International developments are, ummmm, unsettling, to put it very mildly

Three things here, in particular:

1. That crucial G-20 meeting is shaping up to be, as the Brits say, a cock-up No Clear Accord on Stimulus by Top 20 Nations
2. China, with much very good reason, is not pleased with their US 'investments' China has more to worry about than its Treasury holdings (thank you Dr Setser!)
3. Pakistan is on the brink of collapse Clash With Police Melts Into Huge Rally

So, you have, over the past three days, a confluence of almost impossibly bad news that many have long dreaded.

In order, from incredibly bad to horribly worse to unspeakably worst:

• A recurrence of 1930's-style global governmental disfunction/protectionism (which led to The Depression).
• China signaling, in no uncertain terms (for them) that the punch bowl will go away if the US doesn't get its fiscal and monetary act together. Where's the money for US debt gonna come from? And why, pray tell, won't the dollar collapse?
• The worst of all possible geo-political messes going, errr, nuclear? And in a very bad neighborhood....

Folks - things are shaping up to be calamitous, with a global Depression, if not a global economic collapse, in the cards. And I haven't even mentioned that the world's banking system is still in the final stages of self-destruction, with French Revolution-style anger being directed (quite accurately) at the 'leaders' therof. This weekend's greed mongering by AIG sure doesn't help matters

But count on most attention to be paid manana to whether the stock market rally will be sustained for another week or three.

This is getting Shakespearean. All the main players in this drama are tragically flawed, self-obsessed, fatalistic, and increasingly doomed. Yet none are able to perceive it: The G-20 cannot act in its collective interest due to parochial concerns; China cannot admit that they are very much at fault for over-saving and currency manipulation; the US is timid yet still arrogant in the face of creating and furthering the banking crisis; and the whole world is hoping that Pakistan can be fixed by act of god

Thus continue to be sewn the seeds of our destruction: we know the demons we face, yet lack the will and the capacity to face them