Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Graham Barnes The news overnight from Brussels is that the 17 euro countries, led in this particular respect by France, have refused to allow the UK to exclude itself from their emerging plans to regulate financial transactions. And this sticking point may well limit the influence of the UK on the development of the central Eurozone programme of fiscal harmonisation.
-The New Agtivist: Edith Floyd is making a Detroit urban farm, empty lot by empty lot
-A citizen activist forces New Mexico’s dairies to clean up their act
-Citywatch: Food’s a trip, Actually a Baker’s Dozen of Trips
-Amish Farms to Hippie Co-Ops Fight FDA Inquiry
-Industrial-Sized Rooftop Farm Planned for Berlin
-Small farmers crave horse power
Why did the Durban climate talks fail? Ultimately, the culprit is the near-universal pursuit of economic growth. All the major players want growth: the US, because it’s still pulling out of a recession; China, because it knows 10 percent annual growth can’t go on forever, but is trying to avoid a hard landing; Europe, which is trying to pull out of its sovereign debt spiral. The US and China, in particular, know that fossil fuels have given them growth in the past, and are especially reluctant to give them up now.
A book from England called “The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger” helps explain what Occupy is about.
The book describes the effects of inequality that have been measured by years of research. The authors gathered all the research and came up with some surprises. What is particularly surprising is that it’s not just the poor who suffer from inequality — we’re all victims.
– NYT’s Andrew Revkin: Naomi Klein’s Inconvenient Climate Conclusions
– Obama Will ‘Reject’ Attempt to Restart Keystone XL
– David Roberts: The brutal logic of climate change
– The 1 Percent and the Fate of the Earth
One of the perennial themes of peak oil discussion over the last decade or so has been what the world will look like once the age of cheap abundant energy comes to a close. While the arguments are ongoing, the answer may already have arrived. With a tip of the hat to green economist Herman Daly, the Archdruid explains.
– Mandelbrot Beats Economics in Fathoming Markets
– OECD inequality report: countries across the developed world are getting less equal
– Financial Times prints bank proposals from Occupy Wall Street
– ‘Crowdfunding’ Legislation Would Allow Businesses And Start-Ups To Use Internet To Find Investors, Access More Capital
– The Other 99 Percent: How the US Compares
A midweekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Developments this week
Economists never told us the story of financial inequity. It took the Occupy movement to do that. And many economists still continue to tell us reassuring fairy tales about how economic growth must and will return.
So, who are you going to trust? Start with Chris Martenson, one of the lay financial analysts who did predict the banking collapse in fall 2008.
– Tom Whipple: E=mc2 (cold fusion developments)
– The Estonian connection: Or how I started worrying about oil shale
– Experts see demand for oil and gas declining
– La fin du pétrole, c’est pour quand ?
Many people would agree that the central desirable end of economic activity is a high quality of life for this and future generations. Conventional economists argue that humans are insatiable, and therefore economics should focus on endless economic growth and ever-increasing consumption. Considerable evidence, however, suggests that humans are in fact satiable-there is a point beyond which increasing consumption does not make us better off.
This land will live again. It will live in America’s countryside, in her mountains and rivers, as well as in her cities. To me, that’s what the Occupy movement is all about—finding ways for all living things to thrive. And for those of us in the grassfed farming community, that’s what we’re all about too, even if we don’t all agree with protests.
