[R-G] The End of the Economy: Some Thoughts on How to Economize

[Anthony Fenton]

Weekend Edition
October 10 / 12, 2008
Some Thoughts on How to Economize
The End of the Economy
http://www.counterpunch.org/ketcham10122008.html
By CHRISTOPHER KETCHAM

The good news for economy – I use the word in its old, perhaps  
archaic, sense – keeps on coming, but we are told the current  
“economic” crisis is a tragedy for the nation’s living standards.  Far  
from it.  First of all, let’s define economy.  What we are hopefully  
entering is a period of real economy, which means conserving, scaling  
down, simplifying, saving, spending prudently and wisely and only for  
the things that one needs.  A decent meal of greens and simple protein  
(I suggest beans and rice and spinach), good drink (Budweiser works  
wonders), clothes and shoes that last and can be mended for the long  
haul (try old military surplus and paratrooper boots), shelter that is  
modest and affordable but functional and not a credit scam.  Having a  
beautiful wife or girlfriend who doesn’t like to wear clothing also  
helps.

But everywhere the consensus trance holds that a slow-down of  
consumption signals the End Time, the shuttering of hope, chance,  
freedom.  Look no further than how the New York Times spins it from  
the usual gibberishing oracles: “The last few days have devastated the  
American consumer,” says retail consultant Walter Loeb.  Americans,  
avers Loeb, “all feel poor.”  Really?  So too we are meant to believe  
that “when consumers get concerned about…their country, they need  
entertainment,” per the wisdom of the Entertainment Merchants  
Association.   So too is it “amazing how much even these 10-year-old  
girls are aware that something is going on,” the chairman and chief  
executive of Tween Brands tells us, who has been traveling the country  
to “listen to moms and little girls.”  And what does the CEO hear?   
“Mom is saying, ‘I can’t afford that.’”

Tragic, darkness at noon, a nightmare I tell you.  The reporters in  
the mainstream press, as dimly discerning as dreamers who know nothing  
but the dream from which they can’t awake, escort us through the  
envisaged circles of hell of this “unaffordable” world.  The benefits  
of the descent are manifold but tacitly unrecognized: the malls no  
longer trap rats with credit cards, the casinos no longer suck blood  
from the arms of degenerates, the lousy restaurants no longer make you  
nauseous for $100 a plate (gasp – the Times reports that the  
ungrateful citizens are eating at home!), the retailers no longer ask  
you to throw away perfectly good shoes, the jewelers no longer sell to  
serious adults the silly shiny trinkets meant for the pleasure of  
cretins, the auto dealerships no longer peddle cars half as efficient  
as last year’s model, the cellphone hawkers no longer sell the  
I3869Zed Super-Iphone to burn out the brains and tire the ears, the  
home builders no longer slap-dab junk homes in exurban fields meant  
for farms that can sustain something we once called the future.

Nor, according to the New York Times, will the new blah-blah Super- 
Blah be available, because of the contracting “economy,” and the other  
new blahs from Blah Inc., and many other new blahs that Blah  
Investments recommends – because the consumer just won’t make the  
penny scream, won’t play the game.  The game, of course, is predicated  
on being an infantilized weirdo, a grasping entitled half-fetus on two  
legs with a college degree crying “awn it awn it” from inside the womb  
of cash, cycling through the drooled suggestions of the marketeers as  
if our “freedom” depends on how much money we can waste rather than  
how much we need to survive.

Like I said, recession is all good news, and not just for our brains  
and souls, but for the planet and the real chance for Americans to  
survive in some kind of non-debased, non-infantilized, non-crap- 
inundated form – a race of fully matured and, dare I say, noble  
creatures.  Every time I hear the New York Times lamenting that the  
average American refuses to open his billfold for bullshit, I envision  
less metal in the junkyard, less garbage in the scow, less forest  
turned into the Times, less pollution in the skies and water, less  
stupidity in the shape of owning more.  I also envision a resurgence  
of cobblers mending the soles of shoes – cobblers who I can’t seem to  
find anymore in these fair United States to fix up my boots.

If it’s true that consumer spending now accounts for two-thirds of the  
American “economy” – god help us – then there’s nothing economic about  
it, as defined above.   In other words, if it doesn’t economize, then  
the “economy” is not worth maintaining.

Christopher Ketcham writes for GQ, Harper’s, and many other  
magazines.  Contact him at cketcham99 at mindspring.com