Starbucks On Every Corner...No More

The McDonald's of high end coffee, Starbucks, announced it will be closing 600 stores by the end of the year and only putting up 200 more the following fiscal year. The reason being, the poor economy. That means around 12,000 folks will be out of work...in this poor economy. That means the economy will be getting even poorer. Chili's, as you all know, has closed all but a couple of doors of their Willamette Valley restaurants. There are about 300 folks out of work beause of that.

I heard an NPR article yesterday that said small town USA is predicted to start draining. Why? The price of gas. The factories and businesses that originally built those towns are gone, most jobs having been shipped overseas by the corporations that owned them who wanted cheaper labor. So, most people in small towns commute long distances to work. With gas prices as high as they are with no sign of slowing down, folks are going to be moving into bigger towns and cities where there jobs are because they can't afford the commute.

The floods in the Midwest have brought corn production way down, and prices way up. Many products are made from corn syrup and other corn dirivitives. With prices skyrocketing there, that means food prices will go up. That may be pretty bad here, but imagine third world nations, as I've read on the TruthOut website, who will possibly be facing something close to, if not actual, famines. Imagine, as well, how horrible FEMA performed with Hurricane Katrina. The flood in the Midwest in '93 moved a whole lot of towns and FEMA did a lot of work actually taking care of the folks. FEMA under King Dick and co-King George is seemingly just an organization where the cronies of the King and co-King get to collect what looks like a legitimate paycheck. If they follow their clear and consistent pattern, the Midwest is fucked and the production levels of the farms there will not return to anywhere near the levels they once were.

Because of the collapsing economy, people are buying less with their credit cards, prompting banks to raise credit card interest rates, which will encourage more people to buy less with their credit cards.

Speaking of credit cards, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are basically built on credit. That means money is taken out of the economy but based on nothing. That has to be taken from somewhere...how about the infrastructure of this nation. Turns out there isn't enough money to repair roads and such here in the U.S. Not only that, the U.S., along with it's Middle East pitbull, Israel, plan on starting ANOTHER genocidal and illegal war with Iran. This, too, will take billions, and not long after that trillions out of our economy, but also slaughter many thousands, if not MILLIONS, of civlilian lives in an attempt to enrich the already overly wealthy oil corporations of this nation. That means...LESS INFRASTRUCTURE HERE.

Here in Coos Bay, we are already seeing small businesses go under. No doubt there are small businesses going under all over this nation. That means less jobs, less disposable income, more poverty, more foreclosures on homes, more banking problems, etc.

Although all of this may sound more horrifying than living in Stephen King's imagination, we are going to survive this as human beings. This brings up the question of HOW are we going to survive this? There will be no stopping gas and food prices from rising. What are we going to do about it?