By B.J. Roche

Last summer, when my local paper, The Recorder, ran a story predicting the collapse of capitalism as we know it, I joked to my husband that we really did live in the people's republic-of-something-or-other. 

"Where the hell else would you see a story like this on the front page?" I scoffed, as I swilled a Stella on the deck. This is Franklin County, after all,  a  Starbucks-free zone. In nearby Amherst, Annie's Garden and Gift Shop gave out free Thich Nhat Hanh poems with every $30 purchase a few Christmases back. (Don't laugh, it probably worked.)

The story was about a Chamber of Commerce speech by Chris Martenson, a local guy who's been predicting the collapse of the economy for awhile now, and suggests we buy gold. And lots of beans and rice. For the cellar. Just in case.

By now you get the punchline to this post;  now I'm swilling Rolling Rock and Martenson would be having the last laugh if things weren't so awful. In fact, business is booming for the new breed of dystopians.

My longtime favorite is the very cranky James Howard Kunstler,  a regular on Albany public radio WAMC's morning talk show. Kunstler's film, The End of Suburbia is worth Netflixing--it's an eye-opening take on peak oil,  how we got to be so dependent on the automobile and how unprepared we are for the post-carbon economy.

My favorite line from his AMC interview: "There's just not enough used french-fry oil to go around!"

Kunstler is also the subject of a recent New Yorker article that's worth a read.  Here's the link to the New Yorker's new digital edition. If you subscribe already, you get it for free. If not, you gotta pay. Please. Pay. Keep the New Yorker in business.

They call NYU economist Nouriel Roubini the Doctor of Doom, and that was back when times were good. Here's his  video take on 2009, from the Financial Times.

And here's CNN's  Recession Map that shows just how bad it all is, state by state.

Off to stir the split pea and ham soup. At least ham hocks are still very cheap. Those little trotter hooves harbor a surprising amount of meat.