Professor Elam

Okay this is not about business or accounting but civilization itself.  Victor Davis Hanson  does his usual great job of framing the issue in classical terms. 

Many futuristic films frame life in  quite a dreadful way. Mad Max , the original apocalyptic starring  Mel Gibson, showed a world dominated by greed for the disappearing resource of oil in which marauding bands of thugs would do anything to obtain the fuel. The same sort of thing is in Waterworld.  Kurt Russel’s Escape from LA and NY depict those cities as enclosed prisons, a sort of modern day Devil’s Island in which the inmates are left to fend for themselves.  Al of these scenarios depict a total societal breakdown.

Hanson makes the point that even among terrorists who seek to destroy society, they need running water and medical services at the end of the day too.  But this is now the problem in the West Bank and Gaza, there is little left to attract or sustain anyone.  Even the terrorists need a clean class of water he notes.  Indeed, the veneer of society is thin, as one could see post Katrina, or even in the lynch mob psychology for  the Duke Lacrosse Players.  As various sites around the world assume Mad Max proportions, where will the civilization emerge to fill that vacuum?