Michael Barone: Was 2007 A Historical Turning Point?

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Investors Business Daily:

'I would bet on globalization slowly being in abeyance," tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel said in a video interview with George Mason University economist Tyler Cowen.

 

"I think with the benefit of hindsight, we will realize that 2007 was not just the peak year of the finance boom but also the peak year of globalization, like maybe 1913."

 

It's a tantalizing thought, and Thiel is well worth a listen. He's co-founder of PayPal and the first outside investor in Facebook, selling his initial $500,000 investment eight years later for $1 billion. His record for spotting future trends and flexion points is impressive. His reference to 1913 was surely meant to be — and should be — chilling.

 

That was the last full year before the outbreak of World War I, a conflict in which about 16 million people died. In its wake, Communists took over Russia and Hitler took over Germany. The war made the world safe not for democracy, as Woodrow Wilson had hoped, but for totalitarianism.