Stock market down -- we need a soma high

Contemplating today's continuing stock market meltdown, which is bearing a disturbing resemblance to the Great Depression, thoughts of soma started running through my anxiety-soaked head.

Remember soma? It's a drug featured in Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World." Wikipedia recaps a book that I read a long time ago:

All members of society are conditioned in childhood to hold the values that the World State idealizes. Constant consumption is the bedrock of stability for the World State. Everyone is encouraged to consume the ubiquitous drug, soma, which is probably a historical allusion to a mythical drink of the ancient Aryans. Soma is a hallucinogen that takes users on enjoyable, hangover-free "vacations".

Sounds pretty damn good right now. Bring on the soma, Obama.

I'm ready for a brave new world. Recently I've said to European-style socialism, bravo. Ditto to legalizing (and taxing) marijuana. Unfortunately, it's going to take a while before we get there.

This is why, in the interim, the government needs to keep our brains from exploding with thoughts of We're fucked! (which is pretty much all that I hear on cable news and see in the newspaper these days).

Thus, the need for soma.

Simply redirect a few billion dollars into emergency pharmacological research from all the money that's being thrown into financial bailouts, most of which doesn't seem to be doing any good.

A drug without negative side effects that makes you feel really good about whatever is happening...bring it on. Along with the World State. Who cares about freedom and democracy if we've got soma on the shelf?

If you're not convinced that soma is for you, here's a nice collection of soma-related quotations from "Brave New World." After seeing today's Dow Jones closing value, this passage appealed to me.

"And if ever, by some unlucky chance, anything unpleasant should somehow happen, why, there's always soma to give you a holiday from the facts. And there's always soma to calm your anger, to reconcile you to your enemies, to make you patient and long-suffering. In the past you could only accomplish these things by making a great effort and after years of hard moral training. Now, you swallow two or three half-gramme tablets, and there you are. Anybody can be virtuous now. You can carry at least half your mortality about in a bottle. Christianity without tears-that's what soma is."

Cool! It sure would be nice if soma was available now. The same Huxley web site that provided the quotes has an article that speculates about what soma might be.

The substance that goes by that name has a rich ancient Vedic history. But religion or mythology isn't what the world requires now. We need a real drug that will make us look at our IRA, 401k, or brokerage house statements and think, Ah, so fine.

So just as the Obama administration is encouraging (or forcing) the auto industry to switch gears, this also needs to be done with the pharmaceutical industry.

There's plenty of soma-precursors for researchers to study and learn from. They need to get to work, pronto. Next time the Dow drops 300 points, I want to be in a Brave New World state of mind.

"Swallowing half an hour before closing time, that second dose of soma had raised a quite impenetrable wall between the actual universe and their minds."