March 31, 2008
The airlines are dying.It was not a good week to be at the mercy of America's floundering air travel program. The price of aviation fuel is killing them. They can't fire any more employees or shed anymore pension obligations. There is no elasticity left in the system. Coming back from Denver yesterday, the chaos at the concourse gates was impressive. Nobody knew when or if a given flight would board, and they certainly didn't post any realistic information on the high-def screens at every gate. When asked for updates, the harried gate agents could offer none. So much for computer wizardry. It is interesting to see how passively the public accepts this. For now, they slump like war refugees in the blow-molded plastic seats, numb with fatigue, anxiety, and disappointment. But I wonder if there will be riots in the concourses sometime later this year.
==
Aloha Airlines (est. 1946) will cease its passenger services after today.
Update: But the Zeppelins are coming!
3 April update: ATA Airlines comes in for a permanent landing.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
World Made by Hand
I've been reading James Kunstler's novel World Made by Hand. I plan to review it here soon, perhaps in tandem with another new purchase of mine, Brink Lindsey's The Age of Abundance: How Prosperity Transformed America's Politics and Culture (New York: Collins, 2007).
For now, I can say it's a very good read, but not quite what I had pictured. I'd intentionally avoided reading any reviews of the book before buying it so that any surprises wouldn't be spoiled.
For now, I can say it's a very good read, but not quite what I had pictured. I'd intentionally avoided reading any reviews of the book before buying it so that any surprises wouldn't be spoiled.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Have Cars Outlived Their Usefulness?
Today's Counterpunch has a commentary by Adam Federman on the automobile
From Autopia to Autogeddon: Cars Reach the End of the Road
By ADAM FEDERMAN
Like the horse and buggy one hundred years ago, the automobile is no longer viewed so favorably as a means of getting around. It is regarded as nearly as foul and smelly as the horses that at the turn of the century deposited some 2.5 million pounds of manure and 60,000 gallons of urine on the streets of New York. In addition to their own waste, horses died and had to be disposed of, posing a significant public health risk. Approximately 15,000 dead horses were removed from the streets of New York each year.
Thus when the car was developed and Henry Ford figured out how to mass- produce them so that more and more Americans could have one, it didn’t seem like such a bad thing. (That is not to say it was embraced immediately or without skepticism. There was, in fact, much resistance to the automobile initially and according to Roy Rosenzweig and Elizabeth Blackmar in The Park and the People: A History of Central Park, “Equestrians, pedestrians, and carriage riders alike complained that the foul-smelling, noisy cars frightened horses, disrupted the decorum of the carriage parade, and ruined their own retreat to nature.”) We would all be masters of our own universe. No more manure, no more urine, and no more dead horses. But like many improvements, technological or otherwise the automobile has outlived its golden age and is now viewed as a menace, a destructive force responsible for our polluted skies, our crowded streets, and our dystopian suburban landscape, ever widening into mega-regions that connect cities and suburbs in a kind of galactic sprawl.
Just as it was once hailed as a symbol of freedom, mobility, and the future the car is now a symbol of excess (the SUV), entrapment (as embodied by the hours long commute or traffic jam), and the past. Today we criticize India and China for their own auto craze as if they’re living through a historical period that has already passed. And in the enlightened West we’re buying green cars and trying to reconcile our lifestyles with a desire to drive guilt free.
We live in a world dominated by the automobile. The Texas Transportation Institute’s 2007 Urban Mobility Report, which notes that the nationwide cost of traffic congestion is $78 billion, opens ominously with the observation that congestion is “getting worse in regions of all sizes.” And not only in the first world. Although the number of cars per capita in India and China remains far smaller than that of America, it is growing. According to Elizabeth Kolbert in the New Yorker, “Assuming that incomes continue to rise, in a few years tens of millions of families [in India and China] will be buying their first cars, and eventually hundreds of millions.” It is projected that by 2020 nearly half of the world’s 1.3 billion cars will clog the streets of poorer countries.
...
Adam Federman can be reached at: mailto:adamfederman@mac.com
I'll have more on this later.
From Autopia to Autogeddon: Cars Reach the End of the Road
By ADAM FEDERMAN
Like the horse and buggy one hundred years ago, the automobile is no longer viewed so favorably as a means of getting around. It is regarded as nearly as foul and smelly as the horses that at the turn of the century deposited some 2.5 million pounds of manure and 60,000 gallons of urine on the streets of New York. In addition to their own waste, horses died and had to be disposed of, posing a significant public health risk. Approximately 15,000 dead horses were removed from the streets of New York each year.
Thus when the car was developed and Henry Ford figured out how to mass- produce them so that more and more Americans could have one, it didn’t seem like such a bad thing. (That is not to say it was embraced immediately or without skepticism. There was, in fact, much resistance to the automobile initially and according to Roy Rosenzweig and Elizabeth Blackmar in The Park and the People: A History of Central Park, “Equestrians, pedestrians, and carriage riders alike complained that the foul-smelling, noisy cars frightened horses, disrupted the decorum of the carriage parade, and ruined their own retreat to nature.”) We would all be masters of our own universe. No more manure, no more urine, and no more dead horses. But like many improvements, technological or otherwise the automobile has outlived its golden age and is now viewed as a menace, a destructive force responsible for our polluted skies, our crowded streets, and our dystopian suburban landscape, ever widening into mega-regions that connect cities and suburbs in a kind of galactic sprawl.
Just as it was once hailed as a symbol of freedom, mobility, and the future the car is now a symbol of excess (the SUV), entrapment (as embodied by the hours long commute or traffic jam), and the past. Today we criticize India and China for their own auto craze as if they’re living through a historical period that has already passed. And in the enlightened West we’re buying green cars and trying to reconcile our lifestyles with a desire to drive guilt free.
We live in a world dominated by the automobile. The Texas Transportation Institute’s 2007 Urban Mobility Report, which notes that the nationwide cost of traffic congestion is $78 billion, opens ominously with the observation that congestion is “getting worse in regions of all sizes.” And not only in the first world. Although the number of cars per capita in India and China remains far smaller than that of America, it is growing. According to Elizabeth Kolbert in the New Yorker, “Assuming that incomes continue to rise, in a few years tens of millions of families [in India and China] will be buying their first cars, and eventually hundreds of millions.” It is projected that by 2020 nearly half of the world’s 1.3 billion cars will clog the streets of poorer countries.
...
Adam Federman can be reached at: mailto:adamfederman@mac.com
I'll have more on this later.
Monday, March 10, 2008
Kunstler Takes on Krugman
March 10, 2008
Going Going....
The feigned cluelessness in Paul Krugman's Sunday New York Times column ("The Face-Slap Theory") about the meltdown in finance is a good index of the cringing mendacity now emanating from those in service to the centers of power. I doubt an editor, or the publisher, Mr. Sulzberger, had to whisper in his ear to soft-pedal the situation. I don't even believe anything like his job depends on it. Krugman's glossing-over the truth is just social cowardice. He doesn't want to be called out dissing fellow members of his club.
Krugman avers to the Federal Reserve's two previous big efforts since August to bail out the insolvent banks, insurers, and hedge funds with cheap loans as "slaps in the faces" of these wobbling corporations -- "yo, wake the fuck up!" -- as if narcolepsy was their only problem. (Try that with a wino on the sidewalk outside the Port Authority bus terminal and see if he immediately signs up for rehab and a high school equivalency program.) Krugman calls the club's latest plan -- for the Fed to just suck up their impaired and worthless collateral in exchange for more cheap loans -- as a "third slap," saying, with all the panache of a midwestern Rotary Club secretary, that "the third time could be the charm." Had the monkeys already flown out of his butt as he wrote that, I wonder.
The line in Krugman's column I love best, though is this one: "Last month another market you’ve never heard of, the $300 billion market for auction-rate securities (don’t ask), suffered the equivalent of a bank run." His presumes that his readers go along with his pretense of innocence. We've never heard of the municipal bond market and it's too complicated to explain so "don't ask." Is he writing for the "newspaper of record" or Highlights For Children? Maybe it would be a good thing if readers of The New York Times asked what the fuck was going on in these markets so they could yank their depreciating dollars out and deploy them elsewhere or convert them into something of value.
Well it was a bad week on the money scene in what is sure to be a worsening year. Paul Krugman and his fellow club members can pretend that the hallucinated finance economy is not really flying to pieces. After all, he / they are trying to avert panic. But, as noted previously in this space, the only thing we have to fear is not fear itself. We have to fear the consequences of actions by a banking leadership that has shown the grossest irresponsibility (and an American public that has been conditioned to expect a steady diet of getting something for nothing). The US faces a pretty stark choice right now: it can let the losers take their losses -- both the big institutions who created and traded in fraudulent securities, and all the "little guys" who borrowed too much money trying to get rich quick, or trying to live like the millionaires they see on TV. We can let them go down, and suffer the consequences of their bad choices (and maybe prosecute some of the culpable bankers and corporate executives), OR, in an effort to let these losers off the hook we can wreck the whole machinery of capital by making our medium-of-exchange worthless.
The people in charge -- both in and out of government -- can't face the losses, so for now they've apparently decided to wreck the currency. The dollar has lost two percent of its value against the Euro just in recent weeks, as cheap loans from the Fed pour into the black hole on Wall Street (never to be seen again). Other soft-pedalers in the media claim that the financial markets have "already priced in" yet another expected .75-point interest rate drop by the Fed this week, but I'm confident that such a move will only accelerate the dollar's vanishing act.
I'll admit, it's hard to believe what's going on in the American finance sector. But incredulity in the face of a rare catastrophe isn't the same as pretending that it's not happening. A whole flock of black swans is flying in front of the sun. Don't expect to work on your tan this month.
Going Going....
The feigned cluelessness in Paul Krugman's Sunday New York Times column ("The Face-Slap Theory") about the meltdown in finance is a good index of the cringing mendacity now emanating from those in service to the centers of power. I doubt an editor, or the publisher, Mr. Sulzberger, had to whisper in his ear to soft-pedal the situation. I don't even believe anything like his job depends on it. Krugman's glossing-over the truth is just social cowardice. He doesn't want to be called out dissing fellow members of his club.
Krugman avers to the Federal Reserve's two previous big efforts since August to bail out the insolvent banks, insurers, and hedge funds with cheap loans as "slaps in the faces" of these wobbling corporations -- "yo, wake the fuck up!" -- as if narcolepsy was their only problem. (Try that with a wino on the sidewalk outside the Port Authority bus terminal and see if he immediately signs up for rehab and a high school equivalency program.) Krugman calls the club's latest plan -- for the Fed to just suck up their impaired and worthless collateral in exchange for more cheap loans -- as a "third slap," saying, with all the panache of a midwestern Rotary Club secretary, that "the third time could be the charm." Had the monkeys already flown out of his butt as he wrote that, I wonder.
The line in Krugman's column I love best, though is this one: "Last month another market you’ve never heard of, the $300 billion market for auction-rate securities (don’t ask), suffered the equivalent of a bank run." His presumes that his readers go along with his pretense of innocence. We've never heard of the municipal bond market and it's too complicated to explain so "don't ask." Is he writing for the "newspaper of record" or Highlights For Children? Maybe it would be a good thing if readers of The New York Times asked what the fuck was going on in these markets so they could yank their depreciating dollars out and deploy them elsewhere or convert them into something of value.
Well it was a bad week on the money scene in what is sure to be a worsening year. Paul Krugman and his fellow club members can pretend that the hallucinated finance economy is not really flying to pieces. After all, he / they are trying to avert panic. But, as noted previously in this space, the only thing we have to fear is not fear itself. We have to fear the consequences of actions by a banking leadership that has shown the grossest irresponsibility (and an American public that has been conditioned to expect a steady diet of getting something for nothing). The US faces a pretty stark choice right now: it can let the losers take their losses -- both the big institutions who created and traded in fraudulent securities, and all the "little guys" who borrowed too much money trying to get rich quick, or trying to live like the millionaires they see on TV. We can let them go down, and suffer the consequences of their bad choices (and maybe prosecute some of the culpable bankers and corporate executives), OR, in an effort to let these losers off the hook we can wreck the whole machinery of capital by making our medium-of-exchange worthless.
The people in charge -- both in and out of government -- can't face the losses, so for now they've apparently decided to wreck the currency. The dollar has lost two percent of its value against the Euro just in recent weeks, as cheap loans from the Fed pour into the black hole on Wall Street (never to be seen again). Other soft-pedalers in the media claim that the financial markets have "already priced in" yet another expected .75-point interest rate drop by the Fed this week, but I'm confident that such a move will only accelerate the dollar's vanishing act.
I'll admit, it's hard to believe what's going on in the American finance sector. But incredulity in the face of a rare catastrophe isn't the same as pretending that it's not happening. A whole flock of black swans is flying in front of the sun. Don't expect to work on your tan this month.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
William F. Buckley est Mort
Here.
28 February update: Selected commentary on Bill Buckley's legacy:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/westley/westley26.html
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/blogs/wolcott/2008/02/given-the-melli.html
http://radioequalizer.blogspot.com/2008/02/talk-radio-mourns-passing-of-william-f.html
http://blog.beliefnet.com/crunchycon/2008/02/bill-buckley-was-a-good-man.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/019662.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/019644.html
The CIA agent, founder of the modern conservative movement, enforcer of warfare-state discipline on the right, brilliant writer and editor, transoceanic sailor, harpsichordist, TV star, charming aristocrat, founder of National Review and Young Americans for Freedom, enabler of neoconservatism, expeller of heretics from Birchers to Rothbardians, and thoroughly bad ideological influence in general, is dead at 82.
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat?pid=291671
http://leagueofthesouth.net/rebellion/index.php/site/buckley_bush_not_a_true_conservative/
29 February update: James Wolcott links to Dennis Perrin, who doesn't hesitate to speak ill of the dead.
Rich Lowry's retrospective on Buckley, originally from a 2004 issue of National Review.
Lew Rockwell and company have many posts on Buckley, diverging greatly from the standard line that Buckley was the saviour of modern conservatism. Below, a choice example:
Buckley's Tainted Coup
Posted by Lew Rockwell at February 29, 2008 10:44 AM
Writes Kevin Griffin: "William F. Buckley, Jr., was a favorite among 'liberals' (albeit, not classical liberals) because he purged the conservative movement of their nemeses: the Original Rightists. Buckley was the prototypical Big-Government conservative, i.e., the Cold War Democrats' Republican. His 'New Right' movement has since been augmented by the statist force of the neoconservatives. Thus, behold the end result of Buckley's tainted coup: John Sidney McCain III."
And a McCainite praises Buckley:
When he founded National Review more than 50 years ago (and to me, it does seem like only yesterday), conservatism looked like a dead philosophy. Prior to World War II, the dominant Republican philosophy on foreign policy was isolationism. In fiscal affairs, Republicans -- well, most of them -- were in favor of a balanced budget, something that was unlikely during World War II and in the subsequent Cold War.
Buckley's conservatism contained a strong element of traditional Roman Catholicism, although with a deep suspicion of Rooseveltian governmental intervention in people's affairs. Most of all, Buckley was opposed to collectivism, the dominant viewpoint underlying Communism, which appeared at the time to be the main competitor for mankind's hearts and minds.
1 March update: Cockburn weighs in.
17 March update: Grant Jones's Dougout posts Edward Cline's good-riddance.
28 February update: Selected commentary on Bill Buckley's legacy:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/westley/westley26.html
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/blogs/wolcott/2008/02/given-the-melli.html
http://radioequalizer.blogspot.com/2008/02/talk-radio-mourns-passing-of-william-f.html
http://blog.beliefnet.com/crunchycon/2008/02/bill-buckley-was-a-good-man.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/019662.html
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/019644.html
The CIA agent, founder of the modern conservative movement, enforcer of warfare-state discipline on the right, brilliant writer and editor, transoceanic sailor, harpsichordist, TV star, charming aristocrat, founder of National Review and Young Americans for Freedom, enabler of neoconservatism, expeller of heretics from Birchers to Rothbardians, and thoroughly bad ideological influence in general, is dead at 82.
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat?pid=291671
http://leagueofthesouth.net/rebellion/index.php/site/buckley_bush_not_a_true_conservative/
29 February update: James Wolcott links to Dennis Perrin, who doesn't hesitate to speak ill of the dead.
Rich Lowry's retrospective on Buckley, originally from a 2004 issue of National Review.
Lew Rockwell and company have many posts on Buckley, diverging greatly from the standard line that Buckley was the saviour of modern conservatism. Below, a choice example:
Buckley's Tainted Coup
Posted by Lew Rockwell at February 29, 2008 10:44 AM
Writes Kevin Griffin: "William F. Buckley, Jr., was a favorite among 'liberals' (albeit, not classical liberals) because he purged the conservative movement of their nemeses: the Original Rightists. Buckley was the prototypical Big-Government conservative, i.e., the Cold War Democrats' Republican. His 'New Right' movement has since been augmented by the statist force of the neoconservatives. Thus, behold the end result of Buckley's tainted coup: John Sidney McCain III."
And a McCainite praises Buckley:
When he founded National Review more than 50 years ago (and to me, it does seem like only yesterday), conservatism looked like a dead philosophy. Prior to World War II, the dominant Republican philosophy on foreign policy was isolationism. In fiscal affairs, Republicans -- well, most of them -- were in favor of a balanced budget, something that was unlikely during World War II and in the subsequent Cold War.
Buckley's conservatism contained a strong element of traditional Roman Catholicism, although with a deep suspicion of Rooseveltian governmental intervention in people's affairs. Most of all, Buckley was opposed to collectivism, the dominant viewpoint underlying Communism, which appeared at the time to be the main competitor for mankind's hearts and minds.
1 March update: Cockburn weighs in.
17 March update: Grant Jones's Dougout posts Edward Cline's good-riddance.
Monday, February 25, 2008
The Nutty CEO
Kunstler's latest Grunt takes on overly optimistic claims that airplanes can run on palm-oil derived biofuel. I've heard of the coconut wireless, and coconut radio, but coconut airplanes?
February 25, 2008
Blowing More Green Smoke Up Our Own Ass
Virgin Airlines CEO Richard Branson announced the beginning of "green" air travel with great fanfare over the weekend by flying a big Airbus jet plane on a combination of coconut and palm oil derived fuel. Now the public is supposed to rest assured that the airline industry has been "saved" by "new technology." It's possible that Branson actually believes this bullshit -- since, contrary to conventional belief, you don't have to be especially intelligent to succeed in business. But the public is sure to be disappointed as reality asserts itself and they discover that the stunt doesn't scale world-wide. That is, sure, you can demonstrate that "a" jet plane can fly on bio-fuel. But can you run the entire global airline fleet on coconut and palm oil, or even a fraction of it? Of course not -- unless you cut down the entire Amazon rain forest and replant it with oil tree crops. Not to mention that the CO2 emissions spraying out of bio-fuel jets at 38,000 feet is not materially different from regular jet fuel exhaust. This is just another tragic attempt to persuade ourselves that we don't have to change our behavior.
===
This Guardian article is also skeptical:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/feb/25/biofuels.theairlineindustry?gusrc=rss&feed=media
February 25, 2008
Blowing More Green Smoke Up Our Own Ass
Virgin Airlines CEO Richard Branson announced the beginning of "green" air travel with great fanfare over the weekend by flying a big Airbus jet plane on a combination of coconut and palm oil derived fuel. Now the public is supposed to rest assured that the airline industry has been "saved" by "new technology." It's possible that Branson actually believes this bullshit -- since, contrary to conventional belief, you don't have to be especially intelligent to succeed in business. But the public is sure to be disappointed as reality asserts itself and they discover that the stunt doesn't scale world-wide. That is, sure, you can demonstrate that "a" jet plane can fly on bio-fuel. But can you run the entire global airline fleet on coconut and palm oil, or even a fraction of it? Of course not -- unless you cut down the entire Amazon rain forest and replant it with oil tree crops. Not to mention that the CO2 emissions spraying out of bio-fuel jets at 38,000 feet is not materially different from regular jet fuel exhaust. This is just another tragic attempt to persuade ourselves that we don't have to change our behavior.
===
This Guardian article is also skeptical:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/feb/25/biofuels.theairlineindustry?gusrc=rss&feed=media
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Peak Oil Apocalypse
From a British nationalist perspective. The scenario laid out is in ways much bleaker than Kunstler's predictions. But there are opportunities to survive and even prosper in a post-oil age.
Monday, February 11, 2008
The Long Emergency in South Africa
February 4, 2008:
I got a letter from a lady in South Africa:
"I am watching South Africa with an eye on what, when and how the global trends contributing to your Long Emergency will start taking effect. But the government here, together with some outside influences of the stock market, have plunged South Africa into the Premature Long Emergency. It has only been a couple of weeks, but the country is in dire straits. . . ."
...
http://www.kunstler.com/Grunt_SouthAfrica.html
SOUTH AFRICA IN THE PREMATURE LONG EMERGENCY
February 4, 2008
It began with a few potholes in the roads, the odd interruption to the water supply in the suburbs, a couple of days with strike action preventing the delivery of municipal services – no garbage collection, protest action disrupting the mining industry and picketing & toy toying at shopping malls…It continued over the next couple of years, largely with disregard for the disruptions, a little irritation to daily commercial and home life by the lack of service provision in food, gas, water and power. In recent months, at the receivables end of the supply chain, there was a little aggravation at the delays, the lack of service, the shortage of a few consumer luxuries in the retail shops…, ‘but hey, what the hell, this is a great country, we cannot fault the lifestyle, the weather…’. For a couple of months, perhaps a year back or so, there seemed little or no reason to change our way of life, our lifestyles…a little further down the road and the disruptions become more frequent, we learn to cope, learn to accept the rising cost of living, gas supply shortages in the Winter of 2007, the intermittent water disruptions, the odd power outage and the potholes. Potholes may well be the singular measure of the calamity we are in or about to face. We accept the transitions in South Africa, but it is all very well passing over these problems in the name of development, infrastructure development, greater housing plans and urbanization as a promised deliverable by the ANC government, together with the balancing of the wealth quotient. Access to finance and the shift of the material wealth are an indication of the success of the plans for economic growth in the New South Africa. So, there have been interesting times, a few PDI’s (previously disadvantaged individuals), through black economic empowerment, becoming significantly enriched through commerce and business and, dare I say, politics. But the cracks that are now evident are tell tails signs, not only of the effectivity of the New South Africa and an explanation of the path traveled to this point in time, but more of what is promised for the future. And the future may be more a by product of global issues than issues unique and unfortunate to South Africa.
So what do we have at hand, what are the reactions and what are the consequences??? South Africa has been flung full tilt into a Premature Long Emergency. In the up market suburbs, not least to say generally all over the urban landscape, there is not a 1km (1/2 mile) strip of tarred road that is not full of potholes (hugh gapping holes, across which vehicles cannot drive), the roadside curbs are disintegrating, the road maintenance programmes over the last 10 years have failed to maintain the roads in a serviceable and passable state. The nation is gripped in a crisis of rolling power outages caused by the incompetence of highly paid government ministers and their charges. The news of the weekend is that the nation is in dire straits with the supply of clean, drinkable water to households and business alike. We are faced with unusual weather patterns, floods at the moment, high rain fall for the Summer, the expectation of an early, long cold Winter.
THE POWER EMERGENCY
The rolling power outages are resulting in about a 25% national power outage per month. The ramifications of this can be related directly to an income loss of the same amount, retail supplies are being interrupted and from a security point of view it is dangerous to shop in malls. The Electricity Supply Commission – ESKOM are indicating a forced reduction on power usage by 10%, further, the mines have been told not to work on Fridays. There are revenue and cost implications here that extend beyond the obvious monthly figures. What of the power saving measures that may in turn lead to greater problems, the mines are unable to pump excess ground water from the shafts, the maintenance programmes are due to suffer. And what of the safety indications, miners are protesting the possibility of being caught under ground or in lift shafts as the random power cuts hit the service grids. It is not only that ESKOM have not maintained or expanded their operations in the last 15 years, but the next big whammy is that there is no coal to keep the power stations running…at most times, there is a couple of months supply of coal onsite for electricity operations, today there is hardly a few days supply. Incidentally the reason given for this catastrophe is that the trucks delivering the coal have been unable to get to the power stations as the road infrastructure has deteriorated- potholes again. In the Afrikaans language: ‘slaggate’ – a direct translation to ‘slaughter holes’. As this is written, we wait for the next couple of days to see the effect of the ‘coal emergency’.
THE WATER EMERGENCY
At some point the effect of the power emergency on water and sanitation supply should be considered and this would be part of the roll out of unexpected events resultant of the collapse of the power supply, but the water board have usurped the power supply with homegrown problems of their own…
So here we have it, 43% of the dams have safety problems and are in danger of collapsing. Further to this, the ground water in Gauteng, the province of Johannesburg, has radioactive contamination from mining operations. Now, as a matter of interest, Johannesburg is one of the few cities in the world that is built on a hill and water has to be pumped up into the city!!!
THE FROG IN THE POT
And what of the peoples reaction? Complacency does not even come close, the nation is either brain dead or ignorant, or just plain ‘frog in a pot’ of water with the temperature rising. The first reaction to the power emergency took the form of a rush for candles, refilling of gas bottles and the purchasing of generators (if you could get them). Then the complacency set it, business learnt to sit through power outages, retail shops were forced to close their doors for a few hours a day. There was and is a shortage of food supplies, food went bad in the fridges and had to been thrown away. It was kind of charming in a strange kind of way, to eat dinner by candle light and forgo the ‘soapies’ on TV. Traffic lights were out over a large number of suburbs and delays in getting to business meetings became the norm. The schools are unable to teach a full day’s lesson. The internet service providers and the mobile phone companies’ frequently have service delays or are just plain ‘off line’. The battery runs out on your laptop and that’s the days productive work is over until the power is back on…Patients in ICU or undergoing operations, as the power grid went down, were at risk of and did, die.
As we head into February, it will be interesting to see the economic figures; theoretically the revenue generation for the period should be down by at least 25% or something similar to the power outage percentages. Notwithstanding that the stock market took a bend downwards and followed the USA crash and the antics of the Societé General rogue trader. (Well done on the foresight, James). The South African property market is following suit, as well. And just as we were wondering how the effect, implications and opinions of an emergency would pan out into daily life, what the tell tail signs would be… it happened, all of this is the short space of about 2-3 weeks, the realization dawns that it has begun, the country is experiencing and living through the beginning of the Long Emergency, rather unexpectedly and certainly too prematurely. I proffer that the events in South Africa, tragic as they are, as they play themselves out, will give a good indication of the events that the USA and other countries will realize in the years to come as The Long Emergency’ comes to pass.[Ha! Just as I finish this, guess what… the power is out, the battery life in my laptop is about 5 mins, so at 11am, I cannot be productive for the rest of the day… the networks are down, so this cannot be mailed for the moment.]
Home
==
17 February update: More on South Africa's electricity shortage: http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2008/01/journal-south-a.html
I got a letter from a lady in South Africa:
"I am watching South Africa with an eye on what, when and how the global trends contributing to your Long Emergency will start taking effect. But the government here, together with some outside influences of the stock market, have plunged South Africa into the Premature Long Emergency. It has only been a couple of weeks, but the country is in dire straits. . . ."
...
http://www.kunstler.com/Grunt_SouthAfrica.html
SOUTH AFRICA IN THE PREMATURE LONG EMERGENCY
February 4, 2008
It began with a few potholes in the roads, the odd interruption to the water supply in the suburbs, a couple of days with strike action preventing the delivery of municipal services – no garbage collection, protest action disrupting the mining industry and picketing & toy toying at shopping malls…It continued over the next couple of years, largely with disregard for the disruptions, a little irritation to daily commercial and home life by the lack of service provision in food, gas, water and power. In recent months, at the receivables end of the supply chain, there was a little aggravation at the delays, the lack of service, the shortage of a few consumer luxuries in the retail shops…, ‘but hey, what the hell, this is a great country, we cannot fault the lifestyle, the weather…’. For a couple of months, perhaps a year back or so, there seemed little or no reason to change our way of life, our lifestyles…a little further down the road and the disruptions become more frequent, we learn to cope, learn to accept the rising cost of living, gas supply shortages in the Winter of 2007, the intermittent water disruptions, the odd power outage and the potholes. Potholes may well be the singular measure of the calamity we are in or about to face. We accept the transitions in South Africa, but it is all very well passing over these problems in the name of development, infrastructure development, greater housing plans and urbanization as a promised deliverable by the ANC government, together with the balancing of the wealth quotient. Access to finance and the shift of the material wealth are an indication of the success of the plans for economic growth in the New South Africa. So, there have been interesting times, a few PDI’s (previously disadvantaged individuals), through black economic empowerment, becoming significantly enriched through commerce and business and, dare I say, politics. But the cracks that are now evident are tell tails signs, not only of the effectivity of the New South Africa and an explanation of the path traveled to this point in time, but more of what is promised for the future. And the future may be more a by product of global issues than issues unique and unfortunate to South Africa.
So what do we have at hand, what are the reactions and what are the consequences??? South Africa has been flung full tilt into a Premature Long Emergency. In the up market suburbs, not least to say generally all over the urban landscape, there is not a 1km (1/2 mile) strip of tarred road that is not full of potholes (hugh gapping holes, across which vehicles cannot drive), the roadside curbs are disintegrating, the road maintenance programmes over the last 10 years have failed to maintain the roads in a serviceable and passable state. The nation is gripped in a crisis of rolling power outages caused by the incompetence of highly paid government ministers and their charges. The news of the weekend is that the nation is in dire straits with the supply of clean, drinkable water to households and business alike. We are faced with unusual weather patterns, floods at the moment, high rain fall for the Summer, the expectation of an early, long cold Winter.
THE POWER EMERGENCY
The rolling power outages are resulting in about a 25% national power outage per month. The ramifications of this can be related directly to an income loss of the same amount, retail supplies are being interrupted and from a security point of view it is dangerous to shop in malls. The Electricity Supply Commission – ESKOM are indicating a forced reduction on power usage by 10%, further, the mines have been told not to work on Fridays. There are revenue and cost implications here that extend beyond the obvious monthly figures. What of the power saving measures that may in turn lead to greater problems, the mines are unable to pump excess ground water from the shafts, the maintenance programmes are due to suffer. And what of the safety indications, miners are protesting the possibility of being caught under ground or in lift shafts as the random power cuts hit the service grids. It is not only that ESKOM have not maintained or expanded their operations in the last 15 years, but the next big whammy is that there is no coal to keep the power stations running…at most times, there is a couple of months supply of coal onsite for electricity operations, today there is hardly a few days supply. Incidentally the reason given for this catastrophe is that the trucks delivering the coal have been unable to get to the power stations as the road infrastructure has deteriorated- potholes again. In the Afrikaans language: ‘slaggate’ – a direct translation to ‘slaughter holes’. As this is written, we wait for the next couple of days to see the effect of the ‘coal emergency’.
THE WATER EMERGENCY
At some point the effect of the power emergency on water and sanitation supply should be considered and this would be part of the roll out of unexpected events resultant of the collapse of the power supply, but the water board have usurped the power supply with homegrown problems of their own…
So here we have it, 43% of the dams have safety problems and are in danger of collapsing. Further to this, the ground water in Gauteng, the province of Johannesburg, has radioactive contamination from mining operations. Now, as a matter of interest, Johannesburg is one of the few cities in the world that is built on a hill and water has to be pumped up into the city!!!
THE FROG IN THE POT
And what of the peoples reaction? Complacency does not even come close, the nation is either brain dead or ignorant, or just plain ‘frog in a pot’ of water with the temperature rising. The first reaction to the power emergency took the form of a rush for candles, refilling of gas bottles and the purchasing of generators (if you could get them). Then the complacency set it, business learnt to sit through power outages, retail shops were forced to close their doors for a few hours a day. There was and is a shortage of food supplies, food went bad in the fridges and had to been thrown away. It was kind of charming in a strange kind of way, to eat dinner by candle light and forgo the ‘soapies’ on TV. Traffic lights were out over a large number of suburbs and delays in getting to business meetings became the norm. The schools are unable to teach a full day’s lesson. The internet service providers and the mobile phone companies’ frequently have service delays or are just plain ‘off line’. The battery runs out on your laptop and that’s the days productive work is over until the power is back on…Patients in ICU or undergoing operations, as the power grid went down, were at risk of and did, die.
As we head into February, it will be interesting to see the economic figures; theoretically the revenue generation for the period should be down by at least 25% or something similar to the power outage percentages. Notwithstanding that the stock market took a bend downwards and followed the USA crash and the antics of the Societé General rogue trader. (Well done on the foresight, James). The South African property market is following suit, as well. And just as we were wondering how the effect, implications and opinions of an emergency would pan out into daily life, what the tell tail signs would be… it happened, all of this is the short space of about 2-3 weeks, the realization dawns that it has begun, the country is experiencing and living through the beginning of the Long Emergency, rather unexpectedly and certainly too prematurely. I proffer that the events in South Africa, tragic as they are, as they play themselves out, will give a good indication of the events that the USA and other countries will realize in the years to come as The Long Emergency’ comes to pass.[Ha! Just as I finish this, guess what… the power is out, the battery life in my laptop is about 5 mins, so at 11am, I cannot be productive for the rest of the day… the networks are down, so this cannot be mailed for the moment.]
Home
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17 February update: More on South Africa's electricity shortage: http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2008/01/journal-south-a.html
Saturday, February 09, 2008
Ron Paul Scales Back Campaign
http://www.reason.com/blog/show/124885.html
Ron's message in full:
February 08, 2008
Message from Ron
Whoa! What a year this has been. And what achievements we have had. If I may quote Trotsky of all people, this Revolution is permanent. It will not end at the Republican convention. It will not end in November. It will not end until we have won the great battle on which we have embarked. Not because of me, but because of you. Millions of Americans -- and friends in many other countries -- have dedicated themselves to the principles of liberty: to free enterprise, limited government, sound money, no income tax, and peace. We will not falter so long as there is one restriction on our persons, our property, our civil liberties. How much I owe you. I can never possibly repay your generous donations, hard work, whole-hearted dedication and love of freedom. How blessed I am to be associated with you. Carol, of course, sends her love as well.
Let me tell you my thoughts. With Romney gone, the chances of a brokered convention are nearly zero. But that does not affect my determination to fight on, in every caucus and primary remaining, and at the convention for our ideas, with just as many delegates as I can get. But with so many primaries and caucuses now over, we do not now need so big a national campaign staff, and so I am making it leaner and tighter. Of course, I am committed to fighting for our ideas within the Republican party, so there will be no third party run. I do not denigrate third parties -- just the opposite, and I have long worked to remove the ballot-access restrictions on them. But I am a Republican, and I will remain a Republican.
I also have another priority. I have constituents in my home district that I must serve. I cannot and will not let them down. And I have another battle I must face here as well. If I were to lose the primary for my congressional seat, all our opponents would react with glee, and pretend it was a rejection of our ideas. I cannot and will not let that happen.
In the presidential race and the congressional race, I need your support, as always. And I have plans to continue fighting for our ideas in politics and education that I will share with you when I can, for I will need you at my side. In the meantime, onward and upward! The neocons, the warmongers, the socialists, the advocates of inflation will be hearing much from you and me.
Sincerely,
Ron
Ron's message in full:
February 08, 2008
Message from Ron
Whoa! What a year this has been. And what achievements we have had. If I may quote Trotsky of all people, this Revolution is permanent. It will not end at the Republican convention. It will not end in November. It will not end until we have won the great battle on which we have embarked. Not because of me, but because of you. Millions of Americans -- and friends in many other countries -- have dedicated themselves to the principles of liberty: to free enterprise, limited government, sound money, no income tax, and peace. We will not falter so long as there is one restriction on our persons, our property, our civil liberties. How much I owe you. I can never possibly repay your generous donations, hard work, whole-hearted dedication and love of freedom. How blessed I am to be associated with you. Carol, of course, sends her love as well.
Let me tell you my thoughts. With Romney gone, the chances of a brokered convention are nearly zero. But that does not affect my determination to fight on, in every caucus and primary remaining, and at the convention for our ideas, with just as many delegates as I can get. But with so many primaries and caucuses now over, we do not now need so big a national campaign staff, and so I am making it leaner and tighter. Of course, I am committed to fighting for our ideas within the Republican party, so there will be no third party run. I do not denigrate third parties -- just the opposite, and I have long worked to remove the ballot-access restrictions on them. But I am a Republican, and I will remain a Republican.
I also have another priority. I have constituents in my home district that I must serve. I cannot and will not let them down. And I have another battle I must face here as well. If I were to lose the primary for my congressional seat, all our opponents would react with glee, and pretend it was a rejection of our ideas. I cannot and will not let that happen.
In the presidential race and the congressional race, I need your support, as always. And I have plans to continue fighting for our ideas in politics and education that I will share with you when I can, for I will need you at my side. In the meantime, onward and upward! The neocons, the warmongers, the socialists, the advocates of inflation will be hearing much from you and me.
Sincerely,
Ron
Lookalikes: Barack Obama and Aubrey Graham
For a long time I've noticed how much Barack Obama looks like Aubrey Graham ("Jimmy Brooks" in Degrassi: The Next Generation). And now I've finally gotten around to posting photos of the two so you can decide for yourself how similar they look.13 February update: The New York Times erred in comparing Barack with Lenny Kravitz, thus inviting this sarcastic post from--Carrot Top?
Thursday, February 07, 2008
R.I.P. James Capozzola
While looking through this blog's list of political links, I clicked on The Rittenhouse Review. The last post was in July 2007. Googling James Capozzola's name in hopes of finding what he's been up to lately, I found out that he had died. I offer my very belated condolences to any friends or family of his who may read this. And I recommend that you check out The Rittenhouse Review, whose link I will leave in the Politics section of the list of links.
Monday, February 04, 2008
Thursday, January 31, 2008
This Will Not Come to Pass
3 February update: This is a link to Green Greenwald's article in The American Conservative.
Giuliani is also a hothead, as this "oral history of Giuliani's temper," published in the February issue of GQ, makes abundantly clear.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Print Not Yet Dead
http://clarkstooksbury.blogspot.com/2008/01/book-notes.html
I'll post soon about a lecture I attended Friday about the challenge of preserving digital information.
I'll post soon about a lecture I attended Friday about the challenge of preserving digital information.
Friday, January 18, 2008
Defining the Early, Mid, and Late Segments of a Decade
Early: Years ending in 0 through 4
Mid: Years ending in 5 and 6
Late: Years ending in 7 through 9
---------
How would I define the early, mid and late segments of a century or even a millennium?
Century:
Early: years ending in 0 and/or 1 through 49 (so, early Nineteenth Century: 1800/1801 through 1849)
Mid: 50 through 69
Late: 70 through 99
Millennium:
Early: years 0 and/or 1 through 499
Mid: years 500 through 699
Late: 700 through 999
-------
In any case, we are ensconced in the late aughts. More later.
Mid: Years ending in 5 and 6
Late: Years ending in 7 through 9
---------
How would I define the early, mid and late segments of a century or even a millennium?
Century:
Early: years ending in 0 and/or 1 through 49 (so, early Nineteenth Century: 1800/1801 through 1849)
Mid: 50 through 69
Late: 70 through 99
Millennium:
Early: years 0 and/or 1 through 499
Mid: years 500 through 699
Late: 700 through 999
-------
In any case, we are ensconced in the late aughts. More later.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Preparing to Downscale
I've added a few links to and bolded key points of this excerpt from Kunstler's latest column.
January 14, 2008
Disarray
The dark tunnel that the US economy has entered began to look more and more like a black hole last week, sucking in lives, fortunes, and prospects behind a Potemkin facade of orderly retreat put up by anyone in authority with a story to tell or an interest to protect -- Fed chairman Bernanke, CNBC, The New York Times, the Bank of America.... Events are now moving ahead of anything that personalities can do to control them.
The "housing bubble" implosion is broadly misunderstood. It's not just the collapse of a market for a particular kind of commodity, it's the end of the suburban pattern itself, the way of life it represents, and the entire economy connected with it. It's the crack up of the system that America has invested most of its wealth in since 1950. It's perhaps most tragic that the mis-investments only accelerated as the system reached its end, but it seems to be nature's way that waves crest just before they break.
This wave is breaking into a sea-wall of disbelief. Nobody gets it. The psychological investment in what we think of as American reality is too great. The mainstream media doesn't get it, and they can't report it coherently. None of the candidates for president has begun to articulate an understanding of what we face: the suburban living arrangement is an experiment that has entered failure mode. ...
A reader sent me a passle of recent clippings last week from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. It contained one story after another about the perceived need to build more highways in order to maintain "economic growth" (and incidentally about the "foolishness" of public transit). I understood that to mean the need to keep the suburban development system going, since that has been the real main source of the Sunbelt's prosperity the past 60-odd years. They cannot imagine an economy that is based on anything besides new subdivisions, freeway extensions, new car sales, and Nascar spectacles. The Sunbelt, therefore, will be ground-zero for all the disappointment emanating from this cultural disaster, and probably also ground-zero for the political mischief that will ensue from lost fortunes and crushed hopes. From time-to-time, I feel it's necessary to remind readers what we can actually do in the face of this long emergency. Voters and candidates in the primary season have been hollering about "change" but I'm afraid the dirty secret of this campaign is that the American public doesn't want to change its behavior at all. What it really wants is someone to promise them they can keep on doing what they're used to doing: buying more stuff they can't afford, eating more shitty food that will kill them, and driving more miles than circumstances will allow. Here's what we better start doing. Stop all highway-building altogether. Instead, direct public money into repairing railroad rights-of-way. Put together public-private partnerships for running passenger rail between American cities and towns in between. If Amtrak is unacceptable, get rid of it and set up a new management system. At the same time, begin planning comprehensive regional light-rail and streetcar operations. End subsidies to agribusiness and instead direct dollar support to small-scale farmers, using the existing regional networks of organic farming associations to target the aid. (This includes ending subsidies for the ethanol program.) Begin planning and construction of waterfront and harbor facilities for commerce: piers, warehouses, ship-and-boatyards, and accommodations for sailors. This is especially important along the Ohio-Mississippi system and the Great Lakes. In cities and towns, change regulations that mandate the accommodation of cars. Direct all new development to the finest grain, scaled to walkability. This essentially means making the individual building lot the basic increment of redevelopment, not multi-acre "projects." Get rid of any parking requirements for property development. Institute "locational taxation" based on proximity to the center of town and not on the size, character, or putative value of the building itself. Put in effect a ban on buildings in excess of seven stories. Begin planning for district or neighborhood heating installations and solar, wind, and hydro-electric generation wherever possible on a small-scale network basis.
We'd better begin a public debate about whether it is feasible or desirable to construct any new nuclear power plants. If there are good reasons to go forward with nuclear, and a consensus about the risks and benefits, we need to establish it quickly. There may be no other way to keep the lights on in America after 2020. We need to prepare for the end of the global economic relations that have characterized the final blow-off of the cheap energy era. The world is about to become wider again as nations get desperate over energy resources. This desperation is certain to generate conflict. We'll have to make things in this country again, or we won't have the most rudimentary household products. We'd better prepare psychologically to downscale all institutions, including government, schools and colleges, corporations, and hospitals. All the centralizing tendencies and gigantification of the past half-century will have to be reversed. Government will be starved for revenue and impotent at the higher scale. The centralized high schools all over the nation will prove to be our most frustrating mis-investment. We will probably have to replace them with some form of home-schooling that is allowed to aggregate into neighborhood units. A lot of colleges, public and private, will fail as higher ed ceases to be a "consumer" activity. Corporations scaled to operate globally are not going to make it. This includes probably all national chain "big box" operations. It will have to be replaced by small local and regional business. We'll have to reopen many of the small town hospitals that were shuttered in recent years, and open many new local clinic-style health-care operations as part of the greater reform of American medicine.
Take a time-out from legal immigration and get serious about enforcing the laws about illegal immigration. Stop lying to ourselves and stop using semantic ruses like calling illegal immigrants "undocumented." Prepare psychologically for the destruction of a lot of fictitious "wealth" -- and allow instruments and institutions based on fictitious wealth to fail, instead of attempting to keep them propped up on credit life-support. Like any other thing in our national life, finance has to return to a scale that is consistent with our circumstances -- i.e., what reality will allow. That process is underway, anyway, whether the public is prepared for it or not. We will soon hear the sound of banks crashing all over the place. Get out of their way, if you can. Prepare psychologically for a sociopolitical climate of anger, grievance, and resentment. A lot of individual citizens will find themselves short of resources in the years ahead. They will be very ticked off and seek to scapegoat and punish others. ...
January 14, 2008
Disarray
The dark tunnel that the US economy has entered began to look more and more like a black hole last week, sucking in lives, fortunes, and prospects behind a Potemkin facade of orderly retreat put up by anyone in authority with a story to tell or an interest to protect -- Fed chairman Bernanke, CNBC, The New York Times, the Bank of America.... Events are now moving ahead of anything that personalities can do to control them.
The "housing bubble" implosion is broadly misunderstood. It's not just the collapse of a market for a particular kind of commodity, it's the end of the suburban pattern itself, the way of life it represents, and the entire economy connected with it. It's the crack up of the system that America has invested most of its wealth in since 1950. It's perhaps most tragic that the mis-investments only accelerated as the system reached its end, but it seems to be nature's way that waves crest just before they break.
This wave is breaking into a sea-wall of disbelief. Nobody gets it. The psychological investment in what we think of as American reality is too great. The mainstream media doesn't get it, and they can't report it coherently. None of the candidates for president has begun to articulate an understanding of what we face: the suburban living arrangement is an experiment that has entered failure mode. ...
A reader sent me a passle of recent clippings last week from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. It contained one story after another about the perceived need to build more highways in order to maintain "economic growth" (and incidentally about the "foolishness" of public transit). I understood that to mean the need to keep the suburban development system going, since that has been the real main source of the Sunbelt's prosperity the past 60-odd years. They cannot imagine an economy that is based on anything besides new subdivisions, freeway extensions, new car sales, and Nascar spectacles. The Sunbelt, therefore, will be ground-zero for all the disappointment emanating from this cultural disaster, and probably also ground-zero for the political mischief that will ensue from lost fortunes and crushed hopes. From time-to-time, I feel it's necessary to remind readers what we can actually do in the face of this long emergency. Voters and candidates in the primary season have been hollering about "change" but I'm afraid the dirty secret of this campaign is that the American public doesn't want to change its behavior at all. What it really wants is someone to promise them they can keep on doing what they're used to doing: buying more stuff they can't afford, eating more shitty food that will kill them, and driving more miles than circumstances will allow. Here's what we better start doing. Stop all highway-building altogether. Instead, direct public money into repairing railroad rights-of-way. Put together public-private partnerships for running passenger rail between American cities and towns in between. If Amtrak is unacceptable, get rid of it and set up a new management system. At the same time, begin planning comprehensive regional light-rail and streetcar operations. End subsidies to agribusiness and instead direct dollar support to small-scale farmers, using the existing regional networks of organic farming associations to target the aid. (This includes ending subsidies for the ethanol program.) Begin planning and construction of waterfront and harbor facilities for commerce: piers, warehouses, ship-and-boatyards, and accommodations for sailors. This is especially important along the Ohio-Mississippi system and the Great Lakes. In cities and towns, change regulations that mandate the accommodation of cars. Direct all new development to the finest grain, scaled to walkability. This essentially means making the individual building lot the basic increment of redevelopment, not multi-acre "projects." Get rid of any parking requirements for property development. Institute "locational taxation" based on proximity to the center of town and not on the size, character, or putative value of the building itself. Put in effect a ban on buildings in excess of seven stories. Begin planning for district or neighborhood heating installations and solar, wind, and hydro-electric generation wherever possible on a small-scale network basis.
We'd better begin a public debate about whether it is feasible or desirable to construct any new nuclear power plants. If there are good reasons to go forward with nuclear, and a consensus about the risks and benefits, we need to establish it quickly. There may be no other way to keep the lights on in America after 2020. We need to prepare for the end of the global economic relations that have characterized the final blow-off of the cheap energy era. The world is about to become wider again as nations get desperate over energy resources. This desperation is certain to generate conflict. We'll have to make things in this country again, or we won't have the most rudimentary household products. We'd better prepare psychologically to downscale all institutions, including government, schools and colleges, corporations, and hospitals. All the centralizing tendencies and gigantification of the past half-century will have to be reversed. Government will be starved for revenue and impotent at the higher scale. The centralized high schools all over the nation will prove to be our most frustrating mis-investment. We will probably have to replace them with some form of home-schooling that is allowed to aggregate into neighborhood units. A lot of colleges, public and private, will fail as higher ed ceases to be a "consumer" activity. Corporations scaled to operate globally are not going to make it. This includes probably all national chain "big box" operations. It will have to be replaced by small local and regional business. We'll have to reopen many of the small town hospitals that were shuttered in recent years, and open many new local clinic-style health-care operations as part of the greater reform of American medicine.
Take a time-out from legal immigration and get serious about enforcing the laws about illegal immigration. Stop lying to ourselves and stop using semantic ruses like calling illegal immigrants "undocumented." Prepare psychologically for the destruction of a lot of fictitious "wealth" -- and allow instruments and institutions based on fictitious wealth to fail, instead of attempting to keep them propped up on credit life-support. Like any other thing in our national life, finance has to return to a scale that is consistent with our circumstances -- i.e., what reality will allow. That process is underway, anyway, whether the public is prepared for it or not. We will soon hear the sound of banks crashing all over the place. Get out of their way, if you can. Prepare psychologically for a sociopolitical climate of anger, grievance, and resentment. A lot of individual citizens will find themselves short of resources in the years ahead. They will be very ticked off and seek to scapegoat and punish others. ...
Sunday, January 13, 2008
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