To Sleep, Perchance to ? Weekend Economists September 10-12, 2010

Demeter

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Fri Sep-10-10 05:30 PM
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To Sleep, Perchance to ? Weekend Economists September 10-12, 2010

Well, another week has staggered to a close. Another valiant attempt by the PPT to touch the sky, or at least 10,500 on the DOW, was missed by That Much! Better luck next time, team!

Another attempt to call the Party Faithful home to vote has been met with derision and scorn. Obama's 69% approval rating at Inauguration has dropped to 48% or worse. The MSM claims it's all over already, the GOP has won, no point in holding the election. More careful readings of the polls show that this is bunk--but just barely. It's a cliffhanger! I expect that my stint as Poll Inspector on November 2nd will be busy and exhausting.

So now is the time to get caught up on our sleep. After all, the rest of the country has been asleep at the switch, why shouldn't we? Of course, those who aren't facing financial catastrophe are free to sleep peacefully. Those in financial catastrophe have no cheaper pleasure than sleep.

"Methought I heard a voice cry 'Sleep no more!
Macbeth does murder sleep', the innocent sleep,
Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleeve of care,
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast,--"----Macbeth: Act 2 Scene 2

We've got a whole elite of MacBeths out there, murdering sleep for all of us. NYC and DC are full of them.

I wouldn't lose too much sleep over it. Between peak oil and global climate change, it won't be long before we can join Hamlet in pondering our choices:

"To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action."

Hamlet Act3, Scene1 Soliloquy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JD6gOrARk4&feature=player_embedded

This is our theme for the weekend, have at it! Post them if you've got them. We will try to stay awake long enough to give it a thorough review!