I think everyone is pulling on strings, it is just a mess. Lets face it, no one has controll any longer, and I think that all predictions are correct, just that the timing is impossible to get correct.

Fortunately the western economy is so huge with so much buffer capacity so it can handle a lot of hits, but there are limits. The reality is that most of us have lived beyond our limits without paying the full bill and indeed most people predicted a slow down and some even the mess we are into.

There a lots and lots of contradictions;

we want growth but then again we want to decrease our environmental footprint, thats impossible the way things work

we want cheap gas, but that is a sign of bad economic times

we want non-polluting cars, but no-one wants new additional nuclear power

I think the good thing for now is that things have apparently stabilized, maybe based on unrealistic governments spending and bail-outs. They don't have the money so they just print it. As long as every western country prints the same excess amounts of money as the US, and the Chinese are too scared to call the bluff, things could work out

My prediction is that indeed we will get high inflation and gold will go up, but I have no idea about the timing.