I like this guy! He is Martin D. Weiss Ph. D. and is far smarter than I ever would have been even if I had not taken up boxing and stick-fighting. Besides, he mailed this free book to me just so I would be aware of the coming Financial End of Days!

Little did Martin know that I was already pursuing what he considers a post-Apocalyptic existence. I will give him the benefit of the Darwinian Doubt and review this book-length sales pitch, for his newsletter, for what it is: an informative; controversial; warning; scare-tactic; sales pitch—a pitch to pay a small fee for his advice. I will review this book objectively, as if I were living above the Financial Horizon and wished to protect my assets and high standard-of-living accumulated over a lifetime of toil. As it stands I can afford beans and oats without Martin’s advice; and all of my weapons are keenly edged and within arm’s reach. However, suppose I were you?

When we think end-of-the-world scenarios our Western template invokes the Book of Revelations; a prophecy about a final battle between good and evil on a cosmic scale. However, when the word apocalypse is used it serves just as well for other potential cataclysms. The most common interpretation is a natural disaster, up to and including a global extinction event. The History Channel has even devoted an entire series to this curiously depressing genre. Let’s craft a list of apocalypse types from most universally feared to most American specific:

1. Cosmic global extinction brought on by extraterrestrial natural phenomena like a comet, meteor, gamma ray burst, etc.

2. Zombie apocalypse or alien invasion, being an attack on our biology, our spirituality and our identity, and the coolest type to make a movie about

3. Plague, bubonic, avian flu, swine flu, whatever is being housed at Fort Meade, as a universal attack on human biology…good luck selling that movie script.

4. Religious end times such as those envisioned by Islamic, Christian, Norse and Aztec belief systems. Most of the planet does not buy into religious annihilation schemes. It seems curiously to be the preoccupation of religions that developed in harsh climates, and to be somewhat self-fulfilling [as two of the above mentioned religions are extinct.]

5. Climate/ecological catastrophe. Since Judaism, Islam and Christianity are faiths built on the Old Testament belief in ecological domination by man, than Western society is particularly paranoid about ‘Mother Nature’ striking back, as in the Dust Bowl of the 1930s.

6. Economic Collapse. One reason that Native American religious leaders chose cultural annihilation over conversion to Western values was their suspicion that any system of living that was based on trade rather than spirituality and community was not only doomed but not worth perpetuating.

7. Societal Collapse. As a multicultural nation built on trade-based prosperity even a less than total economic collapse could trigger significant societal upheaval, possibly including martial law and martial law collapse.

Above we have listed worse-case to best-case scenarios in an order that also seems to be from least to most likely. The book below addresses scenarios 6 and 7, and is predictably aimed at the American investor. It is an investment contingency sales pitch, and will be reviewed as such, not as a work of literature, though a perfect-bound book it is.

A monumental, historic event is about to fundamentally change our way of life forever. Will you know what to do?

Martin D. Weiss, Ph. D., 2012, Weiss Research Inc., Jupiter, Florida [obviously not promoting global flooding preparedness]

This piece of hyperbolic hack writing gets five stars from me as a sales pitch because it scared the crap out of me and I don’t even have assets—well, the nickel-plated gladiatorial helmet is an asset of sorts I suppose. I am not fiscally in-the-know, so cannot check the facts claimed within this book. The arguments however, are well-reasoned, and if the quotes and stats presented are accurate, I would buy this guy’s newsletter in order to be better prepared to shield my investments.

Anyone who has studied the rise and decline of empires finds no surprising assertions or predictions here concerning the likely fate of the American Empire [No objective historian of the future will describe America as anything other than an empire.] If you have read on the rise and fall of the Athenian or British Empires you won’t be surprised here. There are mentions of four self-help books and various online tools that supplement the Weiss newsletter, which is called the Safe Money Report. The claims for past predictive accuracy should be easily verifiable by those so inclined.

The author certainly pushes the ‘panic button’ repeatedly and loudly. I am most intrigued by the fact that he suggests you make money off of the coming disaster, and I suppose some always do during such times. My questions are:

Do you really want to be the guy with a safe full of silver and gold when society collapses?

How are you going to get your money out of Switzerland or the Cayman Islands when world banking systems collapse?

Assuming you can access your safe-guarded wealth; how is that going to help you when your suburban mansion becomes a battleground between gang sets pushing out from the burned out city to acquire your food and shelter, and rednecks with machine-gun mounted pickups swooping in from the sticks to acquire your daughter for breeding purposes?

This book would have instilled more confidence in me as a reader if the author had not repeatedly used such hyperbolic terms as: Armageddon; Doomsday; and ‘when all hell breaks loose!’

It sounds like a good time and I would like to read more. Apparently you can get 4 books and a year’s worth of newsletters for $39. The one thing that I think everybody overlooks is how hard any government will fight to stay in power. If any of the various End of Days scenarios being discussed recently come to pass, expect to see the same U.S. Air/Land military force versus SUV militia combat outside your front door that people in many smaller nations have enjoyed for the past ten years.

And don’t forget the beer cooler and the beach blanket.