This blog is really depressing me

The global financial crisis is a security threat.  If Leadership Gateway were still going on, I would say that economics runs the world, because without money, nothing works.  So when our financial system is in chaos and we are experiencing a recession, the world is in an unstable and insecure situation.  The United States is particularly insecure because of our dependence on the dollar.  When the stock market plummeted, there was a sincere fear that countries that had some of our money would lose trust in our currency and trade it for the euro or something more secure before the dollar depreciated in value even more.  I am not sure if that fear was uncalled for or if that example is still a possibility.  However, I think that security issues are more frightening on the individual level.  All of the large-scale matters will impact the everyday Joe the Plumber and even more unfortunately, the everyday Joe the Farmer. 

Agriculture is going to see some worldwide debacles.  The demand for food is going to decrease, causing the prices to decrease, which may help some poor people, but since the poorest nations of the world have agriculturally based economies, this will hurt the most impoverished peoples.  Wages and jobs will decline.  As unemployment around the world increases, this could cause serious conflicts between citizens and migrant farm workers, which has been a recent problem in South Africa.  This will likely bring about a shift to supporting more right-winged political parties.  Drastic policy changes in the opposite direction will not balance the countries, but create volatile political conditions, which will make the countries less secure. 

However, the more powerful nations will want to deal primarily with their domestic financial problems and the more fragile economies will suffer the most with a decline in foreign aid.  Sustainable development for the third-world will not be on the American’s platform when American constituents are feeling the pain from the crisis.  This will inevitably make security a larger issue in the future when (yes, I am bringing this back to the Palestinian plumbing services) destitute people resort to supporting the extremist groups who get them the services they need.