Even in Hyperinflation, There's Always Golf

The Mogambo Guru offers sage wisdom and advice for those who seek to understand what the freaking hell our government is doing to our economy, though I must warn that reading his posts is not for the faint of heart.

His latest observations on the expansion of federal "credit" -- this is a crazy term that doesn't actually mean what you think it means; it's somewhere between "debt" and "newly printed money" -- offer a comparison to the strategy being used by the Federal Reserve and that employed by the African nation of Zimbabwe, where the currency is now considered "worthless."

So how does an economy keep on operating with no money? Well, the local poor-folks have been begging from foreign sources and furiously digging flakes of gold from the rivers, but the more well-heeled have adapted, and as Golf Digest reports, “Despite hyperinflation, cholera and hugely unpopular President Robert Mugabe, golf survives in Zimbabwe. At Bulawayo Golf Club (founded in 1895), members have been paying with gasoline because local banknotes are worthless.”

So that should cheer you up if you like to play golf and remember how to siphon gasoline from your neighbor's pickup truck. The future's not so dismal after all!

NOTE -- If Waxman-Markey (Cap'n Tax) passes Congress, there may be no gasoline to siphon so that you can play golf. The clock is ticking: call your congressperson now!