A Tale Of Texas Crude Or, It’s All About The Oil Stupid
When this whole Iraq war thing was heating up I was in all places Austin Texas (yes the same Texas GW is “from” he is really an east coast elitist playing cowboy…but I digress). It was an interesting time to be in Texas, the Texas democrats were being hunted down by homeland security to force them to return to the state (they were hiding out in Oklahoma) so that the Texas republicans could ram an illegal redistricting plan down their gullets (thats Texas for neck). The very same Texas republicans also rammed the DOMA (the horribly named defense of marriage act), basically saying to all the gay people in Texas “go fuck yourself”. It was a strange and depressing time to live in a republican state if you were a liberal democrat (like myself).
I remember staying up till 4 in the morning to get my chance to speak at the DOMA hearings. ALL DAY bus load after bus load of right wing religious wack jobs from around the state poured in to tell anyone who would listen that the Gays were going to kill Jesus and rape God if they got the right to consummate their love for one another with state blessing (Texas already had laws that said if you are gay you can’t get married this was just another middle finger to the GLBT community). The pro-gay rights people had to wait till the VERY last hour to speak, and then at 3 in the am most of the people on the board (most of which were openly homophobic, and supporting the wack jobs all day) allowed one hour for the other side to voice its case. Suffice to say DOMA is still going strong in Texas.
I remember joining tens of thousands of my closest friends in massive Anti-war protest marches (several of them over the course of a couple weeks/months). I recall the media mostly ignoring them as people all over the country rose up and told anyone that would listen (and even those that didn’t want to hear it) that they DID NOT WANT WAR! I vividly recall the tear gas used on us when we spent just a little too much time on a bridge that the cops on horses had decided would now be returned to car traffic.
And that brings me to the point of this rambling story. The Cars got priority over the People. We got hosed with teargas from angry cops on horseback because cars needed to drive over the bridge. We were told that Saddam had “weapons of mass destruction” and that he would “have a smoking gun in the form of a mushroom cloud” and and that he would eat our babies, and that he hates baseball, and anything else it took to get the American people to remain docile long enough to shoehorn us into an illegal invasion of another country.
Well it is now many years later and everyone knows that we were lied to, lied to in a big way. The only thing the American people have gotten out of the Iraq war has been dead sons and daughters, or (sometimes worse) sons and daughters who are coming back from war with nothing to show for it but missing limbs and mental wounds that might never heal. The true victors in the war in Iraq have been a tightly knit group of oil companies and military contractors (most of whom orbit very very closely to the Darth Cheney death star).
News flash people, this was a war FOR PROFIT. The profit of a very few very well connected companies. These companies knew a guy (Dick) who knew a guy (Bush) who could get things going. Don’t take my word for it, try reading the New York Times.
Four Western oil companies are in the final stages of negotiations this month on contracts that will return them to Iraq, 36 years after losing their oil concession to nationalization as Saddam Hussein rose to power.
Exxon Mobil, Shell, Total and BP — the original partners in the Iraq Petroleum Company — along with Chevron and a number of smaller oil companies, are in talks with Iraq’s Oil Ministry for no-bid contracts to service Iraq’s largest fields, according to ministry officials, oil company officials and an American diplomat.
The deals, expected to be announced on June 30, will lay the foundation for the first commercial work for the major companies in Iraq since the American invasion, and open a new and potentially lucrative country for their operations.
The no-bid contracts are unusual for the industry, and the offers prevailed over others by more than 40 companies, including companies in Russia, China and India.
KBR, Haliburton, Blackwater, Exxon, BP, Shell, half of these companies have employed Dick Cheney, or he owns massive amounts of stock in them (or both). We are spending BILLIONS of dollars, getting our sons and daughters mutilated, killing tens of thousands of Iraqi’s civilians, destabilizing the region, bleeding the American economy dry, pumping oil prices to record highs, all so that a small group of very rich men can get even richer. Further BILLIONS have been lost to shady contracts with these same companies. Nice.
With Iowa under water, New Orleans still limping towards recovery, oceans rising, and the weather getting stranger and stranger every day, do we really think that the answer to our problems is to funnel Americans money and young people into a black hole of corruption like the Bush administration and it’s illegal war? Of course you don’t thats why in a country of almost 300 million the number of people who like Dick Cheney can be counted on your fingers and toes. But what are we going to do about it?
When you go to vote for president this year (you are going to vote right?) be sure to think long and hard about which choice you make. Do you want John (gas tax holiday off shore drilling, stay in Iraq for 100 years) McCain or do you want Barack (renewable energy, windfall profits tax, pull our troops out of Iraq) Obama. The choice is easy…
Happiness: Who Needs Stuff?
I was inspired to include this first official extract from the forthcoming book “A Matter Of Scale” after listening to an inspirational story about the people of Vanuatu; officially the happiest place on Earth. The audio from the BBC Radio 4 programme, From Our Own Correspondent can be heard by clicking on this link.
Here, I ask the question: “In the dominant global culture we call Industrial Civilization, are humans vital, relevant or irrelevant?” In a culture that puts humans at the centre of everything, above all other life on Earth, surely humans are vital…
Much of humanity has become a commercial entity. No longer are we about subsistence, despite the rich, fulfilling life that it can entail. There is apparently far more to life than this: we enjoy listening to music; watching TV; buying toys, clothes, cars and computers; eating fast food; flying to far-off places and, when it suits us, giving a little money to charity. We even pray, for others and ourselves: for longer lives, for healthier lives, for the dead, for the living, to make us wealthy, to make us happy. Some of us pray for a healthier natural environment; some of us try to create a healthier natural environment. When it comes down to it, though, it’s really all about taking what we want, so long as we can afford it.
The predominant culture is one that certainly puts humans at the centre of things, so it’s clear that humans cannot be irrelevant, but does this culture really suggest humans are vital? In this culture, wars are started and countries are invaded, within and beyond its cultural boundaries. In this culture, only some people have access to universal health care, and commercial pressure is encouraging those countries that do have it to privatise their health provision. In this culture, heavy metals are released into the water and air; organophosphates and other long-lived human toxic chemicals are widely used in poorly controlled conditions; corporations lobby to prevent the control of cancer-causing substances. In this culture humans are warming the Earth as a by-product of the commercialism that dominates the cultural symbols we flock to: in the shopping malls, on the television and in our homes. The implication is that some humans are vital to this culture, but not all of them.
One more way of judging the cultural importance of humanity is to look at the aspirations of humans: what it is they want to achieve in the long run. It is certainly not a universal truth that all humans aspire to something beyond living their lives in a regular way: what can you possibly aspire to if your life is deeply fulfilling? In Western cultures, on the other hand, aspirations to greatness have driven technological and social development to places where, without the desire for greatness, they would never have reached – for better or worse. In Western educational systems, and also those of many other modern cultures, it is assumed that people want to “become” something. Presumably many peoples’ aspirations are going to be cut tragically short due to the kinds of activities I mentioned above; but there must be more than just commerce if humans really are Vital.
Michio Kaku, author of Parallel Worlds, is a highly respected cosmologist who dabbles in philosophy. He views humans as having enormous potential for good, even beyond the lifespan of the Earth, but has severe doubts about our current efforts to realise that potential. Beyond carrying out useful work and giving or receiving love – two vital ingredients (he says) in ensuring humans are fulfilled – he sees two other key factors that, in my mind, make the difference between whether humans are Vital or just Relevant: “First, to fulfil whatever talents we are born with. However blessed we are by fate with different abilities and strengths, we should try to develop them to the fullest rather than allow them to atrophy and decay.”
“Second, we should try to leave the world a better place than when we entered it. As individuals, we can make a difference, whether it is to probe the secrets of Nature, to clean up the environment and work for peace and social justice, or to nurture the inquisitive, vibrant spirit of the young by being a mentor and a guide.”
Does this culture fulfil all of Michio Kaku’s requirements? If so, then I can, without hesitation, pronounce humans as being Vital. But it’s not true, is it? The culture does not truly care for the environment; it does not give equal opportunity for all to fulfil the range of their talents; it does not provide widespread provision for nurturing mentors and guides. It does not even value love in any obvious capacity: certainly nowhere near as much as it values economic work. The 2005 European Working Conditions Survey found that an average of 83 percent of workers were either “very satisfied” or “satisfied” with their working conditions. Interestingly, when asked about job opportunities to learn and grow (mentoring and guiding), only 54 percent of respondents agreed that this was a factor in job satisfaction. For some reason, an awful lot of people don’t see work as a means of self-improvement.
In some cultures humans are considered to be no more than Relevant, largely because the rest of life is considered to be just as important. In other cultures humans are considered to be transcendent – right at the top of existence – yet such cultures also manage to treat the natural environment with sufficient care as to not being grievously damaged. The predominant culture, in which exists the majority of financially wealthy nations, and is having an increasing influence on billions more people, seems to put humans right at the centre of things; but somehow it has conspired to treat the majority of humans as not really important at all.
Is Nothing For Free In The Free World?
For about a dozen years I commuted into London to work. In the last two or three years before leaving paid work for good, and saying goodbye to the unwelcome commute, my evening walk from the office to the station was interspersed with calls for me to take a free newspaper. There were two main vendors: the one at the beginning of my walk would lazily thrust a London Paper into my hand, only for it to be batted away — every day, without fail. The one just round the corner from the station would call out, “Free Lite!”, but make no atempt to hand me a paper.
I took neither. These are not newspapers, they are the means by which advertisers sell their dreams to people who have lives so empty they need filling with stuff — gadgets, holidays, fitness clubs, cars, three piece suites…all padding with no content. The “free” papers eagerly taken by commuters are not free at all; they are gateways into the consumer’s soul, and the advertisers pay top dollar for entry.
Think about the next “buy one, get one free” offer you see. Why are they offering it; what is in it for the seller? The “free” item tempts the buyer into taking something they would otherwise ignore; it changes their behaviour and habits. It creates loyalty. The seller knows exactly what it is doing — that “free” item will pay off in the end.
This has got me thinking about what “free” means. In a commercial sense, nothing is for free — commerce and, more widely, the global economy, has to grow in order to survive, therefore even staying still will be catastrophic for the system. When you read or hear about growth “stagnating” this negative turn of phrase is intentional — without economic growth, civilization collapses. We are sold the lie that we need growth and, boy, are we sold it big time. Believe me, no company would give anything away for free unless they thought it would lead to a profit.
I am a pariah. My world is so cheap that I am considered to be economically non-viable. I am contributing to the contraction of the global economy because my net consumption of material goods has dramatically reduced, year-on-year over the past 5 years. I am having a new door installed at the back of the house — it came from my brother-in-law who was blocking up a doorway, which meant that a door I needed to replace the one that is rotting away didn’t have to be bought. I am growing my own vegetables — a few seeds, some compost and some rainwater and I am buying less food from the shops. We are having a wood burner installed at the end of the week, and much of that wood will come from people who want to get rid of scrap — I will not be buying much wood at all; nor will I be buying the gas that would otherwise have been used to heat my house.
There are few things that are free — clean air comes at a premium where most people live; clean water is at the behest of the privatised water company rather than public wells and boreholes; wildlife has to pay its way if it is to survive rather than be desecrated by “development”. But some things are really free, and I’m really enjoying myself making sure I get as much out of them as possible — and screwing the system into the bargain.
It’s The End Of The World As We Know It
And I have mixed feelings about the whole thing. With oil prices skyrocketing, the Iraq war spiraling downward into an ever more dismal abyss,
the economy falling apart, and to top it all off the specter of global climate crisis ready to finish us off it would seem that the last thing we want to hear is that people are living shorter lives. But that appears to be just what is happening.
A new study shows that there are large parts of our country where the average life span is getting shorter. The main culprits seem to be “side effects” of our lavish life styles. Lung cancer from pollution, diabetes and heart attacks from eating too much food. Depressing, but revealing.
What Did the Researchers Do and Find?
The researchers looked at differences in death rates between all counties in US states plus the District of Columbia over four decades, from 1961 to 1999. They obtained the data on number of deaths from the National Center for Health Statistics, and they obtained data on the number of people living in each county from the US Census. The NCHS did not provide death data after 2001. They broke the death rates down by sex and by disease to assess trends over time for women and men, and for different causes of death.
Over these four decades, the researchers found that the overall US life expectancy increased from 67 to 74 years of age for men and from 74 to 80 years for women. Between 1961 and 1983 the death rate fell in both men and women, largely due to reductions in deaths from cardiovascular disease (heart disease and stroke). During this same period, 1961–1983, the differences in death rates among/across different counties fell. However, beginning in the early 1980s the differences in death rates among/across different counties began to increase. The worst-off counties no longer experienced a fall in death rates, and in a substantial number of counties, mortality actually increased, especially for women, a shift that the researchers call “the reversal of fortunes.” This stagnation in the worst-off counties was primarily caused by a slowdown or halt in the reduction of deaths from cardiovascular disease coupled with a moderate rise in a number of other diseases, such as lung cancer, chronic lung disease, and diabetes, in both men and women, and a rise in HIV/AIDS and homicide in men. The researchers’ key finding, therefore, was that the differences in life expectancy across different counties initially narrowed and then widened.
What Do these Findings Mean?
The findings suggest that beginning in the early 1980s and continuing through 1999 those who were already disadvantaged did not benefit from the gains in life expectancy experienced by the advantaged, and some became even worse off. The study emphasizes how important it is to monitor health inequalities between different groups, in order to ensure that everyone—and not just the well-off—can experience gains in life expectancy. Although the “reversal of fortune” that the researchers found applied to only a minority of the population, the authors argue that their study results are troubling because an oft-stated aim of the US health system is the improvement of the health of “all people, and especially those at greater risk of health disparities”
So there you go, the rich get rich cause the problems and then don’t let the poor people in on any of the solution. Wee! Sounds like great fun.
Human beings like to pride themselves on all the fun and interesting ideas they have. I am one of them, when I read a great book of hear a great song I am uplifted and find beauty in the human condition. But we have forgotten one important fact, nature couldn’t give a shit. Thats right, natural selection, physics, chemistry, the sun, the moon, gravity (nature), doesn’t give two warm turds about humanity.
If every human on this planet were to vanish suddenly it wouldn’t mean a hill of beans to some bacteria living around a thermal vent on the bottom of some ocean. Some dogs might care for a couple of weeks, but they would soon move on to running in packs returning slowly to wolf like behavior.
The sad honest truth of it all is the only thing on this planet the really truly cares about people, are other people. And they can’t even be bothered to do that very often. When people talk about “saving the earth” and “protecting the environment” they really mean “keep this planet habitable to human beings.”
If a global war, or giant climate crisis killed off all the humans, and most of the rest of the species on this planet, the earth would shrug for a couple of million years, and nature would just keep on trucking. Some sort of squid or bacteria or tiny mouse would survive and keep right on evolving to meet whatever climate shows up. Human beings however are a highly complex, and therefor highly fragile species that could easily be wiped out by any number of things.
We are dependent on so many natural things, food, air, water, predictable climate, that if any one of these systems gets out of whack the rest soon fall apart. The next time you hear some hippy environmentalists squawking on and on about how you have to save this owl, or this river, or stop global warming, remember they aren’t really trying to help an owl, or a river, or the climate, they are trying to help YOU.
Ching Hai: Supreme Master…Of Hypocrisy
If I’m not here tomorrow, do not weep, I will have been struck down — in my disrespect — by Ching Hai, Supreme Master, and self-styled “God’s Direct Contact”. A mere lightning bolt will not be sufficient: I expect a plague of SUVs.
A few day’s ago I received an e-mail from Shaam Ven, presumably a follower of GDC (well, if the leader of the industrial West is GOP, then why not?) and a believer that any message of concern is a good message:
Hi.
I read about your website. I wanted to email you immediately about Supreme Master Ching Hai’s efforts to halt global warming. Supreme Master Ching Hai is a God-Realized, living, enlightened Master, who initiates Truth Seekers into the Quan Yin meditation. To learn more about Master and the Quan Yin meditation, please go to www.godsdirectcontact.org or www.godsdirectcontact.com.
Master’s message is simple: if we human beings don’t take steps to halt global warming within the next two years, after that, it will be too late and we could see all of life vanish from this planet by the year 2012.
[Read the rest at The Unsuitablog]
The Ethics Of Climate Change
This is a guest post by James Garvey from the Royal Institute of Philosophy This is an introduction to his new book The Ethics of Climate Change.
…
Thinking about the moral dimension of climate change matters a lot. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has this to say about the role of science in our thinking about what to do about our warming world:
‘Natural, technical, and social sciences can provide essential information and evidence needed for decisions on what constitutes “dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system”. At the same time, such decisions are value judgments determined through socio-political processes, taking into account considerations such as development, equity, and sustainability, as well as uncertainties and risk.’ (IPCC (2001) TAR, http://www.ipcc.ch.)
Science can give us a grip on the facts, but we need more than that if we want to act on the basis of those facts. The something more which is needed involves values. Climatologists can tell us what is happening to the planet and why it is happening, they can even say with some confidence what will happen in the years to come. What we do about all of this, though, depends on what we think is right, what we value, what matters to us. You cannot find that sort of stuff in an ice core. You have to think your way through it.
The Ethics of Climate Change is a start on those sorts of thoughts. It is neither exhaustive nor comprehensive, not the last word but a few first words. It is an introduction, in plain language, to the ethics of climate change, to where the moral weight falls on our changing planet and how that weight ought to translate into action. It has something to do with the conviction that our societies and our lives have to change, and the role of value in the changes ahead.
In the end, I suppose, I’ve left a lot of the reflection to you. Applied philosophy, as it is sometimes called, concerns itself with practical moral problems. Such things as abortion, euthanasia, genetic modification, health care, cloning, and on and on raise philosophical questions which might be of interest to just about anyone. However, you can, all the while, be a little thankful that the problems are way over there, off at a safe distance. No one is about to clone you. With luck, you’ll never be faced with problems having to do with abortion or euthanasia or the rest. However, you are lumped with the problem of climate change. It’s a moral problem for you, right now. You have some decisions to make about how to live, some choices which concern your everyday life. There is some moral pressure on every one of us to come to some conclusions. The Ethics of Climate Change recognizes that pressure and makes a start on dealing with the moral demands associated with the fact of climate change.
…
I will be reviewing his book later, but his intro raises a very interesting question. There are many very real ethical and philosophical questions that are raised by climate change. Do we try and keep developing nations from developing because they will destroy the planet? Even though we did the same before? Do we have a moral obligation to reduce green house emissions? What about stewardship of the earth for future generation? What do you think. I would like to use this thread as a discussion. What ethical and philosophical questions do you see being raised by global warming and climate change?
How Americans Spend Their Money
The stock market went up over 400 points today…What are we spending all that money on.
(click for larger image)
Pretty sick how much of our money seems to be heading towards the rich, while the poor keep getting more poor. It is going to be very hard to fix the problems of this world if the income distribution continues onward in this way.
Did You Know?
An official update to the original “Shift Happens” video from Karl Fisch and Scott McLeod, this June 2007 update includes new and updated statistics, thought-provoking questions and a fresh design. For more information, or to join the conversation, Content by Karl Fisch and Scott McLeod.
100 Dollar Oil, Is It Time To Freak Out Yet?
So yesterday sometime around mid-day someone paid $100 for a barrel of oil, oil closed the day just under 100 bucks, but this is the first time anyone has crossed the $100 point. While this is not the highest oil has ever cost if you do some inflation math, in the 80’s it hit $102 and change, it is the first time we have crossed that nice round $100 mark.
So what? What does this mean. Well the most obvious answer is that oil is going to cost more, and that this probably wont be the highest it goes. That means that everything that runs on oil is going to cost more, everything made of oil is going to cost more, and everything that needs oil to get it from point a to point b will cost more. To save you the trouble of thinking of that list here are the things that wont cost more; wind, sunlight, and um thats about it.
So we are going to be a little more broke. That milk will cost a couple cents more, the gas tank will be a bit more painful to fill, that plastic crap from China will cost more, all of it will lead to us going broke. We will mindlessly march forward living the exact same lifestyle, racking up bigger and bigger credit card bills, continuing to buy larger and larger SUV’s, and moving our homes further and further from where we work. Eventually society will break down, zombies will rise up, and everyone will live like Mad Max and be forced to drink their own urine…Yea right, I have more faith in people than that.
High oil = lifestyle changes. whether or not people like it they are going to have to start changing the way they live. They simply wont be able to afford the same old lifestyle anymore. There are two ways you can go about making change. One, wait till the last possible moment and make the change super fast (this often means it costs way more, and is way more painful). Two, get ahead of the curve and make the changes in easily manageable increments (much less cost, and way less painful).
We could also be making some industrial sized lemon aid out of these mega global warming lemons. Why not jump on this opportunity to create an entire green economy based around efficiency, lowering our consumption and renewable energy. I wonder how long it will take large corporations to figure out that the best way to compete against their rivals will be to stop using fossil fuel.
What do you think $100 oil means? How high will the cost of destroying ourselves have to get before we stop doing it?
High Cost Of Oil And Sub-Prime Mortgage Bust Combine To Show Folly Of Sprawl
So what do you get when you mix high transportation costs (high cost of gas) with falling home values (sub-prime mortgage debacle) I say you get the the prefect lens through which to view the folly of sprawl. Specifically suburbs and exburbs (think suburbs on steroids, with a wall around then, even father out in the middle of nowhere).
I was listening to NPR this morning about how housing values were falling all over, but not so much in places close to big cities. It seems that living near or in a big city still has value, while the mc-mansion suburb home values are dropping like flies.
Many people spend an hour or more a day commuting back and forth from their suburban home to their city job. Get up, get in the car, drive in traffic, find and pay for parking, work, fill up with gas because you burned it all in morning traffic, sit in afternoon traffic, get home late and exhausted, rinse and repeat. Does this sound like your life? Imagine if your work day could be something like this, get up, eat breakfast, walk two miles to work (or ride your bike), work, walk home, enjoy your evening. This could be the perfect time to move back towards a city center.
Living close to where you work has the added benefit of allowing you to go home for lunch, keeping you healthy (all that walking/riding is good for the love handles), keeps money in your pocket and carbon out of the air (less car rides). Not to mention the mental savings of not having to sit in traffic all that time. Living in a sustainable but dense way leads to a lot of cultural and ecological and economic benefits. Not to mention the fact that it leaves more of nature free to be well, natural.
The growth of suburbs happened right along with the growth of large national highway systems (at the expensive of rail traffic, something I am a fan of). They also saw the emptying out of our city centers of mostly white rich people, leading to slums, self imposed segregation and a whole host of other unintended consequences.
This might have not seemed that bad (to some) when gas was cheap, and the earth wasn’t over heating. But now that our nations highways are crammed full of cars belching green house emissions into the air and our homes are 30 (or more) miles from ANYTHING well I think we got a little out of hand.
Could we be seeing the first stages in the inevitable death by neglect of the suburbs? What will an abandoned suburb look like? What do you think? Is this the beginning of the end for suburbs and sprawl?
(Bonus conversation starter: Would the deployment of cheap and renewably powered electric cars that had the same range as gas cars cause even more sprawl?)
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