Back in the good old days coal miners carried canaries in a cage down into the mines, since lethal gases killed the canaries before humans. The allusion ‘canaries in a cage’ has been assigned to political, natural, and economic threats to our existence.

Five nights ago I arrived at Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi Airport a little past midnight. The 777 from Tokyo had been packed with tourists and returning Thais, but ours was the only incoming flight and I passed through immigration within a few minutes. My bag was the first onto the carousel and I went outside to catch a taxi. The driver took Motorway 7 and maintained a steady 110 KPH on the southbound highway.

Within a few kilometers I noticed that the taxi was the only vehicle on the road. There were no cars behind or before us on the normally busy highway. Trucks lined the breakdown lanes. None of this was a good sign, for a busy highway indicates a bustling economy and no matter what the present or past government has forecasted for growth, I suspect that industries on the Eastern Seaboard are suffering from the onset of the western disease ie the Great Depression.

And it can only get worse, unless the governments decide to accept International Write-Off Day as the only solution to the bank’s destruction of the monetary system.

Someone someday had to admit that free market capitalism was a disaster.

And hopefully soon, unless the lack of cars was due to the danger of zombies or khon ngoh walking the rice paddies after dark.

I haven’t seen any, but zombies know enough to avoid Thais.

They are tougher than a bag of nails when the going gets tough.