Margaret Atwood vs. debt

[Mark Kohut]

On the "crisis of confidence" in our financial system:
The true news item that lead Melville to write The Confidence Man:

A man goes up to another man on the streets of NY.

"Will you trust me with your watch?", he asks.

Guy with watch does--gives it to him.

Man runs off with it.

Banks are NOT this guy with their watches. 





--- On Thu, 10/9/08, bandwraith at aol.com <bandwraith at aol.com> wrote:

> From: bandwraith at aol.com <bandwraith at aol.com>
> Subject: Re: Margaret Atwood vs. debt
> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
> Date: Thursday, October 9, 2008, 6:21 AM
> Dave:
>   Atwood:
> 
> "In good times we float around on it as if on a
> helium-filled balloon;
> we rise higher and higher, and the balloon gets bigger and
> bigger,
> until -- poof! -- some kill joy sticks a pin into it and we
> sink. But
> what is the nature of that pin?
> 
> Another friend of mine used to maintain that airplanes
> stayed up in
> the air only because people believed -- against reason --
> that they
> could fly: Without that collective delusion sustaining
> them, they
> would instantly plummet to earth. Is "debt"
> similar? In other words,
> perhaps debt exists because we imagine it.
> 
> Another part of the human imaginative debt/credit structure
> has to
> do with payback time -- the time when you have to pay the
> debt
> back, or else suffer the consequences."
> 
> 
> This is perfect. Thanks Dave.
> I can only assume that Ms. Atwood is slyly referring to
> ATD.
> 
> But the question remains: "What is the nature of that
> pin?"
> 
> Pyn's pin- a pen?