I delivered two TED-style talks at the 2011 International Conference on Sustainability, Transition and Culture Change in Bellaire, Michigan. The presentations embedded below were delivered to the few dozen people remaining at the conference on its fourth day, Sunday, 13…
There are various ways to ready oneself for the trip down the peak-oil curve, as well as for climate chaos. Most importantly, as I've indicated many times, is psychological readiness. If you are mentally prepared for a future radically different…
My recent foray to Wisconsin and Michigan had me staying five different homes, hence sleeping in five different beds and eating at many different tables. It was quite an exciting adventure, spent with wide-awake people, and I hope to repeat…
The U.S. Department of Defense consumes 360,000 barrels of oil each day. Yet corporate Amerika wants you to conserve, no doubt to save the last drops for the military (to be used to secure more oil). We're being fleeced, folks,…
by John Stassek Infallible A sliver of green and fertile earth, far from other lands. Poly- nesians settled long ago, and came to under- stand. Three days of labor, tilling the soil, could feed them- selves all year. Easter Island…
A Christmas card from one of the in-laws was unintentionally soaked in irony. I'll skip the rant about celebrating Christ and mass, the two components of Christ's mass (i.e., Christmas) in which I don't believe, much less celebrate. And, too,…
I was enjoying lunch with a former student and long-time friend yesterday after walking across campus on a gloriously sunny day in the American Southwest. I mentioned to my friend the resurgence of "fashion" among young women -- women without…