The war on drugs

I skimmed an article about Afghanistan - apparently producer of 92% of the world's opium trade, a difficult "war on drugs" of a different sort as the old Taliban political faction funds their continued guerilla war using drug money.

I don't have a secure opinion about the "war on drugs". I accept that criminalizing "consumption" of illegal drugs is overall counter-productive. I accept overall anything that is "valued" by enough people can't be banned, and that blackmarkets lead to more problems than the banning attempts to solve. Generalizations are never secure, always exceptions.

On the side of growers, whether opium, coca, hemp, or whatever plant, I can't easily take the enforcement side of simply destroying crops - not to say I'm against destroying crops, just that I acknowledge there's issues - specifically assuming growers tend to be poor farmers who are just trying to grow something they can sell for a profit - and perhaps in a world where legal crops are underpriced by subsidies that make small scale producers unable to earn enough to make a living. In other words, enforcement alone is insufficient, if it fails to pay attention to poverty that encourages the drug crops. Ideally at minimum, it is an education issue - if farmers knew that their crops made drug traffickers rich, while causing suffering for those who abuse the drugs, that might influence their choice to grow it.

I do wonder what effect "peak oil" will have on the world drug trade. Overall, I expect "high-value, low-weight" products like drugs will ALWAYS be traded under long distances, whether industrial scale production or family farmers.

And stepping off the deep end for a minute, my "inner liberterian" wonders whether controlling drugs can ever ultimately be justified. It's tricky still for me. I want to "protect" people from drugs, but education is the first defense. AND I want to protect people from "bad drugs" - blackmarket drugs have no quality assurance, and could be ANYTHING - so regulated drugs at least can be what they say they are. AND lastly I recognize that many drugs, like marajuana have gotten more and more potent through artificial selection, so "first time" users now are in more danger than those 40 years ago.

And still I'm wary. Like legal drugs - alcohol and tobacco, they are regulated to protect children while adults are free to abuse them as they like, at least in private. Some would justify the same ought to be true for marajuana at least, and I admit given I was king, I'd probably relent in that case - not worth the fight to me.

Some would argue cocaine as well ought to be legalized, and obviously there was a time it was legal and used in products, like the original Coke soda. Some would argue Heroin also ought to be legal. I don't have the medical knowledge to judge any of it, or the inclination to experiment myself. I suppose for me I'd be more likely to TRY if a drug was regulated, but I'm mostly a chicken, and no representative.

It is curious to imagine how the prices of drugs would change if regulated. At least they could be taxes if legalized. Intiutively I'd imagine prices would go down, which seems bad since it'd encourage more consumption.

Drugs like Meth, apparently used by Japanese pilots during WWII, I start getting more and more scared, but I don't know how to draw a line. I'd DRAW a line here - a drug that destroys a person's health is BAD BAD BAD, even if it can be used to improve their "productivity", but the same could be said about Cocaine. Perhaps some would even say about caffeine?

Well, whatever else I don't know, I'd have to say it is SENSELESS to not regulate illegal drugs. I mean keep as much as possible in the light of day. Even criminalizing the selling of drugs is problematic - makes economic activity between consenting adults illegal. (I know there's always exceptions where the greater danger to society exceeds individual freedom.)

Overall I know the whole issue of "regulation" is sometimes offensive, always better to try to use education to minimize harm than police everything which ultimately always fails at some level.

I was thinking of "peak oil" in the sense of "industrialized production" in the present can usually "underprice" smaller efforts, so for the moment, I'd imagine drugs would be cheaper if made legal, even if taxed significantly. Hard to believe consumption wouldn't go up, but perhaps lower prices mean less incentive for production - who knows? Maybe economists?!

Self-preservation and self-destruction

A spectacular presentation at TedTalks on Aids in Africa:
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/143

Lots of fun thoughts can come out of this talk, but the one that hit me first was the idea that places in Africa with higher Malaria (higher deathrate besides AIDS) had minimal inpact on changing sexual behavior compared to places with longer lifespans.

I've thought about this in my own life, trying balance "being good" with "feeling good", you know on all the small things, snacking, procrastination, keeping a regular sleep schedule, exercise, etc.

I notice when I make poor decisions, it comes from times of hopelessness, like eating a half dozen candy bars when I'm miserable working a 12 hour day that can't end until I'm done. I offer "trade-off", soothing frustration and emotion, but making my body deal with the poor calorie choices. I mostly figure in the short run, the body can handle bad choices, but effects can accumulate beyond some happy moderation level, and affect our health later.

I imagine a little that AIDS in Africa offer a similar dilemma. People who feel good about their future, their choices, their opportunity, will be more able to step back from short term stress and make better choices that take a little work, whether that means wearing a condom, or limiting sexual partners, at least thinking of the male side, although issues like prostitution apply perhaps at least to the degree women trade sexual favors for economic ones, protective relationships, even outside of formal prostitution.

Anyway, it hit me mostly because at a "rational" level, I'd long think we ought to just make good decisions, but I realize people (including me) make poor/irrational decisions, those that trade long term risks for short term relief of suffering or stress. I wonder when will power can be enough, to let the mind lead (and limit behavior), and I don't have an answer, except to admit we all need hope and comfort and safety, and in environments when we lose these, we won't make the best decisions.

I'm not sure what "politics" can do about this, almost more a religious question, except thinking of the constitution and the "pursuit of happiness."

Education is one side of helping people, but it only helps at the level of mind. I suppose education can be used as propaganda, to produce fear, and fear of future pain (like suffering eternity in hell!) perhaps can motivate people to avoid things that are bad for them in the long run. Maybe fear breaks down when the costs are only projected into the future? Fear helps people from TRYING "crack", but once they do something else must help them resist returning when they decide to stop.

Religious people sometimes say people take drugs because they want to feel closer to God, to bridge the gap created in the banishment from the garden, or whatever. I don't have any great interest to deny such stories, except to call them mythical, representing "something" inside, which may or may not be as claimed.

On poverty in general, lack of opportunity, fear of inferiority, of rejection, of not fitting in, of not having what it takes to get ahead, it all knocks people down, convinces them to not try as hard as if they could see exactly how to succeed. At only level I'm all for "great care" against a "welfare society" that rewards failure too much, teaches dependence. I only constrast that with the reality that "society" may not be offering what people most need, or some people, so you can't expect all people to get excited about 9-5 existence alone.

I suppose the population explosion is also related. I mean I know it must be. Raising children for those in poverty BECOMES their central opportunity, and however much pain it causes at times, it gives all meaning and hope. And I can see there little incentive necesarily to be strategic against "more kids" when its all you have. You just hope SOME might find success.

Some like to talk about the Western life as reducing poverty, and reducing birthrates, and perhaps that relation is fully true, BUT if the world's resources can't sustain the transition population and consumption needed, then it's a false hope to me, from my rational view.

The scary thing for me, if population growth is a response to poverty and a short lifespan, THEN there's this dilemma or fear. We can't simply reduce death rates through modern knowledge UNLESS we can reduce hopelessness, and once population levels get too high, poverty too high, then hopelessness might be impossible to cure. So how much can we "help"?

And more scary, is hopeless people are easily lead by promising leaders, by religious fundamentalism, giving them hope such that they serve darker interests of the leader for power. You gotta think much of ancient wars came from this dynamic.

And in modern capitalism, it seems IMPOSSIBLE to "help" people in third world countries without exploiting them for our benefit. I suppose I'll always just feel guilty on things I ought not to, not wanting to profit from others. I live a privledged life I can't teach or advocate how to reach, and I expect it can end without my consent, like losing my job.

It really does seem that modern life offers very mixed blessings. It allows short term prosperity to many, at the cost of honest hope for future prosperity, and the success itself guarantees the loss of future prosperity.

At some level, my despair is not smaller than those in an african village. I suppose at least I hope for a long life, so I can't be too lost, but more if I look at the world backwards, not forwards. I'm not sure what my life will be worth among 9 billion people in 2050, if our success continues as planned, but best guess for me either a lot LESS energy and resources, and/or a lot dirtier resources keeping us happy.

Sure, I can play "happy" with the technologists, just wait a little longer, we're told, and the promised land will come. Such beliefs keeps us happy so we'll perhaps take care of our health, and hope to live to a ripe old age, and all that good stuff.

And if I let my gloom&doom side come out, which I do, I'll throw away saving for a retirement I can't imagine will ever happen. I'll throw away investments that could compound nicely. I'll just keep building larger walls to protect myself from danger, until I'm fully alone and paranoid about those drug dealers down the street, coming into my house and robbing me at gunpoint, and all that. Fears can be rational, and yet quickly jump to irrational, exaggerate dangers and hide the little steps needed to change things for the better.

Whatever else I know, we're all in this world together, and we've all got struggles, and we've all got challenges to overcome, and finding rational hope is perhaps the biggest one that needs practice every day!

Resource consumption management via consumption vouchers

Ah, too long of a title, but thinking HARD what, if anything, can be done to face the impending world oil crisis.

Americans don't like taxes, although I expect a good $2/gallon tax hike is completely justifiable to help cover hidden costs of oil production and consumption. BUT I admit the evidence suggests that a $2 gas is still insufficient to seriously curb consumption. PLUS, it is a regressive tax, hurting the poor who are less able to change their lifestyles quickly to reduce their demand, at least in regards to commuting.

The idea of "consumption" vouchers is an interesting one to me, at least to explore. When there's a summer time drought and water is limited, communities will put restrictions on unnecessary consumption, like watering your grass. People largely accept that, for the common good, in a short term crisis.

But what about long term crises? What if a community's water source is ground water, and the water table keeps falling, year after year. Deeper and deeper wells are needed to keep the needed water flowing. It is actually astounding to me, that ground water is so easily wasted, used in quanities that can't be recovered sustainably. Like a draining savings account, wouldn't people "get a clue" and start conserving?

The difficulty of long term crises perhaps is that memories don't go deep enough to remember a previous drought and we've NEVER taken out so much ground water as now, so there's simply no clear sense of the risks of what we do, the diminishment of future availability.

Prices are set by how much the water takes to be extracted, NOT how much it will cost to replace when local sources are drained.

Nature perhaps handles this dilemma by diversity. Although some species gain "monopoly" influence over resources, there's other species that thrive on other resources, so the depletion of one resource means the fall of the species that is dependent upon it and the rise of species who can do without it.

On that ground, if we take the big picture, our loss of vital resources means a diminishment of OUR future, to the degree WE are not flexible enough to do without.

In nature there may be "negative feedback" loops that keep systems in equilibrium, while modern human culture has (so far) been able to push the limits further and further. Our success expands our apetite, so no matter how successful we are at continuing another day, there's no promise tomorrow we will find a NEW way out of the next bottleneck. There's no promise WE are not heading to a brick wall and a crash and a world we won't like as much.

Maybe it is just "unnatural" for a species to set voluntary limits? I mean in some ways humans have done it when we had to. I think of the stories of the eskimos putting their elderly out to die in cold winters when food is scarce. We can make hard choices semi-rationally when we must, but when the sky is bright in the sun and the air warm and breeze cool, in the best of times, can we accept our ways can't last?

Maybe it's just nonsense? Maybe "necessity is the mother of invention" and a species that is too "rational" will stagnate under our own "good sense"? Well, just trying to play devil's advocate against myself!

Still, I have to wonder if reason is possible, if caution can be considered, if guarantee risks can be faced before the last possible moment. Why can't we just admit we're importing nearly 2/3 of our oil and our domestic production will decline whater we do, and world demand will keep increasing to catch up to us, so let's face this sooner than later.

The interesting thing about a consumption voucher, is the idea that "everyone deserves a share", so you might divide a resource equally (or at least with some dividing rule of proportions, by need or status), and scale the consumption to a limiting supply OR a desired limit to consumption.

The interesting thing of dividing a resource IS the inequality. Obviously WE don't want to share the world's oil based on population, since WE consume 5 times the world average per capita. A "equal" system would give the chinese first access to "their per capita share", and if they didn't need that much they could SEEL their vouchers to US - AND probably for a profit as well, above the price we'll all be paying for "our regular shares". (So we don't want anything like that!)

And in terms of capitalism, it works fine at least. If I don't need "my share", I can sell it to someone who can afford more than their share. This means everyone gets what they need at least, and gives a plan to scale down consumption over time BEFORE geological limits hit us first.

The other failing of such a system is that the FUTURE doesn't get a direct say in what THEIR share should be, although the global production control system at least is capable of asking the question and will limit consumption more than if nothing was done.

Another issue of the voucher system is how businesses purchase energy. I suppose businesses have ZERO priority, zero vouchers, and must depend on purchasing vouchers to do anything, AND hope their sale price can cover their costs. Anyway, that makes sense.

It would be interesting. Thinking of gasoline, everyone would get say a 20 gallon gas voucher every month. It would "expire" perhaps within 3 months to limit hoarding or saving. Vouchers would be used or sold, maybe on an e-bay system? People could join "selling pools" and give a broker a cut to manage their sales for a best price.

I'm sure it would be messy, some months quotas would be too large for demand, and others people would clean up to sell what they have extra.

THEN on another side, producers have a dilemma. Let's say there's 1000 gallons of supply among 3 companies and only 900 gallons of vouchers. That means prices will drop. And if supply is only 800 gallons, people will buy vouchers which will be USELESS with no gasoline available to purchase it, not at any price. So buying vouchers is a risky decision - first you're paying up to get the voucher, and then you're paying up for the gasoline IF it is available.

Hmmmm... I mean ALL of economics is a matter of games like this - expectations and individuals trying to play for their best interests. A sound game will be played and can make things better.

But what is really fair? I don't have a car. Do I really DESERVE vouchers for gasoline that I'll turn around and sell - JUST for being a deadweight standing around? (Or SHOULD I be rewarded for not consuming and leaving more for someone else?)

Heck, I'd probably "donate" my vouchers to charity groups who could sell them to earn money to run their programs. Easy for me, and good for them.

Okay, last thought. People fear that limiting energy limits economic growth. I think this is GOOD, but I admit good is relative, and joblessness is less good in the short term, even if economic sustainability is good in the long term.

Ideally vouchers should be scaled from current consumption BACKWARDS based on reducing overall consumption. Ideally this will raise prices for gasoline, and make alternatives more competitive, if such alternatives exist. The reduction of consumptoin can be scaled in response to prices and availability of alternatives. That is, as alternatives come around, gasoline consumption can naturally reduce in response. So it's messy to manage well, but this stuff happens already, like the Federal reserve controlling interest rates and borrowing for the money supply. Nothing new, EXCEPT for facing a declining resource, rather than an expanding one, which might make ALL THE DIFFERENCE in the world.

Who knows what happens in a contracting economy?

Okay, last last issue. Let's say you regulate something different, like Natural gas, where some states are HUGE users, and others small. Should citizens of Florida get equal vouchers for NG as citizens of Minnesota, and WE have to buy their unneeded vouchers to heat our homes?

I ask the question from the point of view of a cold winter state. On gasoline, there's also the issue of urban vs rural citizens. Rural citizens perhaps drive 50% more than urban ones. Should they get a larger voucher JUST for where they live?

At one level YES - their higher consumption means their conservation is worth more, but also more difficult. A rural person who COULD drive but doesn't DESERVES more "credit" to not drive than an urban person who choses not to drive (and who has mass transit available.)

And should parents get larger vouchers, needing more driving for their kids? Again, perhaps, given their conservation is more important.

So in principle I accept unequal distribution of vouchers, but in practice, this is a zero sum game, so a system that is "too liberal" will become like our tax laws, becoming ever more complex with special exceptions, credits for varied conditions, and everyone fighting for more share for themselves and those like them. AND groups MOST politically capable (like the elderly perhaps) may find themselves with UNDUE shares simply for their influence, while others with less resources suffer more serious shortages and difficulties making their ends meet.

I mean I think these issues come up any time a valued resource becomes scarce, and ultimately it comes down to those with more money get what they want, and the government must find a way to help those who can't make it under the new conditions.

Overall my mind tires trying to imagine how such systems can work, and I do believe whatever is started, it'll slowly transform into a complicated mess. It might even become an entitlement program where prices sky-rocket the government ends up subsidizing poor consumption, just putting more money into producers smart enough to keep undercutting the national quota with their supplies to keep prices high for them.

Seriously, it's messy, and ugly, and perhaps in the end, if I could live 10 lifetimes I'd give up control, and let "informed citizens" gamble with their choices, and accept the consequences, and make throw away people when they can't prosper under our system. Wait, perhaps we all ready have that?

I just don't know how much I should FIGHT to pay more for my lifestyle!

No I'm convinced evil is occuring now, even if we participate willingly, but there's always a question of whether control or enlightenment lead to freedom. Of course the second, but the first seems easiest. (Or I mean "control" through systems, trusted through enlightenment.)

Denial and irrational market faith

I went to a discussion on the price of gasoline:
http://citizensleague.org/events/past/2007/07/policy_and_a_pi_6.php

Overall a disappointing discussion, even if both speakers tried their best. Of course I wanted "peak oil" to be discussed - the idea that world oil production will start to decline sooner than most think.

The closest we came to a "deadline" was dividing a supposed reserves of 1200Bbbl by annual consumption, 31Bbbl to get 38 years AND admit that consumption will keep growing so the date will be sooner. No recognition at all that the "second half" of world oil production will be slower and harder than the first, and that oil production MUST decline much sooner than oil runs out and we have no experience with such a useful and irreplacable resource becoming less and less available.

So there's just no serious (mainstream) public voice calling for imminent danger of oil shortages. The best they could do is say it is LIKELY that oil prices will be higher in 5 years than now.

They said ideally we'd compute "hidden costs" of oil consumption and add it on as a tax, but that the american people are dead against their money going to taxes (although willing to let their money go to Venesuela and Saudi Arabia.)

True, my opinions don't vary from that, except to say IF we CHOOSE to BLINDLY continue to depend on oil that which we can't guarantee to be there for us in the future, then it's our own damn faults when geology or politics start trying to reduce our easy options.

For individuals I say "Plan on $10 gasoline" and that is perhaps all you can do, even if $10 gasoline will have a multipler effect on all goods and services as well, but its a starting place for realistic assessment. Overall, I think our economy CAN run on $10 gasoline, at least given how much less we COULD drive if we HAD to.

There was a hand-raising survey, "What price will you stop driving at?" and a large number (including me) said any price (and I don't even have a car myself). Even when I did have a car, I NEVER commuted daily with a car, and pretty much never drove more than 4000 miles/year, and some years perhaps closer to 2000. If I had a car, I'm already throwing out lots of money, so I'd drive it, even at $100 gasoline - just less miles! Not everyone is as free as me to reduce driving I know, but they'd better learn their options!

Anyway, mostly my thoughts on leaving the discussion is that human nature is always short sighted and prone to discounting long term dangers. It is funny that there's like a 1 in 1 million chance a huge meteor will hit the earth in the next say 40 years, and a 100% chance we're going to be using much less oil in 40 years than now. The "value" of oil ought to be based on what it'll be worth in 40 years, not now, when we're guzzling it away.

I suppose there's always a shadow side playing with us. We have exaggerated security in the way things are, and in the dark corners of our lives, an exaggerated fear that our prosperity will be ripped out from under us by forces beyond our control.

I try myself to BELIEVE in that 100% that oil MUST diminish, but I still go on as-if the economy made sense and could go on indefinitely. No, not exactly, but my "panic" is still in the dark corners. Fear teaches me to reduce my debt, reduce my need for a high income to continue my lifestyle, and gratitude for my income, BUT I'll as easily go about my hobbies and interests like all is well.

I think SERIOUS beleivers ought to be like missionaries, calling for the end-days, devoting our remaining time to the service of humanity and those less fortunate than us. SERIOUSLY, its about the only sensible response I know, EXCEPT there's a little devil in me who says there's more FUN things to do with my time than serve the weak and drug-muddled souls of the world. I mean I can't really save them, even if I was religious. I know they're no more likely than me to have positive action to respond to future risk.

I sort of agree with the Pope and others, to hold life-affirming values, but in practice, it is very easy to be pessimistic, hopeless that "all can be saved", so why not focus my attention on those closest to me?

I'm mostly sad, filled with elistist thoughts, that so many people are so easily seduced into false promises given to them to sign over their time for beads and trinkets. I pretend I'm less seduced, at least I fear even the sincere promises are temporary.

In short, the consciousness for change has not yet arrived. People are still looking in the wrong direction for salvation. They still think technology and good work can allow our unsustainable lives to be sustained. Until this consciousness is fully disillusioned, or at least by some critical mass, we must just keep waiting, and preparing as we are inspired and able.

I'm in denial too, since I don't want the party to end either...

Conservation versus development pressures

It's rather curious that I as often as not reject the claims of conservation groups, like Sierra club rejecting a new Stillwater bridge on "aesthetic" grounds of wrecking the beauty of the St Croix river valley, while for me the REAL issue is a big new bridge large is a DEVELOPMENT issue, that Metro sprawl will lose one last natural boundary and there'll be a skyrocketing of land prices on the other side. Those who OWN that land will gain a huge financial advantage, whether luck of their ownership or through speculation. So I vote with the antidevelopment side as much to SPOIL short term speculators from profitting, WHILE causing a real problem - making it easy to continue unsustainable development.

On a different side, I think of any sort of nonrenewable resource, or any renewable resource that is being depleted in nonrenewable ways, what sort of resistance should a community put up against this.

Thinking of the Alberta sandtars, or Appalacian mountain-top removeal coal extraction, it seems clear to me that booming development for such a dirty resource, done by people who come there merely for work, and don't personally care about the consequences of their development to the environment. Even if the industry itself is "forced" to "care" by law, in practice it is pretty easy for "big money" to bribe there way out of real responsibility for cleanup, or for accepting a level of cleanup that meets the needs of the local community which is affected by the development.

I try to not be fully a naysayer, and I know I'm generally just a worrier, so if I had "my way", there'd be 1/10 the development there is now, and effectively "life as we know it" would end sooner, not that I don't believ it won't end later, if we TRY to maximize our exploitation of the environment.

I try to be practical as well. Environmental regulations are "warm fuzzies" to a well-to-do society, especially one capable of buying resources from DISTANT markets which can do anything to THOSE environments they want, as long we can afford to buy what they offer. So if regulations merely move a problem further away, they're not helping. AND if regulations merely delay action until we're more desparate, it's equally unclear if we've done anything constructive.

I'm very impressed by the "Nature Conservancy" and their efforts to purchase special lands to protect from development, BUT I wonder if even THEY will someday find themselves short on cash, and lower their standards, allowing development unsoundly. I can't even judge, since I don't know what is good or bad. If the NC discovers oil under their lands, and can get paid $1 billion to develop it cleanly, sell it for profit, and then use the proceeds to buy up more land to protect, what's the harm? I ask rhetorically in a general case, and clearly in specific cases, an analysis can be made on harm/risk/benefit. And interestingly there's "risks" not usually considered, like if a future time comes where land-ownership laws can't be enforced, what are they willing to do to protect their lands?

And more interestingly, considering ALL land as ultimately "The commons", owned by the people, AND the government is getting bribed by big money to reduce the land's potential, to destroy that which takes centuries to restore and heal, is there means to defend that which the government won't defend?

I can think of Iraq now, with a good fraction of the remaining oil in the world, underdeveloped, and under threat from multiple sides, including foreign developers who will come in (under government support) and drain away the country's resources?

If you simply believe in democracy, then if 51% say "Let's sell off our resources for a quick profit", then the other 49% be dammed, unless they're willing to start a revolution perhaps. A step beyond democracy protects "Human rights", so minorities can't be trivially harmed by the majority, but what if a minority isn't protecting their rights, but "the commons" for future potential? Ideally you'd say its up to the minority to convince the majority their position is worthy, but in practice "harm" can be measured in many ways, like "job loss" and reduced "economic development", and so as long as a majority "feels" they benefit, a lot of decisions can be made with long term consequences which are left unackowledged.

Okay, easy to get too abstract. And in specific cases, like a new bridge, there's simply divergent values going on that have no good compromises. Those who believe development can't be stopped and the future will always grow (a false belief to me, but defendably exaggerated here by my version of it), and those who think something must give and we ought to accept limits when they present themselves and focus our energy where we can have more hope for the future.

I fear NOW that conservation is a tough legal fight, but LATER different fights will come along that may be impossible to defend, and maybe some fights against development now should be let go. I'm going abstract again, but just recognizing the question and uncertainty.

When building a dam against development pressures, you must ask what forces you use to reinforce the dam and how those forces can be maintained in the future.

A most curious example is development of nonrenewables. If they are developed sooner than later, and used wisely, perhaps a better future can be created. On the otherside, like not extracting the resource might mean someone else might just use force to take it anyway. Not that ANY development is clearly defendable.

I feel pretty useless in these questions, but just trying to see them. I think peak oil is a real problem and we need to look sooner than later, both how to deal with less energy, AND to consider what NEW development pressures may come of it.

Kunstler things suburbia is doomed, will be abandoned with oil prices, and perhaps become lawless squatter villages or something. Its too hard to imagine such things. I imagine "Gated communities" as becoming more and more popular, as well-off citizens cluster their resources together from crime, and pay their own police services to protect them. I mean its already happening, peak oil or not, and perhaps things will go differently. It's not even that I'm against such things, communities protecting their common interest. My only complaint is when wealth clusters to protect itself, and lets the neighboring poor areas go to hell. Whatever defenses can be set up they need to consider the needs of their neighbors.

Yes, of course, and that idea is universal and scalable, from household to neighborhood to city to state to country to world. We're not responsible for the problems of our neighbors, but if we ignore them, there's going to be a cost to pay later.

I could have fun and imagine how empires fall, how ruthless leaders EXPLOIT the poor and oppressed to unify to a common cause, even if a false cause, carried through scapegoating, to destroy neighbors through fear. I could imagine even the Roman empire itself fell partly from its own brutality, teaching lessons of brutality to their neighbors until they weakened and fell to them.

An uncaring, inwardly directly elite, whether through royal families, or technocrats and exploiters of a complex modern world, we're all selling off some of our souls, when we reach first and last for our short term self-interest, when we take more than we need, while others are suffering, there's costs that come from this.

As always, the wider world scares me as much as anyone, and I'll cocoon my interests close to home as well as anyone, and blind my effects through abstract money values.

Most of all I just have to realize I'm pretty much already lost. I don't have the heart to fight, so whatever I have, is easily taken by those angry or ruthless enough to take it.

What do I defend now, knowing the weakness of my resolve to protect the life I know?

A period of consequences

I don't know if I'd ever have liked Churchill had I known him, a politician both ahead of his time, and behind it, but at least for World War II, he was a man for his times, recognizing growing danger and calling it such.

I suppose I'm mostly a contrarian myself, better suited for recognizing danger and demanding attention than to the more daily practical aspects of democracy.

I hold a deep appreciation for a modern contrarians and writers, James Howard Kunstler and Wendell Berry, both calling the "truth" that modern ways are based on lies and foolishness, and we'll pay for it sooner or later. Both TRY to offer visions for a different future, but besides avoiding the greatest insanities of our time, they choose to continue their lives trying to practice something better, at least in practical ways.

Al Gore quotes Churchill as well, in the slow coming disasters from Global Warming, and climate change, glacially slow but perhaps perceptible changes that will make the earth very different from what we've known, as if our entire species hasn't already done this on reduced diversity, things could get much worse than we've had to deal with so far.

The difference to Gore's problem is we are our own enemy, like the fat person who eats to feel better, and then feels bad for eating too much, so must eat more in a downward spiral of self-destruction. Well, the puffy way Gore has looked recently, perhaps it is what he's been doing. Anyway the point of no return for the sedentary lifestyle is when you're too fat to get up off the couch.

I don't know about GW, except to say we're probably screwed by our own momentum and "will to life" that self-restraint is LONG past a viable option. The sheer mass of humanity, ignoring our blubber, has already doomed us, UNLESS something better comes along to save us.

Peak oil would seem to be the first call, a vital resource that has been in decline in the U.S. for some 36 years, and is likely in decline nearly everywhere except for a few key countries holding on a little longer.

It was just a few years ago VP Cheney said (rightly so) that "Conservation was a personal virtue", long before world excess production capacity evaporated under a sea of demand that has been slowed by rising prices, but not reversed.

Then today I read an interview like:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/07/10/fa.lundberg.qa/index.html Chatting with America's gas price survey maven

Mostly I won't argue, but the last question reply astounds me:
Q: As far as conservation, what are the trends you are seeing?
A: I'm hoping that consumers will see through the rhetoric about consuming less, demanding less, as faulty. It is not a given that consuming less will be good for our economy or for our personal freedom. It is not even established for our environment that we [should] deprive ourselves of gasoline for our personal mobility as well our commerce. And to suppose that it is good to do that, and pretend that we have consensus and put our heads together to deprive ourselves of this great product that makes the country go around, commercially and individually, I think is flawed. I'm hoping consumers and voters will see through that and be able to ignore some of the most extreme suggestions.

I think that there has been friendly as well as unfriendly brainwashing taking place. And when I say friendly and unfriendly, I'm talking about decades of extremist views that have now achieved mainstream acceptance. And the No. 1 item among those affecting current oil politics in Washington is the boogeyman, also known as global warming.

I don't accept it as established fact, nor do I accept that it would be caused by petroleum consumption, nor do I accept that the human species should not affect its environment. So even if it were someday to be shown to have some small effect on the environment, I see no crime. In fact, taking into account the many, many millions of people around the world that envy our way of life, it would seem more humanitarian to wish them the kind of plentiful petroleum products and vehicles ... that we enjoy ... to lift themselves out of [a] backward, poor way of life.

I suppose I can forgive her for meaning well. She just isn't afraid like me. She doesn't want to dishonestly support the idea that conservation will help BECAUSE it might not. And she's so virtuous, wishing the rest of the world can follow our lifestyle. In her mind I guess the "solution" can only exist by consuming more and more, and that can only happen because there's consumption pressures on us to find our next fix, or combination of fixes.

Its just curious to me that people in power are not afraid, or at least that people in power believe fear is ONLY GOOD if it promotes us to continue further on the same road we've always followed.

Well, not much more to say. I'm a contrarian. I know things that can't last don't, and someday the systems that support us will faulter. Individually we can prepare, and perhaps collectively us gloom&doomers might find some lifestyle choices that we can accept.

I suppose people in power say what they do because its the only thing they know. They can't imagine a world with less energy next year than this year. They know when this happens, their game will be over.

I suppose I shouldn't even be disappointed. I know conservation is a "personal virtue". I not ready to tell people they should suffer discomfort now MERELY for the opportunity for a little less discomfort later. It's a personal choice, at least to those who are lucky enough to see it and have extra resources now to do something.

Mostly I'd advocate "practice" at deprivation, nothing big, just the sort of inconveniences know since time immemorial, that we now can hide in our spending spree.

Be afraid, and recognize the enemy is our own success. Beyond that I'm lost as anyone I guess...

SiCKO and socialism

I sas Michael Moore's movie, SiCKO yesterday, overall, an effective message that suggests America is backwards in how we do health care and ought to look at other nations with "universal healthcare".

I'll try not to complain too much, but it would have been an interesting comparison if the 13,000 emails he got when he requested information from people on problems with their health insurance, perhaps it would be worthy to ask the SAME question to people in other countries he offered as comparsion - Canada, UK, France, and Cuba. Are horror stories unique to our system? Perhaps by frequency, but the question was never asked by Moore.

Being a terminal devil's advocate I suppose, wanting to see the bigger picture to give context to facts and judgement, I still don't have the curiousity to reach out on my own, so left with speculations to offer.

The biggest concern I have for "socialized" ANYTHING is how things are balanced out -personal accountability and what motivates the best behavior. I mean, for instance, If I take good care of my health and you don't do the same. Lets say you drive a car without a seat belt, do I want YOU on the same car insurance policy as me? If you smoke, drink, or consume drugs, do I want to subsidize your higher health care costs?

I can easily express outrage at a for-profit-health industry, and its short term interests at maximimizing returns for investors at the cost of reduced health and wellfare for its clients. Clear examples as shown in the movie say moral lines have been crossed, systematically, and intentionally, rewarding workers best able to minimize payouts by whatever excuses and loopholes they could find.

The republican position to government run health care is that without a profit motive, costs will spiral out of control. It's just as easy (and almost harmful) to nearly always say yes as nearly always say no, and programs costs will grow much faster than inflation until taxes can not cover the costs.

And on a parallel issue, government debt is about as horrible as personal debt. I mean like my complains of having a credit card. It is easy to be corrupted into the idea that as long as you can make the minimum payment, that you're using a credit card "responsibly", while the cumulative debt rises far about what can ever be paid back.

Government debt is a good tool if used responsibly, but as soon as debt is used as a way of paying for services, you go onto a slippery slope where there's no clarity of what is acceptable.

So I'm happy enough to raise taxes to COVER health care costs, but much less happy if the program can only be passed by increasing the national debt to cover the shortfalls when taxes are not increased enough to cover costs.

I remember governor Jesse Ventura complaining that education was a money pit, and I don't agree with any assessment simply, but I see that view. Systems and institutions ALWAYS grow, perhaps by nature, and corruption enters them. I think counter-systems that try to externally contain costs by force are mostly doomed, but I don't see anything else I have faith in.

Mostly I'll be with Moore, prefer to take away the profit motive, and find ways to "keep things stirred up" over time to expose the corruptions.

Running for governor in 2006, Peter Hutchinson repeatedly rejected the position of raising taxes. He said we're paying as much as we're willing, so its up to programs to deal with whatever they get. Overall, I was a skeptic to his message, seemed to be pandering to a political mood of resistance to taxes.

No great final thoughts, except democracy and life are messy things, far removed from idealism and clear principle. Everything grows and decays and nothing is fully resistant to the cycle. Principles run on idealistic simplifications of reality, and miss the differences between intent and result. When result is off course, I believe stirring things up is worth something, even if just a little windstorm that cleans out a few cobwebs.