Life is becoming more Difficult.

Its not hard to realize that the economy is starting to deteriorate at a more pronounced level. People are being laid off around the country, companies are downsizing, and the cost of energy is rising to stressful levels.

Right now we have hundreds of analogies about the state of the economy that relate to canaries in coal mines. All I can surmise is that they are selling a lot of imaginary canary gas masks.

What we have to look at here, is the "credit card looting" going on. If you know that you are about to loose your house to the bank, it makes sense to run up the credit cards--bankruptcy then foreclosure and you start over.

What is really laughable, is the credit card CEO's thinking that this is just an anomaly. Lets look back at 1930's

"The average person began to spend less for consumer goods, although for a while this fact was hidden by an increase in buying on the installment plan. When hard times came, this merely aggravated the situation since families could not find the money to pay the installment collector.

Quoted from "The Thirties" by Fon W. Boardman Jr 1967

I shredded two more credit card applications that I received in the mail this week, so I guess that the party isn't over yet. Let the good times roll.