A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall

Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son?
Oh, where have you been, my darling young one?
I’ve stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains
I’ve walked and I’ve crawled on six crooked highways
I’ve stepped in the middle of seven sad forests
I’ve been out in front of a dozen dead oceans
I’ve been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard
And it’s a hard, and it’s a hard, it’s a hard, and it’s a hard
And it’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall 


To me, the rolling thunder of Dylan's  A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall describes what is happening to society as we move from the old way of doing things to the new, where transitioning will be a truly wrenching experience, something I feel every civilization at our stage of development in the multiverse experiences with some succumbing to the rigors of change while others survive and become wiser for the passage. It's the old saw of the student asking the Zen master this question...

Master: Chop wood, carry water, that's what one does in the journey through life.
Student: What happens after enlightment?
Master: Chop wood, carry water.

I use these examples as gateway to Robert Reich's excellent article titled Another Bailout of Wall Street?

"The Street's total exposure to the euro zone totals about $2.7 trillion. Its exposure to to France and Germany accounts for nearly half the total.


And it's not just Wall Street's loans to German and French banks that are worrisome. Wall Street has also insured or bet on all sorts of derivatives emanating from Europe - on energy, currency, interest rates, and foreign exchange swaps. If a German or French bank goes down, the ripple effects are incalculable.


Get it? Follow the money: If Greece goes down, investors start fleeing Ireland, Spain, Italy, and Portugal as well. All of this sends big French and German banks reeling. If one of these banks collapses, or show signs of major strain, Wall Street is in big trouble. Possibly even bigger trouble than it was in after Lehman Brothers went down.


Make no mistake. Lurking here is another giant bailout of the Street. The United States wants Europe to bail out its deeply indebted nations so European banks don't implode. And they don't want European banks to implode because they don't want the Street to crash again like it did three years ago."

Musical Chairs, musical chairs, the guardians of the old way of doing things keep circling the chairs but sooner or later, the music stops and A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall.