“We’re different.”
“We’re special.”
“We’re too intelligent.”
“We’ll find a way out. We always do.”

We’re humans, and therefore animals. Like all life, we’re special. Like all organisms, we’re susceptible to overshoot. Like all organisms, we will experience population decline after overshoot.

Let’s take stock of our current predicaments, beginning with one of several ongoing processes likely to cause our extinction. Then I’ll point out the good not quite so bad news.

We’re headed for extinction via global climate change

It’s hotter than it used to be, but not as hot as it’s going to be. The political response to this now-obvious information is to suspend the scientist bearing the bad news. Which, of course, is no surprise at all: As Australian scientist Gideon Polya points out, the United States must cease production of greenhouse gases within 3.1 years if we are to avoid catastrophic runaway greenhouse. I think Polya is optimistic, and I don’t think Obama’s on-board with the attendant collapse of the U.S. industrial economy.

Apparently — too little, too late — a couple people have noticed a few facts about Obama. This “awakening” might explain why his political support is headed south at a rapid clip.

But back to climate change, one of three likely extinction events. Well, three I know about: I’m certain there are others, and any number can play. With four months remaining in the year, the U.S. has already tied its yearly record for the most billion-dollar weather disasters. Russia is headed directly for loss of 30% of its permafrost by 2050. Tundra fires could accelerate planetary warming. This year, the Northeast Passage was open as of 27 July. This is a massively dire situation for the Arctic. In fact, we have passed a de facto tipping point with respect to Arctic ice. This latter outcome is stunning, but only to those who follow the horrifically conservative and increasingly irrelevant Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Nature is responding with hybrid bears, suggesting the near-term loss of all polar bears. Indeed, all Earth’s systems are rapidly declining. Many organisms can’t keep up as they try to stay ahead of an overheating planet.

As the living planet decays, we keep piling on. Examples abound. Here’s one tiny example among thousands, from that pesky BP well at Deepwater Horizon. It’s out of the news cycle, but it’s not done destroying life in the Gulf of Mexico. But perhaps this tidbit belongs beneath the heading of …

We’re headed for extinction via environmental collapse

Nature is bankrupt, just like Wall Street and the USA. Thanks for playing, but you lose. The banksters on Wall Street “win.” But only in the short term. In the long run, we’re all dead (as first stated by John Maynard Keynes).

Among the consequences of taking down more than 200 species each day: at some point, the species we take into the abyss is Homo sapiens (the wise ape). The vanishing point draws nearer every day. Our response, in the industrialized world: Bring on the toys. Burn all fossil fuels. Harvest the rain forests and strip-mine the soil. Pollute the water, eat the seed bank.

And, most importantly, figure out how we can make a few bucks as the world burns.

We have our hand in a monkey trap, and we can’t let go.

We’re headed for extinction via nuclear meltdown

Safely shuttering a nuclear power plant requires a decade or two of careful planning. Far sooner, we’ll complete the ongoing collapse of the industrial economy. This is a source of my nuclear nightmares.

When the world’s 442 nuclear power plants melt down catastrophically, we’ve entered an extinction event. Think clusterfukushima, times 400. Ionizing radiation could, and probably will, destroy every terrestrial organism and, therefore, every marine and freshwater organism. That, by the way, includes the most unique, special, intelligent animal on Earth.

Ready for some good news?

Meanwhile, back on Wall Street

The Securities and Exchange Commission is busily covering up Wall Street crimes, just as they did during the last presidential administration. And, as it turns out, they’ve been performing this trick for two decades. Finally, though, the S&P is taking the U.S. to the woodshed.

The S&P knows what the media and politicians know: U.S. national debt isn’t really $14 trillion and change, as we’ve been led to believe. In fact, it exceeds $200 trillion. And, back when it was a mere $10.5 trillion, it exceeded the value of all circulating currencies as well as all the gold ever mined. It cannot be paid off, ever. The response will be default. With luck, it’ll happen quickly and completely, thus sending us directly to the new dark age (with the post-industrial Stone Age soon to follow).

The ongoing crash of the stock markets differs from prior events because, for one thing, the Fed is about out of ammunition. At this juncture, there are no easy solutions. In fact, there are no solutions at all. We have just about used up all our “rabbits in the hat” as far as fiscal and monetary policy are concerned. Economics pundit Graham Summers agrees: The Fed is about to find itself completely powerless as 2008 redux appears. The great collapse, for which 2008 was merely a warm-up act, is under way.

Think of 2008 as an economic teddy bear, and 2011 as a grizzly. And I think I mentioned this one already: The hunters are out of bullets.

The all-too-expected political response from the final remaining superpower: ratchet up covert wars. Maybe, while we’re at it, launch another World War.

The bottom line

You’ve been warned repeatedly in this space, and the Guardian finally joins the party: The industrial economic system is about to blow. This burst of hope, our remaining chance at salvation, will undoubtedly be greeted with the usual assortment of protests, ridicule, and hate mail I’ve come to expect from planetary consumers who want to keep consuming the planet.

The underlying predicament — reduction in available energy — is described graphically by Gail Tverberg in this essay. She then tacks on fine analysis in this subsequent essay. Jared Diamond adds a dose of complexity, as described by Erik Curren at Transition Voice.

But these warning shots are only the most recent in a rich history dating back to Marcus Aurelius (and probably further). For materials only slightly older than me that focus on our energy predicament, take a peek at M. King Hubbert’s 1956 paper and the text of Admiral Hyman G. Rickover’s 1957 speech.

And then, let go.

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This essay is permalinked at Seismologik, Max Keiser, Conchscooter’s Common Sense, Counter Currents, Speaking Truth to Power, Seemorerocks, Jackpot Investor, eWallstreeter, Stocks that Pay, Intelwars, Tov Hazel, Equity Help Desk, InvestmentWatch, Gold & Silver Mashup, Singstock, a few dozen other sites, and Zero Hedge (comments at the latter site echo my opening paragraphs).

As a result of runaway fossil-fuel consumption, the amount of carbon released to the atmosphere is still going up, even as the industrial economy is buried in a depression. We haven’t observed below-average temperatures on this planet for 25 years. Even high oil prices can’t keep a bad country down.

The response of the government and its sponsors at the Federal Reserve Bank remains unchanged: print money. Quantitative Easing (QE, i.e., printing money) has been a complete failure. But because Ben Bernanke has adopted levitating the stock markets as the Federal Reserve Bank’s prime directive, I’ve no doubt we’ll see QE 3, QE 4, and so on, right through to QE infinity until the U.S. dollar joins every other fiat currency in the dustbin of history. Alan Greenspan warned about the worthless paper certain to result from the ongoing Ponzi scheme, back in 2005.

The debt problem is as bad as they say. And probably worse than anybody is saying. Reducing U.S. debt causes the stock markets to fall profoundly. Increasing U.S. debt makes a dire predicament worse, but a missed payment on U.S. debt leads directly to junk status for the dollar, so Benny and the Inkjets will continue to print until the dollar is dead.

What are the options, after all? We’re on a train going over a cliff, and the cabin smells of natural gas. We can ride out the train wreck or jump out, sans parachutes. The banksters in charge have posed a third option: light a match. As economist Mish says, “Expect chaos.”

Every additional brick in the wall of civilization, placed there by the fascists in charge, has two profound consequences. First, each brick enriches the financially wealthy at the expense of the rest of us, even as economic collapse looms. Second, every brick further destroys the remnants of the living planet. Let’s kick Barack Obama — the American Gorbachev — out of the way so we can tear down this wall.

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This essay is permalinked at Kick It Over and Plan B Economics.

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Update: Please note the new CLASSIFIED ad under the tab, above

Further signs abound: The industrial economy is in serious trouble. Cats can no longer obtain credit cards. The bond market is nervous as a lizard on the interstate. The influence of the U.S. extends only as far as its military. And, stunningly, oil extraction is limited by availability of carbon dioxide (complexity is expensive).

Europe isn’t exactly a model of financial maturity, either. Throughout the industrialized world, we set ourselves up for financial disaster when we put money-grubbing juvenile delinquents in charge of the checkbooks. The biggest Ponzi scheme in history was the only outcome we could have expected, had we been paying attention.

A crash reminiscent of 2008 is on the way, but this one will be bigger. Why? Because “America’s leaders never learn the lessons of history. Never.” Instead, they purposely distract the willfully ignorant masses. How long must we endure this hokey carnival ride before we finally start focusing on legitimately important issues? Actually, it’s probably too late for that, at least at the level of society. Bring on the next round, American Idol.

As Americans complain about the price of fuel for their personal vehicles, Barack Obama urges oil producers to increase output. Of course Obama knows about peak oil, which is why we’re in Iraq, according to the U.K.’s MI6, and why Obama will almost certainly never authorize withdrawal from Iraq. It’s also why he has us breaking international law to arm Libyan rebels, and it’s why he has chosen to ease restrictions on oil and gas drilling while opting for oil production over human life as the Mississippi River floods. These choices are based on the reality that high prices at the pump fuel voter discontent with presidential leadership, hence could harm Obama’s re-election chances. After all, the U.S. system is all about the four-years-at-a-time approach to politics, even if emissions from burning oil destroys our only home one gallon at a time.

It’s becoming increasingly difficult to deny world oil extraction has peaked, so the Obama administration has employed the timeless strategy used by ostriches throughout history: burying the data by slashing the budget of the Energy Information Administration. As usual, the populace chooses ignorance over reality, collectively whistling past the graveyard of reality even as reality comes up to take a bite.

Media alert:

I mentioned my interview with Adbusters as an addendum for a guest essay, and the transcript is linked here.

In addition, I am one of a few talking heads featured in College Conspiracy, the video embedded below. My inclusion in this video does not imply my endorsement and, contrary to this messages delivered in the video, I think (1) public education should be funded with taxpayer money, (2) making the college market more “free” is a terrible idea, (3) online degrees are lucrative for institutions but usually are worthless for students, (4) stocking up on silver will make you a target, not a wealthy genius, when the industrial economy completes its fall, and (5) the final two minutes are sadly emblematic of much that is wrong with the United States of Advertising. Perhaps I’m just irritated because they cut my best line: “Today’s institutions of higher education are replete with teachers who don’t want to teach and students who don’t want to learn.”

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Update: My monthly essay for Transition Voice is online today: Blessings of a dying paradigm. You can read my beyond-the-blog essays here, and interviews are posted here.

Meanwhile, on the all-important oil front, Saudi Arabia cuts output, claiming the market is well supplied. I guess the price of oil pushing industrial economies into the abyss indicates adequate supply. Or maybe the kingdom is lying, and their fields are in precipitous decline.

Declining oil extraction at the world level and ongoing money printing by King Ben are, unsurprisingly, raising the price of oil. In response, Barack Obama is demonstrating the type of leadership I’ve come to expect from national politicians: He’s blaming speculators for the high price of oil while expanding military operations in oil-rich countries (e.g., Libya is the new Iraq quagmire). This failure of leadership should no longer surprise anybody, but it should disappoint everybody who claims to care about human life.

The war to nowhere continues in Afghanistan while the occupation of Iraq, intended to allow American access to oil (as I’ve been writing for years), continues to strengthen the hand of Iran. The latter country — the world’s third-largest oil exporter — is threatening to tighten oil supplies, thus driving the price up to $150/barrel. Bombing Libya was intended to alleviate this problem, but Libyan oil is in limbo. Perhaps the IMF forecast of a 60% increase in the price of crude within a year is right on the mark. If the forecast is even close, the industrial economy is done within months thereafter. The IMF is joined in the forecasting game by the ever-clueless folks at CNBC, who foresee $6 gas at the pumps this summer and also by John Mauldin, who predicts $8 gas this summer (we’ll never reach the requisite $180 oil associated with the former forecast and keep the pumps … well, pumping).

Graham Summers points out the U.S. dollar is falling off a cliff, and he worries “the Fed will push into a full-scale inflationary collapse within three months.” While I doubt hyperinflation trumps ongoing deflation that quickly unless China dumps the U.S. dollar as threatened promised, Summers’ argument might explain why the Federal Reserve Bank has upped the ante even as the industrial economy hovers on the brink because the Fed has lost control of the monetary system. In addition, hyperinflation is the only governmental solution to overcome the problem of handouts exceeding taxes for the first time in 75 years.

As we continue to trade in tomorrow for today — that is, as western civilization continues to destroy the living planet — every energy “expert” in the world pines for civilization, thus carelessly wishing for continuation of the ongoing planetary omnicide. This makes as much sense as longing for intelligent design and suspension of the Laws of Thermodynamics, and is equally effective. The times are changing, and we can hope they change rapidly enough to save the final remnants of the living planet that support human life.

The planetary death wish on the part of energy gurus is one of many examples of partial understanding of the interconnected nature of our predicaments. Other examples abound, even though I’ll ignore the teeming masses of neoclassical economists who have no clue where are, how we arrived here, or where we’re headed. Jeff Rubin, called by Nicole Foss an economist who doesn’t understand economics, seems to believe the industrial economy can endure oil priced at $225 with a little attention to relocalization. And he describes how traders can makes tons ‘o money in the casino. Foss, a peak oiler who doesn’t understand peak oil, claimed the price of oil would never exceed $100/barrel after 2008 and predicted the 2-year bull run in the stock markets was done at the 6-month mark. She ties every thread to the ever-falling ball of string that is the housing market and she and her partner at The Automatic Earth continue to insist we’re headed for oil priced in the low double digits), albeit with the industrial economy Disaster As Usual (DAU) continuing for decades. I’ve no doubt deflation is under way, or that it will take another big bite after June if Benny Bucks cease to flood the markets. But it’s a good bet the shelves turn bare, the fuel runs out, and the water stops coming out the taps when banks and other companies are perceived as financially worthless (instead of horrible, life-draining monsters financial bargains).

Other pundits exhibit similar bias toward civilization extinction of every species on Earth, including Homo sapiens. Chris Martenson stresses the importance of accumulating and protecting financial wealth, especially his, as he charges $500 per hour to chat with people. The normally sedate Martenson, who indicated it was time to head for the hills a couple months ago, is calling for a big breakdown within a year. Is he just shaking us down for cash silver? And, as we head for the hills, should we pack our silver into our bug-out bags? Won’t owning precious metals make us targets, if only because industrial humans love shiny objects?

Similarly, “Tyler Durden” and his fellow traders at Zero Hedge are all about making money as the world burns. James Howard Kunstler longs for walkable cities served by railroads and sailing ships. Michael Ruppert is trying to save his own ass, apparently unconcerned about who or what comes in the wake of civilization. The list goes on. And on. The blogosphere is bursting at the seams with people who believe the industrial economy is more important than environmental protection, and that future generations of humans don’t count as much as the current crop.

Based on reading these fine folks — much less the mainstream media — you’d never know the mother of all paradigm shifts was under way. It seems nobody can give up their love for money. Obviously, industrial humans are poorly suited for this world, much less the one headed our way.

It’s small wonder the likes of Foss and the gang have as many fans as John Michael Greer. One quick way to increase your fan base is predicting DAU to infinity and beyond while claiming it’s a good thing. Civilized people love planetary destruction, as long as the lights stay on and the municipal water keeps coming out the taps. And especially if there’s money to be made along the way.

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This essay is permalinked, sans hyperlinks, at Counter Currents.

It’s too late for a fast collapse of the industrial economy. According to every significant index, the U.S. hit its economic peak in 2000. We’ve been in the midst of an economic recession since 2000. We’ve been mired in an economic depression since 2008, when the industrial age came within an eyelash of reaching its overdue terminus.

Even Ben Bernanke admitted as much, years after the meltdown on Wall Street. When all the banks fail — or even a significant proportion of them — we’ll suddenly lose access to the fiat currency that allows the current set of living arrangements to persist. I strongly suspect the high price of oil had a lot to do with the near meltdown in 2008, a notion consistent with oil price spikes preceding every economic recession since 1972.

When the next spike in the price of oil hits us, we’ll see another huge downturn for the industrial economy. According to more than 70 pundits, it’ll be the one that puts western civilization in the abattoir. This would be no surprise, given the fragility of the industrial economy and its near-termination back in 2008, when it was on much stronger footing than now. Oil priced at $140 barrel is almost certainly coming this year, and that should do the trick, much to the astonishment of those who believe the industrial economy is unaffected by spikes in the price of oil, or that its long-time decline can turn into a collapse.

Even Bank of America has joined the rising tide of voices calling for the price of crude to exceed $140/bbl within the next three months. And no wonder, with OPEC raising expectations of world demand after Saudi Arabia and OPEC have peaked.

As I’ve pointed out many times, and as Japan is making clear right now, economic growth is all about oil consumption. We’re falling off the oil-supply cliff this year, according to many sources, including the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration and the Joint Operating Environment of the U.S. military.

I don’t know the terminology for a sudden stop of the industrial economy. I don’t think terms such as hyperinflation and deflation apply, and economists rarely use the phrase, “industrial economy crushed by Godzilla.” As with any leap off a skyscraper, it’s not the fall that’s fatal: It’s the sudden stop at the bottom.

The rapid collapse of AIG back in September 2008 is a harbinger of an equally rapid failure of the Fed, hence our entire monetary system. The only difference is that this time there will be nobody to bail out the ultimate backstopper and, as a result, we will observe the long overdue termination of a failed experiment.

Here’s one analogy: We’re in an aerial tram, suspended a few thousand feet above the valley floor by a sturdy, steel, 2-inch-diameter cable. But the cable is comprised of thousands of tightly wrapped strands, all of which are hundreds of years old and half of which have already broken. The remaining strands are breaking at an increasingly rapid pace as the pressure builds. The U.S. Federal Reserve Bank has been holding this sucker together with duct tape and baling wire, but King Ben is fresh out of both items.

I find it a bit odd — no doubt because of bias inherent in my life as a scientist — that artists have a better understanding of reality than do scientists. Matchbox Twenty provides one example (thanks to Mike Sliwa for the tip).

And while we’re on the topic of rearranging the deck chairs as the Titanic takes on water, the international community is rightly aghast at North Korea for spending a fortune on its military when its populace is suffering. Nearly one quarter of North Korea’s population is either starving or at risk of starvation, according to a recent UN report, yet its government pours money into missile and nuclear programs. Such behavior seems to be the height of irrationality, especially when you consider they stole the model for this behavior from the U.S.

I realize you and I had little to do with the dire straits in which we are immersed (i.e., we didn’t fuck it up). But we’ll be paying a high price.

No matter how many times I point out the acceleration of this ongoing slow decline, people take issue. I suspect it’s the primary reason Energy Bulletin and similar websites do not carry my essays. It can’t happen here. This time is different. There’ll be plenty of warning. And so on. In response to the insanity of the herd’s groupthink, I turn to Nietzsche for solace: “The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.”

The seemingly rapid collapse of the former Soviet Union — the latest superpower to hit bottom, never to recover — actually took a few years to transpire. The collapse was faster than the ongoing collapse of the current system, but I have the distinct impression Obama is a conniving version of Gorbachev. A few informed people saw the Soviet collapse coming and sounded the klaxons, but government officials did not post warning signs on the nightly news. Quibbling over minor differences between socialist news delivered by and for the Politburo and fascist news delivered by and for the Corporatocracy seems irrelevant at this point. As Oliver Stone points out, Barack Obama could take a lesson from Mikhail Gorbachev about how to dismantle a dysfunctional empire that has long overstayed its welcome.

Warning shots have been plentiful. The masses have completely ignored these many shots. The next shot likely will be terminal for the industrial economy.

The decline of the U.S. industrial economy has been a slow-motion, ongoing process, albeit with several steps down along the way. If we’re lucky, the next step leads right off a skyscraper, thus leading to a sudden stop at the sidewalk below. Obviously, this is the only legitimate remaining opportunity to prevent the near-term extinction of the many species we drive to extinction every day, as well as our own species. And, of course, it will allow us to see the end of Twain’s limitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities.

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This essay is permalinked at Island Breath and Running ‘Cause I Can’t Fly.

Those events are coming to the whole country, and a lot sooner than most people realize. Nobody thought a first-world, industrialized nation such as Argentina would implode, either. Until it did, quite rapidly, a decade ago. And no wonder: All police states fail.

The U.S. will prove no exception to the rule of police states that fail. If unrest spreads to Saudi Arabia, it’s game over for the world’s industrialized countries (and therefore a whole new, better ballgame for life on Earth). Here’s hoping.

Economic hit-man John Perkins points out the obvious: Corporations, not nations, run the world. Maintaining American Empire as a corporate state requires obedience at home and oppression abroad. Oh, and we’re headed for complete economic collapse whether or not you continue to act as slave to the fascistic monsters in charge.

Even as corporations are worried about their ability to maintain supply chains to keep you fed and filled with toys, they continue to find novel ways to take money from your wallet. Consider, for example, your tax dollars going directly from Freddie and Fannie to Wall Street in the perfect bailout for the banks.

On the other hand, Obama is promising to cut the budget significantly, as indicated in this video. But the deficit comprises a larger share of the industrial economy than any time since 1945, and Obama’s response is to continue along the same path and lie about it. Sadly, many Americans believe Obama about his many promises, even gulping down the Kool-Aid of his surreal budget projections. For most Americans, soaring rhetoric beats the truth every time. Despite Obama’s frequent expressions of love for the free market, it’s pretty clear the government is manipulating the stock markets. After campaigning on the promise to close Guantanamo Bay, Obama is expanding it. And so on, until it becomes impossible to keep up with the never-ending string of lies emanating from our elected officials (which doesn’t stop the lists, such as this one, from proliferating). Along with his other transgressions, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize has become arms dealer for the world. In short, hope and change is not working out for the average American, leading Mike Whitney to suggest we trade Obama for Hugo Chavez. That’s a great idea, but I doubt the Venezuelan people would go along with it.

Resistance is fertile. If you’re unwilling to take resistance seriously, you can start by planting a garden. Never mind the old adage, “who feeds you, owns you.” You’ll need the garden to survive. As you plant, grow, share the harvest, and improve the soil, it should become clear that your garden is a metaphor for life. You’ll want to tend your relationships as you tend your garden.

I suggest you start today. Even if the ongoing collapse of the industrial economy is not complete for another three years — which seems inconceivable in light of the steadily rising pace of events, including the accelerating decline of the U.S. dollar — it’ll take time to prepare for a bountiful future. As I’ve indicated many times, the time to dig a well is not when you’re thirsty, the time to plant a garden is not when you’re hungry, and the time to build shelter against the storm is not when it’s sleeting.

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This essay is permalinked at Running ‘Cause I Can’t Fly.

Not that we should believe IEA about anything related to oil. This is the gang that promised an annual decline rate of 9.1% in conventional oil, beginning in 2009. We’re holding at a decline rate of about 3%, year over year, since early 2009.

Techno-optimists take note: It’ll take 131 years to replace oil. Not 130, and not 132, but 131. And we don’t have 4.9147 years left in the Age of Oil. That might prove problematic.

Taking a turn to the other side of the fossil-fuel coin, the IEA devastatingly projects global temperature will rise 3.5 degrees C by 2035. This prediction comes on the heels of increasingly dire projections, the latter of which all suggest habitat for humans will be gone from this planet by mid-century. I remain optimistic because none of these projections acknowledge physical limits on combustion of fossil fuels. That is, they fail to acknowledge the truly good news of economic collapse for our species and many others.

If we accept the IEA’s analysis and prediction, the few humans on the planet by 2035 won’t be worried about the price of air fare. We can only hope the projection for global temperature is based on the same kind of fuzzy logic used to conclude we’ve passed the world oil peak, then conclude we never will. Or we can hope the IEA is using climate change to justify economic collapse contraction. I suspect we’ll see a lot of this type of argument in the coming months, as the world’s industrial economy goes up in flames.

Just when you thought the Great Recession Great Bank Robbery was over, it turns out the courts are helping the banks steal money from homeowners. No surprise there, of course: Civilization is properly defined as the transfer of fiat currency from those who have little of it to those who have a lot. And there is nobody more civilized than Bernanke and Obama, as indicated by the way they spend print money on bank executives instead of us “little” people. If you have a sense of humor about the economic apocalypse, check out the video below, bearing in mind that if you can laugh at yourself, and you can laugh at the apocalypse, then you’ll never run out of material.

Fortunately, regardless of the lies by the likes of Geithner, Bernanke, and Obama, the days of fiat currency are just about behind us as collapse of the industrial economy nears completion. Ireland is the new Greece, but the U.S. is dogging both countries on the path to insolvency. Historian Niall Ferguson describes one plausible outcome here. Regardless of the details, soon — and perhaps soon enough, though only time will tell — we’ll be using Federal Reserve Notes as toilet paper or fire-starter, which will be handy when we can’t find either product at the grocery store.

The American Dream, which is based on never-ending economic growth, is over. Change is coming, and it’s not the peaceful kind. But it’s bound to be better than living in country governed by war criminals who are adorned with Nobel Peace prizes.

The TechnoMessiah has met Reality. As with the Federal Reserve’s money-printing vs. the secular bear market, there can be only one winner. I’m betting on Reality, in a rout.

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This essay is permalinked at Darwiniana, Counter Currents, Bill Totten’s Weblog, and Island Breath.

A line from Hunter S Thompson comes to mind: “I wouldn’t recommend sex, drugs or insanity for everyone, but they’ve always worked for me.”

The single best word I can come up with to describe the response to my actions: sad. That the self-proclaimed intellectual elite in this country find simply unfathomable the decision to pursue morality over money is as sad as the wise ape finding itself in the midst of two dire fossil-fuel predicaments.

The moral imperative associated with abandoning imperial pursuits hasn’t caught on yet among my ivory-tower colleagues. Although this makes me sad, it comes as no surprise to me: In my experience, university administrators reward unethical behavior and punish people for acting ethically. Reflecting culture, universities are structured to generate financial wealth for those at the top of the pyramid.

Indeed, this propensity for the easy and hence immoral life, underlain by evolution, likely is the primary contributor to both fossil-fuel predicaments. We have trapped ourselves in civilization, thus in the cities. The results likely will be catastrophic for industrial humans, as they have been and continue to be for non-industrial humans and non-human species. After all, you know the line about the root of all evil, and you also know how Ponzi schemes turn out.

On the topic of Ponzi schemes, consider two seemingly disparate examples. A chain letter is illegal because early adopters steal from future participants under false premises. When this same phenomenon occurs at the level of a nation, it’s not called a Ponzi scheme. In that case, the relevant term is “good monetary policy.”

Let’s ignore for a moment the collapse of my ego and contemplate the other collapses, with my usual focus on the environment and the industrial economy. As I’ve suggested previously, if you think the latter is more important than the former, try holding your breath while counting your money.

On the topic of environmental devastation — the one that really matters, if we’re to avoid our own extinction — we have the federal government is hindering investigations in the Gulf of Mexico, even going so far as to crack down on science and scientists under the guise of homeland security and intimidate scientists who might reveal the truth. We wouldn’t want American citizens to know about massive fish kills. I suppose that’s better than ordering the assassination of U.S. citizens on U.S. soil, as the Obama administration now claims as a right of the executive branch. Consistent with governmental lies willingly ignored by the media, the feds refuse to investigate the events of 11 September 2001, the so-called date of infamy characterized by the mother of all coincidences.

The federal government’s response to citizen outrage is to quell the outrage and continue rewarding the companies driving it. Consider, for example, the Orwellian U.S. Department of Homeland Security tracking people who protest energy companies, then sending the data to the energy companies. Apparently my tax dollars are being put to good use: spying on fellow citizens to benefit Big Oil.

Bread and circuses aside, we’re on the verge of an international food crisis. In other cultures, food and water are free. In this culture, the financially wealthy are further enriched because we place our food and water under lock and key, and the key is given to the rich. Coincident with locking up the food, we’re also on the verge of an unprecedented dose of austerity plunging the planet into new financial, monetary, economic and social chaos.

Global climate change stands as a fine example of environmental collapse. On that front, climate scientists continue to equivocate, giving Glenn Beck and his ilk every opportunity further confuse a country filled with environmentally illiterate citizens consumers. It doesn’t help that the all-star of the climate-change “movement” is Bill McKibben, who believes real reform lies in solar panels and wishing Barack Obama will take meaningful political action. But Obama know we’re running out of the lifeblood of civilization, so he’ll use any means necessary to secure black gold. Without cheap oil, as I’ve pointed out innumerable times, we cannot experience economic growth. Even Shell Oil admits we’re headed for an oil shock, although they put the timing far enough into the future than nobody will actually care. And please remember the Khazzoom–Brookes postulate: Energy efficiency and conservation cannot be used to solve this particular predicament

Further into the subject of environmental destruction, with a tad of human brutality thrown in, the Toronto Sun reveals what any sentient person already know about Afghanistan: It’s a worsening imperial disaster that threatens to take America into the abyss. Iraq might do the trick first, even without “combat” troops there (the non-combat troops look a lot like combat troops, though). Sandwiched between those two countries, Iran is beating the drums of war.

In short, the U.S. has lost control of its own destiny. That’s what the undulating plateau of oil extraction will do for a country wholly dependent on ready access to cheap oil. Even data provided by BP acknowledge we’ve passed the world oil peak, with no appreciable increase in extraction since 1998. Small wonder the industrial economy has suffered a lost decade, and is headed for Dow 2000 and the biggest bear market in three centuries.

Meanwhile, as if there remained any doubt, neoclassical economists have proven themselves uniformly worthless. Needless to say, American politicians, media outlets, and citizens continue to worship them, which is completely consistent with our inability to process reality.

After all, the recession is over. According to the economists, it ended in June 2009. I’m sure the boys at the unemployment office will be pleased to hear it. Lest you think it’s time to buy stocks, that particular market is stunningly overpriced, which helps explain why insiders are selling at 290 times the rate they are buying. According to Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett’s sidekick at Berkshire Hathaway, all you un- and under-employed losers need to suck it in. Yes, this is the same ultra-wealthy Munger who last week assured us there’d be more economic pain to come (though undoubtedly not for him) and seven months ago told us, with respect to the industrial economy, basically, it’s over.

Nietzsche’s maxim comes to mind: “What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.” For me, here and now, it’s a race for my physical body, with the outcome seriously in doubt. For the living planet, the race is vastly more important, and the stakes couldn’t be higher: Can we pop the balloon called the industrial economy before it kills the remainder of living planet? How much longer will we trade food for fuel, imperial luxury today for starvation tomorrow, economic growth for a an overheated planet, and life for death?

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This essay is permalinked at The Gable Grey.

Here in the homeland, we peaked in 1970 and we extract relatively little oil on land or at sea. BP’s 100-million-barrel reservoir off the coast of Alaska — er, rather, on a BP-constructed island, and therefore not offshore at all — will meet U.S. demand for less than a week. Meanwhile, long-time swing supplier Saudi Arabia is turning off the tap. So much for satiating our infinite desires with limitless oil from the Middle East. Even the International Energy Agency forecasts demand in excess of world supply.

As world oil supply has fallen, the price has exceeded $80 per barrel twice in recent history. Both events were followed shortly thereafter by sovereign-debt crises in several countries. We’ll likely cross the $80 threshold again soon, even as the industrial economy continues to nosedive. Considering the debt-related economic pain in Europe despite throwing money at the issue (i.e., papering over the economic mess), Keynesian economics makes no sense at all. The printing press hasn’t been sufficient in the U.S., either, and it’s the one-size-fits-all solution of the Obama/Bernanke team. This is the typical government approach: If it ain’t broke, fix it until it is.

I’m not suggesting the debt-based approach hasn’t been broken for a long time. But every attempt to “fix” the industrial economy represents a boondoggle atop a boondoggle, with every one destined for failure at a faster rate than the prior one. Helicopter Ben has created half the U.S. money in history within the last four years even as the money supply continues to crash. On one hand, states want more federal stimulus (i.e., keep the presses running) as the head into a second-half economic tsunami with no clue how to deal with it. On the other hand, pressure is building to stop or slow the printing presses, but it’s already too late: We cannot possibly pay off the current U.S. debt, so — from the perspective of Bernanke and Obama — there’s no point in slowing the presses now, despite ludicrous, vacuous threats from various factions of the tea party. Meanwhile, the sheeple are growing frustrated as they wonder where the jobs went and why the industrial economy remains in the abattoir. Nobody in a position of influence has the guts to tell them about energy decline and its economic consequences; even if anybody with the ear of the people were talking about it, the hyper-indulgent sheeple wouldn’t have the guts to listen, much less act on the knowledge.

Hyperinflation might be on the way, despite the crash in cash. At the very least, the near future will bring increased volatility and a host of economic woes.

The water is boiling around us and, like frogs, we’re failing to notice. Unlike frogs, we have the ability to see what’s going on, and how it’s killing us, but we prefer the culture of make believe over reality. So we pretend we’re immersed in an imperial spa. Fever? What fever? I just need another drink. Apparently the cancer of industrial culture removes cognitive capacity before it kills the host.

Continuing to pretend won’t help the dire situation on the housing front. As it turns out, housing and energy definitely are not too big to fail. Despite out best efforts to ignore reality, echoes of the Great Depression abound. As housing prices continue to decline, Americans lose the ability to use their homes as ATMs. As oil prices continue to increase, aftershocks continue to rumble through the system, with more quakes on the way.

And it’s not just housing and oil. The collapse in commercial real estate is fully under way, banks are withholding information from the federal government because they dare not open their books in the light of day, another credit crunch lies right out the corner because nothing about the financial system has changed since the last crisis of confidence, and bond vigilantes are coming to America and therefore to the world’s reserve currency.

Plenty of people here in the empire think there are alternatives to oil, thus failing to distinguish derivatives from alternatives. These derivatives will never pay their way, of course, much less serve as anything resembling a comprehensive substitute to crude oil. And without abundant liquid fuels, we cannot grow the industrial economy.

Other folks believe hydropower will keep the lights on in their neighborhood, without working through the consequences of capitulation of the stock markets. Why would the engineers and technicians keep showing up to run the electrical plant if they aren’t getting paid, either because all the banks fail or their employer’s stock is worthless?

Too little, too late, Bill Gates is urging us to spend billions on an energy revolution. But he’s not spending his billions on it, probably because he knows the fossil-fuel party is over.

As a result of running out of inexpensive oil on the way to passing the world oil peak in 2005, we witnessed an oil shock in 2008 that nearly brought the industrial economy screeching to a halt. Chief Executive Officer of insurance giant Lloyds warns of another price spike headed our way, and I cannot imagine the industrial machine of planetary death surviving oil priced at the expected $200 per barrel.

Source: EIA Annual Energy Outlook 2009

But I’m an optimist, as I’ve pointed out before. I think we can terminate the industrial economy before we move the assault from the Gulf on our southern border to the wholesale destruction of interior lands on our northern border even as it becomes increasingly clear the tar sands will not meet expectations. The events in the Gulf of Mexico illustrate an important point: As my detractors have been saying for years, we really are awash in a sea of oil. Are you happy now?

The disaster in the Gulf provides a perfect opportunity for the dead hand of Ronald Reagan to rise in the form of judicial activism. This pattern is blatantly apparent in the Supreme Court and all lower courts and is consistent with the notion that the right-wing thought police have taken over this country.

In support of my omnipresent optimism, historian Niall Ferguson has added his voice to the large and growing chorus predicting the collapse of U.S. empire by the end of 2012. If we cease to kill the industrial economy, it will continue to kill the living planet and all of us who depend upon it. Either way — with imperial collapse or reduction of Earth to a lifeless pile of rubble — we can stop worrying about power politics. As should be evident to any reader by now, I prefer a robustly living planet over a dying or dead one. As should be equally apparent to any sentient being, I don’t have much company on this particular point.

The economic endgame is rearing its head. The stock markets are headed down — way down — with a monster shock headed their way. One plausible scenario has collapse of the bond market following collapse of the stock markets. But at Dow zero, you’ll be a lot more worried about feeding your children than the rate of return on your bonds.

Meanwhile, out in the dying murdered Gulf of Mexico, BP has claimed success. Calls for a boycott will fade away and clueless Americans will continue to display an inordinate capacity for cognitive dissonance as they continue to demand abundant cheap oil even while throwing the occasional tantrum at Exxon-Mobile BP corporations providing our drug of choice. You might go so far as to call this yet another example of American psychosis.

Will human life be wiped out by events in the Gulf of Mexico? In a word, no. We’re taking quite an impressive toll on the entire planet, but destroying our entire species with only the tools we’ve developed during the last two centuries will take more than a few years, our vaunted technological prowess notwithstanding. The Titanic of ecological overshoot has crashed into the iceberg of limited oil, leading to a painfully slow descent of the industrial economy. The descent is painful because it allows us to keep the current game going, re-arranging the deck chairs as we head straight for a rapid decline in the human population in the wake of a devastated Earth.

There is a better way. We know what it is. It’s time to give up our childish dreams and act like responsible adults. Is that too much to ask?

Don’t you know, yeah, yeah

The hour is late as the game enters the top of the ninth inning. The home team has held the Industrialists scoreless, and leads by a single run. If the Industrialists score, the home team will bring out the bats.

Don’t you know that you are a shooting star

The lead-off batter for the Industrialists reaches base on a bunt down the third-base line. A sacrifice fly to deep right follows a sacrifice bunt, advancing the runner to third with two outs.

And all the world will love you just as long
As long as you are

Nature’s pitcher checks the runner at third before smoking a fastball low and away. The Industrialist’s best hitter swings and misses.

“Strike one,” cries the umpire behind home plate. “You’re out.”

Johnny’s life passed him by like a warm summer day

Incredulous, the batter turns and stares at the umpire. The Industrialist’s manager storms from the dugout to argue the call. But it’s game over for the Industrialists. Nature wins again. All the appeals will be for naught.

If you listen to the wind, you can still hear him play

Stunned by the outcome, the few fans of the visiting Industrialists file out the exits as the fans of Nature collectively exhale a sigh of relief. A few angry Industrialists lash out, injuring Nature’s players for a final time. But everybody knows it’s over. Nature didn’t even need to use its last turn at bat to win this one.

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Perhaps Osama bin Laden was correct when he said, twelve years ago, oil should be priced at $144 per barrel. Perhaps this price will suffice to bring down the empire. Perhaps the first post-peak spike in the price of oil will yet do the trick.

President Obama and his lead lackey Ben Bernanke have managed to paper over the gaping holes in the industrial economy for 18 months, largely because the clueless fans of empire have been watching reality television instead of paying attention to reality. As managers of the industrial age, Obama and crew have effectively argued against economic collapse. Among the many costs to industrial humans, which admittedly pale relative to the costs to non-industrial humans and non-human species: criminal banks and ongoing erosion of the freedoms we once took for granted.

All that arguing could have been spent preparing an unprepared citizenry instead of creating a diversion from the central issue of our time. But that’s water under the proverbial bridge. Instead of a recovery, we’re witnessing an economic death spiral. Although it seemed absurdly unlikely as little as a few months ago, it is becoming evident that the economic impacts of passing the world oil peak are still running full-out. We might not need a second spike to bring the shooting star of industry down to Earth.

Johnny died one night, died in his bed
Bottle of whiskey, sleepin’ tablets by his head

Woah …
Don’t you know that you are a shooting star

It wasn’t supposed to turn out this way. The industrialized world was supposed to have time to prepare alternatives to oil. Or so goes the mainstream story.

The ongoing story runs contrary to conventional wisdom. This version of the traditional narrative includes a twist, completely unexpected by most readers (and especially by economists). Just when it appears Nature is down for the count, even as Nature is gasping for life through the many assaults of industry, even as the living planet is turning belly-up and taking our species with her, a light flickers.

At first distant and dim, the light grows until it obscures the darkness of industry. Plants grow through the asphalt and then cloak the highways and bridges. Cities give way to small towns. Machines give way to nature’s bounty. The global horde of humankind gives way to a compassionate host of humanity.

This version of the story includes a Hollywood ending and a feel-good, bumper-sticker mantra: Nature Bats Last.

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This essay is permalinked at Energy Bulletin and Island B.reath