Apocalypse Now

The last time the sky fell was 96 years ago. Few saw it coming; no one panicked. But panic wouldn't exist if it weren't a useful instinct from time to time. The celestial bricks came unglued in August 1914. By 1918, 40 million people had died. But that was just the beginning. WWI bankrupted or destroyed almost every major government of Europe. The plumy families that had dominated the continent for centuries - the Hohenzollerns, the Romanoffs, the Hapsburgs - were all clobbered. The Ottoman Turks fared no better. Then, scarcely 20 years later, France's Third Republic was another victim…and so was Germany's Third Reich.

Civilizations come and go with the wind. Bill Bonner wonders which way the wind is blowing now.