The guest said the economy had stalled some years earlier, with high unemployment and futile government stimulus. Several events had combined, to cause this disaster. The Asian stock markets had gone into a panic when China raised interest rates to crush rampant speculation and stock market swindles. Over the summer, China had made enormous investments in Russian energy, selling their hoard of US bonds to raise the cash.
A dissident Chinese blogger claimed China quietly sold US dollars for months and received as little as fifty cents on the dollar. The American dollar had gradually strengthened over the previous year and spiked higher in the morning as investors rushed to safety. Once the blogger’s claim circulated, the greenback value plunged and still fell when markets closed.
“Yeah, scared people bought US dollars and treasuries.” Sloan talked over the expert, “but others got into the market.” Bill sighed and strained to listen to the radio as he manoeuvred through heavy traffic.
The Rottweiler man went on. “Drought in the US central plains has made wheat and corn futures skyrocket. Fear has captured the Chicago commodity exchange.”
“Will that affect food prices?” The announcer asked.
“It may raise flour prices and sweeteners, your burger bun could become more expensive than the meat,” the expert laughed, “but it will soon hit the livestock industry hard. Feed corn and barley will be expensive and rationed. In the short term, meat prices might fall as ranchers sell off herds they can’t feed.”
“Great,” said the announcer, “my steak is thirty dollars a kilo.”
“Not so fast,” Rottweiler chuckled. “Once the herds decline, meat will be in short supply and prices will skyrocket. Your bun will then be worth less than the burger once again, except the whole thing will cost a lot more.”
“Will we be able to afford food?” The CBC interviewer sounded alarmed. “Will there be any food?”
Bill could not see the Rottweiler’s shrug of uncertainty and would have to wait for the next newscast to discover the full scope of the day’s events.
In the early hours of the morning, Middle East Time, Israel had bombed Iranian nuclear facilities, including the partly completed Ahvaz nuclear generating plant. The radio had referred to that on the way to work. It did not seem too important. Iran counter-attacked by bombarding Saudi oil facilities and sank a couple of tankers to block the entrance to the Persian Gulf, sparking the spike in oil prices. Iran had not attacked American ships or bases, and it had not attacked Israel, other than the downing of several airplanes in the initial attack. They paraded a captured Israeli pilot through the streets of Tehran. There was no current fighting. Iran played the victim.
These political events had caused the chaos in world markets. The European markets had fallen apart, and when the North American exchanges opened, they quickly reached “limit down”. By noon, two Texas refineries had announced they would shut down in six weeks due to lack of affordable crude. The price of gasoline soared. Bids on benchmark Saudi heavy crude hit one hundred and eighty dollars. It was only a year since Mexico announced it was no longer exporting crude oil because of rising domestic demand and falling production. Worldwide commodity prices doubled in response to the collapse of the American dollar.
Australia imposed an additional tax on coal and iron ore exports. China, Australia’s biggest customer, had made their displeasure known, and had sent a delegation to Canberra to “negotiate”.
Later in the morning, the merger of the two largest telecom providers collapsed. No one underwrote the fifty billion dollars of joint debt. A rumour circulated that both companies would declare bankruptcy, looking for a government handout.
The host turned the commentary over to a bank expert.
“It’s only a minor correction. The USA released crude oil from its strategic reserve and calling on OPEC to increase shipments.”
Bill thought the designated expert ignored the fact that this would be impossible with the Persian Gulf closed to shipments from key Saudi terminals.
“The European Union has made hundreds of millions of Euros available to the banks and cutting interest rates,” the banker continued. “The USA followed suit.” He seemed enthusiastic about this, while not bothering to mention that interest rates in the USA and Canada had been effectively zero for years.
“I must admit that bond interest rates are rising in a worrying way, but all will be well,” the banker parroted other commentators. “We have a liquidity crisis, and when we fix that, everything will be normal.”
Much later they realized they faced a solvency crisis. Most governments were bankrupt. Several European and South American countries had announced total default on their national debts. More nations would follow over the coming weeks. Unable to find more experts, reporters interviewed other reporters in a wave of uninformed speculation.
.

In the story, I intend the character, Rockford III, to be an echo of Trump. This is the setup paragraph.

"As much as Rockford III overestimated himself, the factional interests in Austin underestimated the danger of releasing a narcissistic incompetent into the directionless stew of a separate Texas. The old English Bard would have recognized the potential for breathtaking tragedy."

Life at the Foster’s
 
Humility, I thought, as I watched from the deck, mug in hand, as the children frolicked in the backyard.
These foster gaffers have lots to teach me.
I sipped my coffee, dry-eyed but not, and examined each of them. The agency referred to them as clients or cases, not in any indifference, but those were the words. We saw them as children, our children for the time they blessed us, and our challenges.
My life, my childhood, seemed now to be blessed compared to the sadness and sometimes horror that lingered beneath each of these excited faces, flushed with their game.
I watched the three siblings, only with us for this respite weekend. Ash stood at the threshold of teenage. She was the calm one, full of fun, but even now showing hints of motherhood. At 12 years, she should not, really, but circumstance and the failings of the adults in her life thrust maturity onto her. The others, her brother a few years younger and still with the innocence of youth, damaged but hopeful, and the wee sister whose pained heart lay deep beneath the exuberance of the young. Ash had become the parent, the guardian of her brother and sister. They were her brood and to be shielded as she could.
I pondered. My wife and I hoped, for a few brief days, that we might relieve Ash’s burden and let her be a child. These children, all who came here, carried the shadowed reflections of our long gone from home offspring.
Love grows, I thought, love grows.
Jer flashed across my sight. He was ours, in agency speech. He lived with us full time for now, and his bright smile as he chased about the yard brought hope. Jer was as feral as any of the kids we had seen. The system had its ways and biases, mostly dictated by bureaucrats and politicians who thought in dollars and intellectual theory. Both were important, but they obscured the needy humans they wished to help. Jer should not even be here. Income support, perhaps a support worker too, for a struggling mother who had to leave him feral at home while she struggled to earn a living would have kept him home. It would have allowed her to be a mother.
“Tag, you’re it,” cried from the yard. It raised a smile.
Last night came to my mind, and I eyed Jer and the brother Tim. The boys had recovered from last night’s trauma. Being feral, Jer had been used to living alone in the apartment, doing whatever he felt like, and slipping out to the store if he could. In the middle of the night, by happy chance, I had to do an old man’s duty. As I passed the room that the boys shared, I heard the whispers.
“It’s okay,” said Jer in conspiracy. “we’ll sneak, go to the Mac’s and be back before they know it. They’ll never find out.”
Jer seemed enthusiastic and Tim doubtful, if not scared. This old guy smiled, did my duty and eased downstairs to the front porch. I only needed five minutes sitting in the street light spilling through the windows.
“Going somewhere, boys?”
The little heads that had confidently emerged from the doorway suddenly held anguish. They froze. The jail break had not gone according to plan.
It was a short, if one-sided, conversation as I delivered my lecture quietly and calmly, not wanting to wake the cats. I explained the folly of their ways, and the dangers that might lurk in the nighttime streets, although our little town was safe. I explained that facing me was a lot more comfortable than if they had met a constable who might have bothered to be on Main Street at 3 AM. Chastened, the little felons fled back to bed.
I hoped they had learned three lessons: that sneaking was wrong; that making mistakes need not be fatal and that I cared for them. I slept well.
The system is flawed; I thought, sitting and watching the play. None of these kids had ever been in real danger, but circumstance and flawed parents and a flawed culture put them here.
Then I remembered Isaiah, who was somewhere else this weekend. He was the only one of our kids who had likely ever been in danger of death in his biological family. I called him “the ghost”. Isaiah would move through the house, ghost-like, as quietly as possible, and then materialize. Before they apprehended him, as the quaint jargon of the agency puts it, he lived in fear from his parents. We never knew or asked about the details, but we received that bit of back-story. Isaiah often visited for respite for his full time foster family. He was a great kid, but I suspect partly because survival had meant not aggravating the dangerous adults. And he listened. He heard everything, and we guessed that again, his safety at home depended on his knowing what was going on, what horror might be in his future. We tried to never talk about him unless he was with us. He deserved that morsel of power and respect.
My coffee had gone cold. I rose to refill and nuke it. I looked back at the happy youngsters, and somehow felt satisfied that we had given some of that to them, no matter how briefly.
I blinked.
We received an enormous gift of happiness from these children, to care, to love.

https://breachmedia.ca/trumps-trade-war-a-perfect-time-to-embrace-no-one-left-behind-strategy/?vgo_ee=gQx6lxu8dHgPkPmafHMIDlz%2BdEQyvaAUNxnYd35jRxAZ1Dg%3D%3AeWuQZQusMT4tBmfP5DEfZfS%2FAFWq5ioZ

Tomorrow’s Dawning (1969)
 
So Adam
You are lodged
In this cell
These many years
The scaffold’s shadow
Crossing your doorstep
Industriously making noises
And scrawling
Meaningless markings
Upon these
Decaying walls
While out
In the full sunlight
Of the day
Your noose
Is being prepared
The first coil
Wound
By your own hand
From innocent purpose
Perhaps
But taught and firm
Just the same
And over the ages
Your kindly
Intelligent brothers
Have tied and
Retied the snaking loop
Until not even
Your kindly
Intelligent brothers
Can undo
This supreme piece
Of their craft
For you damned
Your children
By etching in gold
What we hath wrought
Let no god put asunder