Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Bottom Line: In the world we must strive to achieve, however difficult or implausible it may seem today, expanded extraction of the tar sands has no place.
If ever there was a time when the Transition movement was ideally positioned for take-off, it’s now. The popular appetite for radical change is there – of that, there can be no doubt. It’s no coincidence that the Occupy movement in the US, UK and Western Europe snowballed since early 2011, hot on the heels of the Arab Spring revolts that shook the Middle East and North Africa from December 2010.
A weekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Oil and the global economy
-The Iranian confrontation
-The Greek bailout
-Quote of the week
-Briefs
Annie Leonard is one of the most articulate, effective champions of the commons today. Her webfilm The Story of Stuff has been seen more than 15 million times by viewers. She also adapted it into a book. Drawing on her experience investigating and organizing on environmental health and justice issues in more than 40 countries, Leonard says she’s “made it her life’s calling to blow the whistle on important issues plaguing our world.” She deploys hard facts, common sense, witty animation and an engaging “everywoman” role as narrator to probe complex problems such as the high costs of consumerism, the influence of corporate money in our democracy, and government budget priorities.
We need to begin with an understanding of the misguided euro project, which was driven by corporate interests and political ambitions and was unpopular with economists from the start. The sort of strait-jacket it imposed on countries’ interest rates assumed a uniformity of economic development and social values that simply did not exist.
The Houses of Morgan, Goldman and the other Big Five are justifiably worried right now, because an “event of default” declared on European sovereign debt could jeopardize their $32 trillion derivatives scheme.
Ooooby began in December 2008 on Waiheke Island, Auckland, as an online social network of food gardeners. An evolving project, it now also facilitates the distribution of locally grown food. Ooooby has (in May 2011) 3,600 members, 10,000 monthly visitors, 50 local suppliers and 150 weekly customers. Each month an Oooobyversity evening is hosted in Grey Lynn, Auckland, to share knowledge about food-growing and ways to enhance local production.
Cheaters are lurking in the U.S. economy, corrupting what should be an honest game of production, commerce, and trade. “Cheater economics” refers to the corporate welfare system in which corporations are given special tax subsidies and granted access to loopholes for avoiding tax payments. Cheater economics drains away needed tax revenues, leaving governments with the lose-lose choice of running up deficits or reducing services, or both. Often this means cutbacks in environmental, health, and safety protections. Thanks in no small part to the cheaters, the debate on public finance in the United States has shifted to deficits and the need for cuts. To those seeking funds for worthwhile programs, the answer is, “Sorry, we’re broke!”
Far from being discouraged by the rash of peak oil denunciations in the media lately, I am invigorated by it. Remember: we’re now on offense; they’re on defense. The opposition has to explain why oil production has been flat since 2005 despite high prices. And, the twisted logic and demonstrably false assertions they offer will provide ever better opportunities to trump them again and again.
– Defending good science: Michael Mann speaks out
– A Second Front in the Climate War (methane, soot and hydrofluorocarbons)
– Scientist denies he is mouthpiece of US climate-sceptic think tank
– Canadian government is ‘muzzling its scientists’
– Where the Colorado Runs Dry
“I’ve been concerned by the extent of ‘burn-out’ I’ve come across – in particular states of exhaustion, the development of cynicism and despair. But also the opposite of these in the form of a kind of ‘pollyanna-ish’ defensiveness where people convince themselves that all is solvable, either through technology or through local community action. “
“Both of these tendencies have increased post-Copenhagen, along with a tendency for campaigners sometimes to blame each other rather than the powerful actors in the political system. This is a common response amongst groups experiencing failure – you begin by minutely examining the reasons for the lack of success and end by attacking each other or alternatively withdrawing altogether.”
Obviously getting by without fossil fuels (owing to impending shortages of oil, natural gas and coal) will be an incredibly rude shock for all of us. Our current telecommunication, transportation and retail infrastructure, as well as our current system of industrial agriculture, are based on the abundant availability of cheap fossil fuels. On the plus side, Fleeing Vesuvius is full of a number of specific strategies, currently being tried in Ireland and elsewhere, for building resilient communities to withstand this transition to a non-fossil energy society.
