[Desdemona]

Uh, we're not at dustbowl stage yet. No one is migrating to find work. We have enough food stockpiled to get through it if crops fail. There are no reports of livestock dying in the pastures from lack of food and water. It's hot, but nowhere close to 1930-1934 (My grandmother swears these were the hottest years of her life).

We haven't gone through a winter yet. Those winters were cold. Coal isn't scarce. In fact, individually, we scarcely use coal anymore. It's mostly for power plants. We have lots of crude stockpiled as well as many more sources for oil.

The stock market is bearish, but it's not LIVING money, for the most part. It's nest eggs (that's still a bad thing). There has not been a run on the banks. No property foreclosures.

There are no free givaways to get people to go to the movies. No one is hoarding sugar, coffee, cotton, or any of the other things which might become scarce.

In fact, people are still spending a lot of money. And the Fed is raising interest rates to ridiculously high levels.

In hate to tell CNN...we're not in a depression. GWB is not Hoover. Get over it.

[Desdemona]

Make that the Fed is NOT raising interest rates...

Jeez, I'm coming down with a cold and not thinking.

At this point we've cleaned out so mny houses of people who lived through the depression...the junk! And I swear, in one house there was 40 pounds of sugar stored in the attic. We threw it out, but sifted it first.