“The whole economy is a pyramid scheme.” That doesn’t sound so crazy, given the last couple of years, but it’s just the beginning of Michael Ruppert’s warnings in Chris Smith’s minimalist documentary. Author, decorated cop, CIA whistle-blower, political watchdog, and straight-talking prognosticator of the collapse of the world as we know it, Ruppert has been trying to convince us for decades that a civilization built on oil and petroleum products is unsustainable.
Ruppert is the whole show in Collapse, which features the chain-smoking dissident delivering his assessment in blunt, easy-to-grasp terms: We’re heading for a collapse. Economies are failing around the globe, the arable soil is being drained of nutrients that are being replaced with petroleum-based fertilizers, the human population has exploded to numbers that the planet can’t sustain.
It’s a dire prediction out of some sort of science-fiction apocalypse, and the temptation is to label it crackpot paranoia and fringe conspiracy theory (as many of his critics have). But Ruppert is well-informed, articulate, and backed by a pretty good track record of equally ignored predictions, if he does say so himself. We have to take him at his word there—Smith is no Errol Morris. It’s not so much that he doesn’t push as that he doesn’t engage. Collapse is not an interview, it’s a lecture with prompts, and Smith provides Ruppert a platform for his conclusions without investigating his evidence. For all the charts and vague illustrative film footage, Smith offers little beyond a snippet of a Ruppert lecture warning of the dangers of earnings based on derivatives and the impending collapse of Bear Stearns and the rest of Wall Street. “I was off by about a year,” Ruppert confesses. But yeah, he did peg that one.
Actually, most of his arguments are pretty convincing. You just have to turn on the news to see his examples in action. It’s the conclusions that are hard to swallow, if only because they’re so catastrophic. Maybe the impulse to patronize or dismiss such alarmist predictions arises because it’s just too overwhelming to confront them. Because if we do accept them, Ruppert’s survival advice is pretty grim: Buy gold, store seeds, and grow your own food. Otherwise, we wait for a new, sustainable paradigm, because no one’s rushing to change this one. 
Yada Yada Yada.
Heard it before.
Typical stuff you get near the ends of a century, when a large minority of the population gets all caught up in the Rapture and End of Days crap …
Once they stop behaving irresponsibly – and they will – things will be right as rain.
Well, other than the fact that the salmon stocks need to be migrated about 1000 miles north so the rivers are at the correct temperature for the species.
As a lecture, Collapse was certainly interesting, but as a documentary I found it so frustrating as to be nearly unwatchable. Stylistically, it apes Errol Morris (Fog of War, Standard Operating Procedure), which would be fine except that they pull it off so badly. The way Ruppert is always looking just to the side of the camera made me realize just how wonderful Morris’ Interrotron really is. It hints at Ruppert’s personal problems, but doesn’t push it enough to really develop him as a character. To cap it off, the minimalist soundtrack is far more heavy-handed than Philip Glass’ nigh-perfect scores for Fog of War or The Thin Blue Line.
Paul Constant says all 9/11 theorists are evil. So why no kneejerk ad-hominem attacks against Ruppert?
9/11 theorists aren’t evil.
they’re just dumb.
@1
Gee, I always look to the willfully ignorant folks like you for advice. You have _all_ the easy answers!
@1
you realize salmon already exist 1000 miles north, right? they just need to be protected there (i.e. no pebble mine in bristol bay).
Why would gold continue to have value in a world where there is no functioning political economy? Will people obsessed with collecting gems and precious metals always be in control of the world markets? Don’t waste your time with gold, buy and stock a commodity that people will always be in desperate want of — freedom. And failing that — escape.
“Rip City Hustle” is a perfect example of mindless drones who bought the official story hook, line and sinker. No ability to think critically. No intelligent counter arguments. Just more parroting of what they’ve been told and personal attacks against anyone who dares disagree.
@4 is a perfect example of mindless drones who bought the official story hook, line and sinker. No ability to think critically. No intelligent counter arguments. Just more parroting of what they’ve been told and personal attacks against anyone who dares disagree.
I got this farm out by Colfax WA! Come on let’s go! You can all live in the barn and be my slaves I mean workers!!
We have horsies and a black walnut grove down by the creek and a pioneer graveyard up on the hill!
@10! And the Codger Pole! Don’t forget about the Codger Pole!
MK1 I like you
and when you need to take a break from farm work you can walk to vibrant downtown Colfax and look at the Codger Pole! The Codger Pole! Codger Codger Codger Pole!