Don't think he'll mind having this one posted
Kaiser Express 2001-06
Copyright 2001 John A Kaiser
September 13, 2001
Resisting a Faceless Enemy
Canadian stock markets are set to resume trading Thursday morning and one
small question on everybody's mind is what to expect. With regard to the
market I follow, Canadian junior companies, volume and value traded have
been so low during the past four months that there is little room left for
further damage. I do not expect to see true panic selling, though we may
see bids being hit by shareholders finally throwing in the towel after
wavering with this idea all year long. Bids, however, are so weak that
there is not likely to be a follow through high volume washout. The
Canadian Venture Exchange is undergoing an internally driven grinding
structural death that outside forces are not likely to hasten. Outside
forces are more likely to have a positive effect on the CDNX than a
negative one. With regard to the senior markets, the message everybody is
urging is that investors be calm and not contribute to a market collapse. I
agree. Our buttons are exposed and the task at hand is to disable them.
There is nothing I can do about the present calamity except to act in such
a way that down the road I can declare that while the perpetrators did
great damage to human lives and property, and put me and my kin through an
emotional wringer, no faceless piece of shit pushed my buttons and made me
dance to his evil tune.
The terrorist attack on America was an atrocity that took as yet still
uncounted numerous lives, injured many people, and demolished American
monuments in spectacular fashion. This cowardly attack on innocent
civilians is physically over, but the real attack still raging fiercely is
on the minds of several hundred million Americans, and arguably the
billions of people that populate the world. The planning, coordination, and
mental resolve required to pull off this attack creates an image of an
all-powerful force that can stealthily reach into our lives and deliver
brutal destruction using little more than the means and devices that make
up our everyday lives. Comparisons have been made with the Japanese attack
on Pearl Harbour, but the World Trade Center attack has implications that
are far worse and sinister. If it is possible to hijack four passenger
planes simultaneously and plough all but one into major buildings, how much
easier is it to get a single sex-starved fanatic dreaming about a paradise
laden with naked virgins to detonate a home-made nuclear or biological bomb
in the heart of a metropolis?
We cannot turn the clock back on the leverage technology yoked to a
nuclear, chemical or biological payload can put in the hands of a random
individual. We shrug our shoulders at this risk and carry on with our
lives, hoping that the incidence of Timothy McVeigh style crackpots is few
and far between as is the case with major tornadoes and hurricanes. But the
message created by the World Trade Center attack is that a faceless
organization operating from hidden locations around the world can deploy at
will any number of individuals to unleash destruction from within America.
No missile defence shield, no degree of military preparedness can prevent
this sort of attack which orchestrates itself from the very foundation
which constitutes an open society. Through this attack, Osama bin Laden, or
whoever masterminded it, is telling us: "you are not physically safe, you
cannot hide from us, you are not financially secure, and the power to
decide your fate, whether you live or die, prosper or suffer, lies with us
alone whom you do not know and cannot see". This is the mind rape that I am
grappling with as I hold back the tears that brim when I think of the
thousands already struck down by this power in action.
There is only one defence against this rape of the mind. That defence is to
resist the emotional impulses connected to the buttons that the attack has
exposed. We must not give the faceless enemy a face by equating it with
Islam and ushering in a religious cold war reminiscent of the crusades. We
must not give the faceless enemy an olive complexion, black hair and beaked
noses, for those belong to a vast number of innocent people. We must not
turn innocent civilians into byproduct victims of retaliatory military
strikes because that is to forfeit our claim to innocence. We must not
suspend our rights to privacy and self-determination in order to facilitate
a surveillance based police state that thrives on paranoia, promises us
security, and ultimately becomes indistinguishable from the dream world of
the faceless enemy. We must not solve the economic prisoner's dilemma by
liquidating our assets at the first opportunity, for that is to give
visible confirmation of the faceless enemy's power over us. We must not
batten down the hatches and guarantee fulfillment of the prophecy that a
severe economic recession awaits us, for that again is to do as the enemy
wishes. We must carry on as usual with the added understanding that evil
and destruction no longer just plays itself out elsewhere. We must not cede
power to these rapists of our minds. The perpetrators have little power to
pull off an encore that does more physical damage, but their power to alter
the course of history through the manipulation of our minds is for the
moment extraordinarily intense. We must resist this piper's evil goading
tune.
That said, for the moment I do not care to talk about diamond stocks,
bottom-fish strategies, gold plays, or knowledge management companies. To
do so would be to trivialize what has just happened and what may still
unfold over the next few days. I will, however, carry on my research work
and soon enough resume publishing commentaries from which you would never
guess that something horrific had just transpired. If we on the whole
successfully resist the mind rape, ignoring the market over the next few
days should be inconsequential. There is little chance that we will ever
again see a terrorist attack with the elaborate choreography of the World
Trade Center attack. It was staged for maximum visual impact so that it
could reach deep into our minds and expose our buttons to the faceless
enemy. Forensic analysis of the attack will no doubt reveal many obvious
signs that should have tripped the alarm. There will be new safeguards put
into place that rule out similar attacks. The real danger lurks within the
range of actions available to the American government and the possible
psycho-social mind shifts the public may undergo. Sadly to say, some of the
more deplorable choices have positive implications for Canadian resource
and energy juniors. For now the repercussions of this shot from left field
remain indeterminate.
For a really good online resource that pulls together perspectives and
information from media around the globe, check out the following link at
the web site of the San Jose Mercury News:
siliconvalley.com
[No statement or expression of opinion, or any other matter herein,
directly or indirectly, is an offer to buy or sell the securities
mentioned. While we believe the sources of information to be reliable, we
in no way represent or guarantee the accuracy thereof, nor the statements
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