, many Americans began to read the Business section instead of the comics and students flocked from the ashram to "business school."
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| Peorian Bowery Hotel |
Hollywood went corporate. Harvard went corporate, The NBA, NFL, and MLBaseball went corporate (the NHL went nowhere, of course). New York City, including Soho, the
Bowery, Tribeca, the Village, even the Upper West Side (gasp!) went corporate; even NYC mayors went corporate before they went ga-ga.
Slowly at first, but then very quickly, when you said "China," you were not just talking about the relatives coming over for dinner. Even Mao's China went corporate! With a vengeance (real vengeance, not just metaphorical).
So, you can understand why Peoria became infatuated. They too figured out that the only way they could pay for their families healthcare was to work for large corporations. They too traded something called "profit sharing, " AKA money, for stock options. They began investing in 401K's tax free, and watched in amazement and with gratitude as their monthly statements came etched in gold. Finally, even middle class Peorians, which is as middle as middle can get, were able to do exactly as the truly wealthy Peorians and Americans could do, use
other people's money to make even more. They could borrow.
Looking back, some thoughtful Peorians (a dying breed, as in you know where) began to wonder if it was a good thing that plumbers, electricians, doctors, salespersons, CEO's were spending an enormous amount of time day-trading instead of working. And, it turned out that many of them were trading in stocks of "internet" or "tech" companies that did not yet actually have products or customers, which turned out to be not as good as bank analysts and stock raters had preten....ah, hoped
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| Great Peorian Bubbles I and II |
Meanwhile, Peoria had adopted the two-year long Presidential campaign, another capitalist miracle in that it earned millions for Peorian media companies and the political consulting industry, although the candidates sometimes looked like those to-good-to-be-true internet products. In short, Peorians too got the leaders they deserved, watching it all on huge TV's in their huge homes, in banks, at airports, and at the deli waiting for a Peorian's favorite meal, a 1,000 calorie sandwich and a 2,000 calorie drink (love really is blind, and fat too).
Since Peoria is in the Middle East, it has lots of enemies, real and imagined: Families, tribes, religions, sects. And these are just
inside Peoria. So, when its idol was forced to borrow trillions of dollars from those very same Chinese to find Weapons of Mass Destruction that were amazingly like those pretty much non-existent internet products, political leadership qualities and stock options, Peoria too began to borrow and fight, borrow and fight.
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| Federal Reserve Of Beijing |
This went along pretty well as long as Peorians tuned into Foxoria (oh, yes they copied this too), until they began to hear rumors that some Peorian banks may have over-extended themselves in real estate. Well, okay,
every Peorian bank, its Treasury, Federal Reserve, its Fredoria & Fannoria Macs, Peoria Internationl Group Insurance, even Peorian Sachs, Holy of Holies, was going bust overnight, all of them AAA rated by their own raters!
You know how this story goes, having lived it yourselves. The smartest, bravest and richest in the Peorian land saved the Whole Shebang. Soon, all the bad stuff had gone up in a puff of smoke (Acapulco Gold?) and bank profits and bonuses returned. Naturally, Peorians celebrated their deliverance by reforming healthcare, promising (with a wink) to improve education, and once again buying SUV's, made in Peoria by Peorian hands, on Peorian machines. Peorian banks were forced to buy the really ugly banks for pennies and to change their logos so that executives could avoid any jail time.
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| Mandarin Lesson |
And, just like us, Peorians have just dodged a fiscal bullet and avoided having to shut down their magnificent government. They have, yet once again, saved Planned Parenthood, although to some it might appear that the most truest of true things one might say about both Americans and Peorians is that they wish that the parents of the num-sculls left in charge of everything had done more parent planning and saved all of us a great deal of discomfort, not to mention hypocrisy.
Reportedly, the Peorian rioters chief demand is that every Peorian begin mandatory lessons in Mandarin.
To them we say: be careful, sometimes you get what you pray for.
