Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Fred Upton been much in the news of late as chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce of the U.S. House of Representatives. He told us as recently as April 24, 2009 that “climate change is a serious problem that necessitates serious solutions.” But now that he has finally gotten a little power, he has contracted selective science disorder.
Brent crude surged to $104 this week as anti-government protests spread to Libya and Bahrain, prompting a violent reaction from the authorities in both countries. 24 protesters are reported killed in Libya, and in Bahrain 4 have been killed and hundreds injured. Unlike Libya, Bahrain is not a significant oil producer, but there are fears that instability there could spread to its neighbour Saudi Arabia…
World-renowned public intellectual Noam Chomsky discusses several domestic issues in the United States, including the protests in defense of public sector employees and unions in Wisconsin, how the U.S. deification of former President Ronald Reagan resembles North Korea, and the crackdown on political activists with anti-terror laws and FBI raids. [includes rush transcript]
A midweek roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Developments this week
-Budget struggles in Washington
Several prominent organizations dealing with peak oil, have just launched a petition drive urging President Obama to mark the anniversary of the Gulf spill with a major speech to the American people on the subject of peak oil.
Bill McKibben, author and founder of the international environmental organization 350.org, says that without a global campaign to curb climate change, the ecological devastation of our warming climate will make our planet uninhabitable. His appeal to citizens and policy-makers, the seventh video in the series “Peak Oil and a Changing Climate” from The Nation and On The Earth Productions, is a call to action as much as it is a sobering account of the damage we’re already doing to our environment.
There is powerful information waiting to be unleashed in water data. If it were set free it would force us to re-think how we use, develop, sell, transfer, and dispose of water. Rather than focusing on the miles per gallon our cars get, we might consider how much water per mile that fuel’s production required. Rather than arguing over how much energy is being used to produce water, we would give credit to how much water is required to produce energy. Rather than focusing on whether our food is grown locally, we would consider how much water it took to grow that food in our locality.
Were the Egyptian people that bravely took to the streets to overthrow a tyrannical regime taking part in the world’s first peak oil revolution?
The report states boldly right at the beginning that “Nothing less is required than a redesign of the whole food system to bring sustainability to the fore”, but nowhere starts to develop the tools which would help people develop a vision of what such a re-design might look like, as if it doesn’t want to say ‘boo’ to power. It seems to take a relatively uncritical view of global and open markets; indeed, whenever the politics of food threatens to break the surface, the report seems to move swiftly on.
The food crisis is manifestly just that – a crisis. At the same time, there’s another side to this coin. Rising food prices are to some extent good for farmers. And there are plenty of people, me included, who have been arguing for years that we don’t pay enough of the true costs of our food. So who is right? How do you balance the merits and demerits of food prices?
-How to build a left-wing Tea Party: A guide for Americans
-Life in the Water
-Paradox: Linchpin of the Long Emergency
– How Cyber-Pragmatism Brought Down Mubarak
– Another Step Toward Mainstreaming Nonviolence
– How to Build a Progressive Tea Party
– Wendell Berry Joins Retired Coal Miners and Residents in Kentucky Capitol Sit-in
