The jig is up
Oh, the conundrums faced by TPTB.
Consider Ben Bernanke and the other goons at the Federal Reserve Bank: They have to raise interest rates. But they can’t. If they raise them, thereby strengthening the declining American dollar, they destroy any hope for economic growth. And if they don’t raise them, the dollar plunges straight down the toilet (the flush kind, not the composting kind).
An overdue explanation
Last week’s contentious Viewpoints piece in the Arizona Republic stirred some long-overdue interest in peak oil. On the first of six pages of online comments is this one: “We’ll check back with ya in 10 years Guy. You might have some ‘splanin’ to do.”
I suspect there will be no need for explanation in a decade, by which time we’ll be well on our way to the post-industrial Stone Age. So I’ll provide the explanation now, before the power goes out and the Empire collapses under the weight of its own hubris. Actually, I gave a partial explanation in a follow-up piece in the Republic, but more details follow .
BushCo’s peak-oil plan
The lamestream, corporate media are finally beginning to spread the news about peak oil, though they’ve been remiss in pointing out the ramifications. And, as with global climate change, they’re too late to this party to do much good, if any.
Personal preparations for the fall of empire
It doesn’t pay to be a prophet, at least not in one’s own time. I’ve been ridiculed, disparaged, and generally mocked in public, and the email in-box is filled with hateful missives. I’m not complaining, mind you: Every social critic knows how little regard society has for criticism. I don’t much care for it myself, when it’s pointed my way.
Thriving in the post-carbon era
We’ve passed the world oil-supply peak and we’re staring down the barrel of a crisis to which leadership is conspicuously absent. If you think the government — or anybody else for that matter — will bail your sinking rowboat when oil is priced at $400/barrel and annual inflation is running at 1,000 percent, you failed to notice how long it took FEMA to get water to the Superdome in the wake of Katrina. That was a temporary inconvenience, and the feds had plenty of resources, including carbon-based ones.
Imperial collapse: things I’ll miss, things I won’t, and a few things I’ll enjoy
As I prepare for my post-carbon future, I’ve been thinking about the benefits of empire. My entire life — all 47 years, so far — has been marked by economic growth and rapidly increasing national prosperity. My folks were the first in their families to attend college, and I spent my childhood in a small, redneck town filled with hard-working manual laborers — it was a logging town, complete with a lumber mill and filled with white, lower middle class folks. The only real dangers were barroom fights and bad driving. I was too young to drink in public, and very lucky to avoid dying in a car crash.