Ruins were still a smutch in all of Manhattan, as the elephantine scraps of major bank headquarters, the New York Stock Exchange, and government buildings resembled fallen herculean replicas from the Greek and Roman empires. Buried inside the massive chunks of concrete and stone were wrecked computers with billions of bytes of information, no longer useful to the world of great finance; no doubt hundreds of bodies also rested among the rubble, by now decayed and rotton from the events of January 17, 2008. The giant banks, brokerage houses, and revered financial institutions were nothing more than glutted ghosts of an economy that virtually ceased to exist nine months ago. Small community banks still flourished, but the huge national conglomerates were all but vanquished from the face of the nation. The country had managed to continue operations, but on a much smaller, more community-based level. It was verity at its most veritable: the verisimilitude that "big was better" had turned out to be a gigantic lie. The country was doing just fine, thank you very much, without the Chase Manhattan banks, the New York Stock Exchange, the federal government bureaucracies, and the giant corporate conglomerates that always proclaimed their puffed-up self-importance to the survival of the United States.
The theory of "supply and demand", as had been taught to millions of college students over the decades, was proven to be a falsehood. When one thought about it, the time-honored hypothesis was not all that theurgy. In fact, it was a blatant misrepresentation. WalMart and other big chain stores always claimed that they could offer lower prices because they bought in larger quantities that the little retailer with one small store. Hence, WalMart's "demand" for plastic trinkets from China caused manufacturers to "supply" their goods at lower prices. But, if that were the case, then why didn't "demand" for gasoline during peak driving seasons also lower the price at the pumps? Well, it was explained how that was a commodity, and therefore when "demand" was higher, the "supply" drove the price up. Simple economics. Simple bullshit designed to keep an ignorant public at bay, willing to pay whatever price necessary to maintain healthy corporate profits.
If native American Indians could sustain an economy based on beads, buffalo hides and beans, American citizens could now return to an economy based more on the community and barter. That hundred-dollar bill squeezed into the palm of a maitre d at a plush five-star restaurant could just as easily be a rock, if you be believed - and trusted in - the value of that rock. Americans had put their faith in a worthless system of currency and paper that, most believed, was backed by silver and gold reserves held by the United States Government. Few realized how perilously close to the edge their monetary system perched.
While U.S. Treasury representatives, financial 'experts', bankers, and stockbrokers boasted about the strength and stability of the American economy, nothing was farther from the truth.
All over the country, Americans were "making do" without the intrusion of "big business" magnates who had made millions for themselves as they conned their countrymen into believing they were financial gurus. It had all been a sham, just as the politics of the nation had been a monopolization of power, held by a handful that dictated to the rest. There were ways to equalize things so that everyone had the same kind of opportunities and needs fulfillment.
There was no reason for any youngster in the U.S.A. to go to bed hungry while some obese fat-cat politician pigged out on a $72 caviar appetizer at Nathan's.
There was no logic to a Social Security system that complemented a millionaire's income by an extra $2000-a-month while 88-year-old widows had to choose between eating cat food or refilling a prescription so they could pay their rent from their $987-a-month government stipend.
There was no sense to a system that allowed one working family to live in a cardboard refrigerator box simply because they couldn't scrape together the deposit and first month's rent for a rat-infested ghetto apartment, while another working family whined because they might have to sell their condo in Redondo Beach.
There was no validity to a justice system that sent a teen-ager to jail for selling marijuana as a means of helping to feed his younger siblings and poverty-stricken widowed mother, while movie stars and celebrities like Robert Blake and O.J. Simpson could literally get away with murder just because they could afford a scalawag lawyer.
Without reverting to socialism or communism; without reigning in on the entreprenuerial spirit that made America great; without demoralizing man's quest for 'success' and the accoutrements that accompany it - there had to be a means of sincerely subscribing to the declaration that "all men are created equal".
America's hedonistic society had to be tempered, and Americans' values had to revert to those of charity, compassion, selflessness, and honesty. The country could no longer afford the convenience of 'looking out for #1' while stepping on the downtrodden or the underdog. To avoid the same fate as the Roman and Greek cultures that were felled because of their sybaritic preoccupations, America had to return to its roots of hard work, morality grounded by ethics and a stauch sense of what's right and wrong. O.U.T.R.A.G.E. had, through the 'Rebellion of '08', provided a catalyst for such reform. Now it was up to the surviving American people to follow up and do what was best.