Fact is said to be stranger than fiction. The older I become the more I believe this to be true. If someone had written a novel a couple of years ago about the causes of this huge financial crash that we are experiencing at present, the critics would have dismissed this pecuniary osteoporosis as a gross exaggeration. As the irredeemable mortgages like dud hot potatoes were passed on in a game of Pass the Parcel that became Chinese Whispers, bad debts were somehow transformed into A class shares and watertight bonds, safe as houses. That, and the ongoing costly war that renders nothing either by way of world security or financial reward, so debilitated the Bush regime that after a very uncomfortable rejection by the Senate last Tuesday we woke up on Thursday to the news that the $700 billion bailout was strongly approved by the Senate and will have an easy passage through the House on Friday. I wonder what brought about the volte face. Throwing $700 billion at a radically rotten problem as if it were Monopoly money just stinks.

The proverbial crap has hit the fan. It's been a hell of a long time coming. Just think of it.

The US has been "at war" since 2001. The Afghan war, ostensibly a retribution, a declared War on Terror, for the terrible tragedy in NY on 9/11, has yielded nothing. The Taliban, like the forces of Morgoth, are becoming stronger than ever and where on earth is Osama Bin Laden? To boot, in 2003, the US and its allies invaded Iraq on the pretence that Saddam Hussein was amassing weapons of mass destruction. Saddam was toppled and subsequently hanged. The weapons of mass destruction were never found.

Since then the US and its dwindling allies are still languishing in this appalling unmappable and intractable country of strong religious, ethnic and tribal differences that only a ruthless bullyboy like the late Saddam could control in his bloodthirsty iron fist and the Allies are, like sitting ducks, targets for the terrorist Al Qaeda and others to pick off at leisure. Not a day seems to pass when we are not regaled with yet another incident of soldiers and civilians being blown apart in some van or suicide bombing. The War on Terror has now outlasted both world wars. Could it rival The Hundred Years War?

I had a peek at the Sotheby's website this morning.

The New York house is holding a silver sale on the 17th. The quantity and quality of the silver is astounding. These are not "surplus to requirements" type of objects but excellent pieces that are undoubted family heirlooms. Wonderful Georgian silver along with a collection of snuff boxes and Spanish ecclesiastical objets d'arts are being auctioned.

One may argue that it is nothing strange or new and that because of the financial crisis the family silver is being flogged. That may be true enough. What was fascinating though were the estimates that were, in my opinion, pretty astronomical compared to European prices for the same thing. I still cannot figure it out. With the US in a financial turmoil how are the sellers of these heirlooms expecting such high prices? Maybe they expect them to be bought by European buyers? Possibly the market will have shifted to the emirs of the oil-sodden Gulf? I am pretty flummoxed. The shifting of chattel is nothing new. They simply move to where the money is.

So now, where do we go for honey? There are more ways for Islam to infiltrate the once Christian West than immigration. Nobody can resist that most powerful of weapons: money!

In the midst of all this, while people were imagining how long the $700 billion bailout will postpone the inevitable financial cataclysm, we in Malta carry on regardless thinking that, for all we care, the islands of Malta, Gozo and Comino could be on Mars! Irrespective of whether we are, along with Pantelleria and Lampedusa, mere stepping stones for Africans to reach Europe, we seem to think that the most dire global crisis should not affect us or involve us and that we should remain, like a virgo intacta, financially, genetically and sociologically undefiled rather like the Parsees in India, which is pure rubbish and defies all logic.

The Labour Party is not happy, no Sir, not happy at all, with the latest agreement about burden sharing that has just been ratified but not yet signed in Brussels and Joseph Muscat is urging Lawrence Gonzi to dig in his heels a la Dom Mintoff in Helsinki and not sign the document in order to obtain a better deal. It looks as if he is putting his reputation on the line too. I wonder why? Dr Muscat, to date, has kept his cards closely to his chest.

I confess that I am utterly perplexed.

kzt@onvol.net