“YOU Were Meant for Greatness.” Those words are stenciled in black spray paint on a gray electrical box on my street. When I first saw this curious graffito, I indulged in a faint little smile. Some days as I passed it on my way home from work it almost made me cry. So many (other) toothless, hopeless wrecks in my neighborhood, you know, need some courage and a kind word. Hope. Then one day I noticed the little anarchist’s A in a circle underneath it. Ruined the whole thing. Now it’s taunted me for a year and a half of my not-great existence. I avoid it now like the curse it obviously is. One of these nights I will paint over it. Those messages that are born of anarchy die of anarchy, too.

***

We’re well on the other side of the wrenching election that brought such stirring hope and change to every molecule of our collective national being. Many have commented to me about how incongruous Mr. Obama is to them. They still can’t shake a dreamlike feeling. Did we really shed the poisonous Bush regime in favor of a young, smart, attractive, liberal president with a sense of humor and “compassion” that isn’t just a cruel joke, or will we wake up violently from this dream? At the same time, creeping across the proscenium, sneaking inwards from our peripheral line of vision, is a stealthy nightmare. “This Economy”®.

***

I’m going to say what President Barack and his guys have been hinting around at. It’s this: Everything is going to vanish, in stages. Every. Thing.

***

Think of all the vanished answering machine messages in the world, in all the languages of the world. Gone forever. Don’t be so confident that everything you say and do is cached in those “safe” and capacious server farms out in the middle of the country or wherever they are. Answering machines once thought they were indispensible, too. They didn’t see the next thing coming, and now they’re buried deep in a dump. I’m talking to you, Internet. The anarchists are not just going to let you keep going.

***

As the Depression solidifies into Armageddon, we’re all going to have to get more comfortable with committing a lot more crime, too. The average Joe of the near future is going to make Mad Max look like Paul Lynde.

***

I have some ideas for how to profit from the end of the world. I started by registering as a trademark the words “this economy,” so every time one of you uses those words you have to pay me a royalty.

I heard on TV that a lot of down-laid/out-sized people are starting businesses of their own because there are no jobs. I heard the trend is for groups of friends to set up cookie shops in abandoned office space. Like squatting, but the business version.

I think we can do better than a creepy bake sale in a ghost office park, don’t you? See what you think of my first few ideas for businesses to start:

1. Internet II. We all take for granted that there can only be one World Wide Internet. Why? Think of how much $$$ the first Internet generated for its inventor, Bill Gates. Don’t you want to be Bill Gates? He’s got all the money. Get all Chinese on his ass, steal the knowledge you need and build it. Anarchist-proof it. Then underprice him. This current Internet is vulnerable, and it CAN BE BEAT.

2. Eviction Shields. Your pitch to customers: “Don’t let them evict you. Fight back.” The evictioneering field is saturated. But that in itself has created a new business opening: Provide people with ways to eviction-proof their home, such as moats, impenetrable steel doors, and of course strategically positioned snipers. Offer an end-to-end eviction-prevention system and people will pay as much as they can to stave off the inevitable for another week.

You may ask, “But, if they are broke and losing their house, where will the people get the money to pay for the Eviction Shield?” I anticipated that question…

3. Shadow Economy Job Training School. The non-shadow economy, the big one, is f*cked forever, let’s face it. But that means the secondary, “shadow” economy will “boom” all the harder. Lots of former IT workers, secretaries, and HR recruiters have no clue how to get into the cockfighting or drug-dealing business. That’s where you come in.

“But Scott, where will people get the money to pay the tuition at your crime school?”

Maybe I’ll offer scholarships. At exorbitant interest rates. I’ll read up on how the predatory mortgage lenders and banking-product people ran their scam, and get an idea of how to do this. Before angry mobs kill them all.

By the by, I’ve got lots more ideas for Depression-busting businesses you can start, but they’re a little shocking/disturbing, Jeff won’t let me put them on here. (I’ll give you a hint: One of them involves Soylent Green.) Drop me a line and I’ll send you the complete list for $2.