Videos and Confederation of the Great Lakes

Nicholas, this is thoughtful, thorough, and provides valuable insights.  One, the visual culture trend jumps out at your humble servant as he goes through various discount, thrift, retail stores here in Florida over the past three months.  What he sees is lots of romance paperbacks; serious factual books are disappearing.  The same is happening in large retail giants like Wal-Mart.  The video disc section is twice as large as the print section, which includes magazines like Guns and Ammo.  Yesterday, this writer visited the historical museum in Cedar Key, Florida.  The volunteer at the desk, a retired M.D. from New York, told me that not one book store exists in Levy County.  The last one was across the street from the museum, which a retired M.D. from Michigan opened and ran.  He and I became friends over the years; it was one of my favorite stops there.  His wife got sick, and they had to return north.  The book store is now empty, up for rent.  You get the idea.

Two, your discussion of economic domains reminds me of the Canadian consul general from Chicago who a year ago came to speak at a luncheon in the Madison Club, Madison, Wisconsin.  He said, given the population, production, water transportation the Provinces of Canada and the State of America on the Great Lakes could easily create a Federation, the Federation of the Great Lakes he called it!  It would not need the rest of the areas like Kentucky, South Dakota, Manitoba, etc. to become prosperous.  It would trade with them, but it would not provide corporate and social welfare for them!  This is economic domain big time; yes, it was suggested during the US Civil War.  Northerners who opposed fighting Southern planters for Wall Street banks suggested a Northwest Confederation, similar to the Great Lakes proposal.  They said what went on in Dixie was none of their concern; they could use the Great Lakes to make a living without cotton!  If Wall Street and Washington are not careful, such projects could easily emerge.  They would rely on economic domains, not political boundaries, as their engines.  If this country experiences institutional failure, which it could do yet, look for such economic domains springing into autonomous life and shedding the parasites on them.  Thanks for listening.  Dr. Rux