Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. - George Santayana
Those of us in power are choosing to ignore history and make you relive it. - APA
History says housing prices never go down. - NAR
Housing as a driver of an expanding economy is history. - Rob Dawg
Okay, this is a really smart and informed group for the most part but I suspect not everyone has been exposed to the salient points of our current circumstance in historical perspective. Thh picture is a famous one taken by the great depression era photographer, Dorothea Lange. It is taken from http://www.ssa.gov/history/briefhistory3.html which provides excellent background on the past as prologue.
History does not repeat itself, but it does rhyme. - Samuel Clemens
Thus we need to be a bit more analytical than just "we're headed for another depression." The Foriegn Policy Research Institute has a fascinating article on the lessons learned/not learned from the Vietnam War. http://www.fpri.org/footnotes/071.200105.garfinkle.lessons.html
Reading it you can substitute any subject and it still rings true.
We aren't going to have a depression. Besides a depression won't correct the problems we have anyway so why bother? We are gonna be forcibly civilized and go from the 800lb gorilla on the world stage to an ape wearing a people suit in the circus. There are nations that have been waiting a century to humiliate us and some a half-century to destroy us. They'll do themselves even greater harm if they try but that won't temper their zeal. My guess is we are going to return to a stand of greater self reliance. People don't understand things like our importing oil and goods is not purely a pull phenomena, it serves to export a higher standard of living abroad. We'll end up with more socialism not less and less freedoms not more, just like the civilized countries. THe cost wil be borne by the only segment of society that can afford it but cannot afford to avoid it; the middle class. Essentially if you can't get rich fast you are gonna end up poor slow. Read just about anything by Paul Krugman on that subject. But I've rambled long enough. Here's your chance to prognosticate on whether it is 1894 or 1917 or 1929 or...
18 comments:
Robert,
Is that APA quote from the American Psychological Association? Because I have never heard any planners say that.
Speaking of planners, I often like to imagine what Rome would have looked like had town planners got their hands on it first.
I think it would look like a cross between Milton-keynes and Tudor Village.
Now Metro, you know that planners never come right out and state their agenda plainly.
Urbanism failed. New Urbanism.
Traditional URban Development failed. Neo-Trad.
Incompatible land uses failed. Mixed Use.
See? The planners want another bite of the apple.
"What is past is prologue"
-Shakespeare (Tempest II i)
You guys are talkin fancy talk over here. All them there big words is makin my little head hurt. I'ma goin back to the Homey post.
OMG, CASEY SUX!! HOMEY RULEZ!! HATERZ 4 LIFE!!!
IMHO the "average" EN reader is at least a two sigma net user. Bad enough when the administrator slips in a little Shakespere but when the replies include citiations... jeesh. Not to mention the assumption that when somebody says Milton-Keynes the intended audience knows what you mean. The whole discussion could be reduced to a sort of planner short hand:
Point: LeCou plus Radiant.
Counterpoint: Yeah, but Cabrini.
Point: Induced.
Counterpoint: Externalities.
Point: Moses?
Counterpoint: Mullholland.
...on and on.
"New GEICO Commercial"
Narrator: Robert Cote is a real GEICO customer, not a paid celebrity.. so to help tell his story, we hired a celebrity.
Robert: Last summer, someone accidentally side-swiped my car.
Casey Serin: It's not an accident if you don't think about it that way!
Robert: I called GEICO, and was talking to an agent within 30 seconds.
Casey Serin: Win-Win!! Sweet deal!!
Robert: GEICO filed my claim immediately and my car was repaired in short order.
Casey Serin: Now you can reward yourself with Jamba Juice! Well done!
:-)
[[will probably be re-posted to the next Casey thread. heh]]
ROFL @ Benoit!
You win the coveted Comment Of The Week award.
Benoit-
That's freaking awesome!
@Rob Boy, Homey, RoB Dawg
You all realize Casey's main reason for his blog and his created persona is so he can "age" his debts ( credit cards, loans, other debts)when he eventually files BK? My theory is he and Galina pocketed about $150,000 to $200,000 in illegal cash back at closings, then ran up all that unsecured debt to float the properties long enough so that he can get past the 6 month "window of fraud". Granted, it won't work, but that appears to be the most logical explanation for his actions.
@ captain obvious
That's a definite possibility.
At 2:17 RobDawg said
Point: LeCou plus Radiant.
Counterpoint: Yeah, but Cabrini.
Point: Induced.
Counterpoint: Externalities.
Point: Moses?
Counterpoint: Mullholland.
...on and on.
But does it end at Morningside Crescent?
NR
For Morningside read Mornington.
Have a toddler on my lap distracting me.
NR696.699699
He helped type9 th9++a6+t+.6+6+6-+
Rob @ 2:17:
But I find that Thibault cancels out Capo Ferra...
Wait, what?
The pain of the middle class is going to be slow and deliberate. The elitists (GOP/Dem) in this country do NOT care about the majority (poor AND middle class).
It may be too late to find a savior ala Teddy Roosevelt or JFK, but we should just accept our fate in the world. We are not the world's police nor are we a superpower anymore. When China can now blind our satellites and Russia still has as many nukes as we do, it's fucked. When Islamists do NOT want to talk rationally THAT is fucked up. When we declare wars on sovereign nations based on trumped up intelligence THAT makes us FUCKED.
I will say this...there will not be a great depression. The world will basically turn into Old Europe. I believe the GOP will splinter and so will the Dems.
Maybe my house will never appreciate and I will be upside down in terms of equity but it is MINE. I will protect it should law and order break down. But then again, Bush just signed a bill that snuck through increased powers to declare martial law. I am no tinhat conspiracy theorist, but it doesn't take too much speculation to figure out why the President is trying to overrule Posse Comatatus.
Time for America to stop focusing on Shitney Spears and Anna Nicole Slutbag and DO something about this. If they want their kids and grandkids to suffer, be my guest. I've got enough saved to weather the slow downturn. It would sure suck to be Casey mired in all that debt or Brian whatshisname with a family, no job prospects and college debt. THOSE people will suffer more than me. My life is 2/3 done because of my age. I read all this great depression talk and all it does is frustrate me. I see a lot of it as tinhat talk and wishful thinking but I do believe this country will see a revolution sometime in the near future.
Peace out guys.
People don't understand things like our importing oil and goods is not purely a pull phenomena, it serves to export a higher standard of living abroad.
How does this hurt us? The way I see it is that globalism helps bring parity to world-wide standards of living. That's good for the working poor in India and China and the Philippines, as their standards of living increase. And, yes, it means that the standards of living for Americans and Western Europeans and Japanese and Australians may decrease a bit for now, but I see that more as a short term effect. In the long term, isn't the world a better off place when more people are on an even keel and enjoying a higher average standard of living?
Those of us in the first-world nations have been spoiled rotten this past 50 years or so. I'd rather give back a little now and see the poorer nations improve than hoard it all to myself and wake up 25 years from now with a burgeoning super poor and desperate population in China, India, the Middle East, etc.
Robert,
Urbanism has not failed.
New Urbanism. Traditional URban Development has not failed.
Neo-Trad. Incompatible land uses have not failed.
Celebration Florida is a resounding success of neotraditional so is Kentlands in MD. Reston VA has brand new downtowns with mixed use and again it is a resounding success. As for urbanism, even a hellhole like Atlanta is seeing a resurgence in downtown living as is Denver, Portland Or and Seattle Wa. The project you highlight about a month ago has yet to be tested.
Robert you should get out more to see some of these places, I know you have the money. Again I will say it, those who would like that lifestyle now have a choice, the market will decide for those landuse types. If they fail, they fail.
Metro,
Sure Urbanism has failed. Don't get me wrong, I was a world beating runaway success up until WW-I. Urbanism was a prefered mode reight through WW-II. Urbanism until the 60s-70s was still sufficiently competitive that many places remained desireable. Things changed over those last 90 years. That's why nearly every aspect of classical urbanism has been abandoned by even reluctant planners. I'd say the capitulation could be traced to the early/mid 60s when cities started wholesale destruction of the old patterns and among other things reversing position vice the Interstate Highway System. The IHS was in large part subverted and diverted to serve the real and imagined needs of the large traditional cities.
As to Celebration. You really want to get me started? I eat Duany for breakfast. I've got dozens of his own quotes that outline the specific core failures of Celebration incuding the fact that he lamented in 2000 the fact that he didn't pay his own peolple enough to live there.
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