February 19, 2004
Strange Bedfellows and Discipline
Watching the Sierra Club and the United Auto workers crawl into bed together, fully clothed I assure you, we wouldn’t want Michael Powell to investigate us for wardrobe failure, is a study in cautious agreement. The process of defining fuel consumption standards for automobiles is a contentious issue for this nation. We are willing, If the Bush Budget prevails, to discipline the poor by putting them out on the streets by the hundreds of thousands. We are not willing to discipline automobile producers by requiring responsible fuel use standards that may be all that save the US Auto Industry when the oil gets scarcer.
Thankfully the Sierra Club and the UAW have come out against the latest effort to emasculate the current fuel efficiency fantasies of the Federal Government. Scarce oil! What am I, a conspiracy theorist? Well yes I do believe that there is a conspiracy of ignorance now and then in this world that leads every nation to make bad choices about policy. Fuel efficiency matters in the USA, the cost of gasoline is heading above two dollars this year and much higher over the next few years.
If you take the most optimistic projections of the total amount of oil that can be produced at a reasonable cost, oil supply creates no problem until 2044, forty years from today. Then we run out of oil quickly. Those projections are excessively optimistic and neglect to use analytical tools that can define how production of any non-renewable natural resource will proceed. M. King Hubbert, an oil geologist, devised mathematical tools in the 1950’s to project when the US supply of oil would begin to diminish. They turn out to apply equally well to any natural resource which can be used up faster than nature can replace it. The numbers showed Hubbert that oil production in the USA would peak in the 1970’s and it did, it has been declining ever since. Now this feat of forethought did not bring Mr. Hubbert praise from the elders of the oil industry. In fact he was vilified, cursed and laughed at but his analysis was correct. He pointed the way for others who today are telling us that oil production worldwide will peak during this decade. They could even be off by ten years or so. Do you feel lucky enough to buy a new Humvee and test this proposition, do you Cowboy?
The Sierra club and the Auto Workers are going to be sleeping together in a cold bed of coal if these oil geologists are right; and history is on their side. Hubbert’s tools have worked to pick out the peak of production of any natural resource to which they have been applied. They simply require using close to accurate assumptions about the total amount of a given resource available. The mathematical curve that describes how limited resources are produced over time turns out to be shaped like a bell. And we are almost certainly within ten years of the worldwide peak of oil production from cheap sources. We can stretch out that curve a little so that the bell is flat on top if we invest a lot of money into producing oil from shale and tar sands. Canada has a large deposit of tar sands that will help us flatten out the top of that bell shaped curve but it won’t keep going up regardless of what we do. Demand for oil is about to start rising faster than supply. That will keep happening with only very short term interruptions until it is all used up. Little Red Riding Hood, there is a wolf waiting to see you, please hurry to him in your big red SUV subsidized by our nice big bushy government.
The Bush Administration does believe in fiscal discipline though, it is cutting social programs by $4.9 billion to make up for its multi-trillion dollar tax cuts. Of course these spending cuts, if they are applied to the programs designated in the new budget, will put hundreds of thousands of poor families over the edge. Many will fall out of housing subsidy programs and as many as 250,000 could wind up out on the street. It no doubt serves them right for being poor in the first place but it will not affect the deficit projected to be at least $450 billion this year. The deficit is a hundred times the cuts slated for social programs. Those cuts if they are enacted by Congress will cause hardship to hundreds of thousands without helping reduce our deficit by more than 1% of the total. That is Fiscal discipline of the highest order compared to the discipline imposed by our fuel efficiency standards.
Am I saying the Bush Administration is undisciplined, perish the thought. George W has always shown a fine level of discipline as President, he gets to all of his meetings on time. And the whole cabinet no doubt appreciates his stern discipline when it is applied to them. Cheney has probably often said in his private conversations with Rummy, “I wish the kid would let up once in a while, he controls this White House with an iron grip.” Karl Rove probably replies from the closet, “Yeah fellows, I really wish he would let me out of here but his discipline is legendary from his days in College” Rummy probably replies, “give the kid a break, these are desperate times with Osama still on the loose and Iraq resisting our tough love the way they have since we freed them from Saddam.” “You know Karl, it would help if you eased up on the kid’s language tutoring for a while, he’s starting to get nervous when he’s talking about the election.” “I think he might be worried about Osama staying alive long enough to last until October” Karl’s reply, still coming from the closet, “don’t worry fellows he is in safe hands and the portable dialysis machine is working fine.” “He’ll make it to October with room to spare.”
Yeah and I can just hear Condi and Colin trying to find a way to lighten the load for our tough little Wartime President. “Colin, do you suppose if we named a Oil Tanker after the Big Guy he would feel better”? “No Condi, he has the discipline to get him through this election if we just stand by him and keep the public aware of how dangerous those WMD Programs imagined by Saddam really were to us.” “Imagine that guy imagining weapons that could have proved to be an imminent threat if he really could have produced them!” Yeah, they are really disciplined in this White House in a way no one can question. Especially if you listen to Fox and read the Wall Street Journal every morning as all good Patriots do here during the war on Terror. God bless and keep you all safe and sound in these undisciplined times when disciplined leadership can mean so much.
Henri—
I love the phrase “Conspiracy of ignorance.”
As a good friend of mine, and former District Clerk would say, “That’s fourteen karat!”
Posted by: Vince Leibowitz at February 19, 2004 11:36 AMThere is a silver lining in escalating petrol prices. Alternate fuels especially of the environmentally more friendly kind, become cost competitive. I have been waiting for 2 decades now for oil prices to finally skyrocket and make solar and wind and thermal mass far more cost competitive thus making those technologies prevalent. That in turn will radically lower consequential costs from petrol based energy, toxic cleanups, health care system demand dropping, and insurance rates lowering due to much safer energies eliminating fire and explosive hazards. Roads will require less maintenance since less petrol will be moved on our roads, etc. etc.
Higher gas prices? I say bring ‘em on.
All this enviromental beating around the bush is getting nowhere. Fuel efficiency won’t solve a damn thing. There are too many people on the planet. Earth cannot handle 6 billion people. That’s the whole truth. Plain and simple. You know it, I know it. If you want to do something about the enviroment you should should support “skull and Bones” or “Church of Fandel”. Both these organizations want to reduce the population by population control.
This is a statement by the Church of Fandel.
—-We all know that Earth cannot cope with 6 billion human beings. The polution, the scarcity of goods, the enviromental destruction. But also the urbanisation which tries to make humans live in such a way they geneticly cannot live in. Humans are social people. They like to be near other people, but too many people causes alienation or friction. The counter natural city life is the cause of all the mental illness that’s overwhelming this stressed and increasingly violent nation. If the population could be reduced from 6 billion to 2 billion in a 100 years, using the Chinese 1 child a family policy everywhere, the quality of life would increase tremendously. Earth could recover and sustain human life indefinitely.
Ricky, you are of course absolutely correct. Buddhists, Taoists, Atheists etc. can implement such a strategy as you pointed out by the Chinese example. Christians of course will jump through millions of hoops to avoid this obvious conclusion.
Their motto - go forth and multiply - and replace, in time, all other religious and non-religious groups - besides, more population means more jobs, more market demand, and jobs and demand will solve everything else. And of course, in western society, religion and politics have been bedfellows for 17 hundred years.
What the human race needs is a really good cataclysmic event - hang in there, nature is cooking up and trying our various options now, new flu strains, dramatic increases in UV radiation, mad cow, ricin and anthrax via mail, international conflicts in growing numbers. She will come up with something, just a matter of time before we push her too far.
Posted by: David R. Remer at February 19, 2004 04:33 PMYour sky-is-falling view of the environment is completely unwarranted. I would recommend you read “The Coming Age of Environmental Optimism”, or just see the shorter version of it in the Progress Paradox (Gregg Easterbrook).
Misha, we know there are many books written by “hope springs eternal” Christians who believe God gave humans domination over all other life and therefore God will not let us destroy it.
But, then there are just as many if not more, scientists writing books with measured evidence of complete extinction of species we barely know anything about. I even read one person here say that all the ones going extinct are either unimportant and not commercially viable, anyway. I laughed sadly, what hope is there with that kind of thinking?
As a father who does the shopping, the real world is saying mercury levels in shell fish and albacore tuna are too high to be feeding to young children - so I don’t buy that anymore. Quit buying been some 10 years ago when I learned of the brain/spinal cattle waste being fed back to cattle, and the risk it posed. That left chicken and pork, and we won’t eat fat saturated meats so that leaves pork and occasional veal, eggs, beans, and a few other veggies available for protein.
Granted, I still have a relatively safe selecton to choose from, but less today than yesterday, and we aren’t moving back to the good old days. Noise pollution alone we learned was causing problems for us in the city. Since we moved to the country, we are more relaxed and I don’t have to take high blood pressure medicince and my wife is less stressed. My daughter’s allergies are worse since we are in the midst of a cedar forest, but, what the hell, it’s all a trade off anyway.
Posted by: David R. Remer at February 19, 2004 06:44 PMKerry promises Hoffa Jr. he will Drill in ANWR:
MATTHEWS: How about ANWR? You guys want to see ANWR because you want to see guys working in your business. I guess there‘s a lot of Teamsters jobs up there lined up and organized, if you could put a pipeline up to the Alaska wilderness. He is against that.
HOFFA: Well, we talked about that.
He says, look, I am against ANWR, but I am going to put that pipeline in and we‘re going to drill like never before.
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: What, are they going to run water through it?
(CROSSTALK)
HOFFA: … more jobs than the ANWR would have ever created.
MATTHEWS: What are they going to run through the pipeline?
HOFFA: And that‘s the position he‘s taking.
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: But he is against drilling up there. What are they going to run through the pipeline?
HOFFA: Well, they are going to drill all over, according to him. And he says, we‘re going to be drilling all over the United States. And he says that is going to create more jobs.
(CROSSTALK)
(LAUGHTER)
MATTHEWS: You got that guy rolling.
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: What position was he in when he made all these promises?
(CROSSTALK)
(LAUGHTER)
MATTHEWS: It just seems amazing that he has turned around on NAFTA, turned around on WTO, turned around on ANWR, anything to get the Teamsters.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4302564/
Posted by: Heywood Jabangme at February 20, 2004 03:21 AMHeywood, that conversation says NOTHING ! Kerry said he would NOT drill in the Alaskan Nat’l Wildlife Reserve. That is repeated in your the dialogue. Hoffa said the drilling would occur all over - meaning other places than ANWR. Hoffa is asked when and in what capacity Kerry said this - Hoffa did not answer.
You have absolutely nothing hear except words taking up space - no point or perspective is fostered by the quoted dialogue.
David,
It is fairly obvious the point, Kerry promised Hoffa he would drill in ANWR!
Kerry, the environmental candidate sold us out to get the Teamster endorsement!
Hoffa says they are going to build the pipeline! What are they going to pump through it if not oil?
The point is so obvious. Hoffa changes his tune when he realizes he spilled the beans, and, says well they are going to drill all over. All over!
Ok so Kerry says that just for fun we are going to build the pipeline to ANWR but not actually drill for oil there?
Even Mathews concludes at the end that this is amazing.
The perspective is this: Kerry will say anything to get elected, anything, he is a hopeless lying, powdered up wind bag. We are sunk having this guy as a nominee!
What in God’s name is he doing telling the Teamsters President that he is going to drill in ANWR?
I don’t know, it seems to me, and, everyone else that was in the studio that Hoffa spilled the beans about what Kerry promised him behind closed doors.
Posted by: Heywood Jabangme at February 20, 2004 10:51 PMIt is not obvious from the text quoted. But, had I been there, more subtext may have been obvious. I accept that your interpretation of what was meant is what you believe to have been said. But, I have seen far to many a speech heard by opposing parties be interpreted in completely different ways. Same speech and speaker, time and place of delivery, and totally different interpretations.
Psychologists and linguists have been studying this phenomena for many decades and still work at trying to understand how the same words and delivery of them can be interpreted in such different and sometimes, diametrically opposed ways.
Misha, if you truly believe environmental degradation and horrendous consequences to the human species are not in the offing, then by all means, feed your children cow’s milk, eat lots of shell fish and tuna, go for those rare beef steaks, and heaven forbid, you should ever take a water sample from your faucet and send it in for analysis. Perhaps the $10 or $15 it would cost is too much to pay for the truth.
Folks in my county forced a Diamond Shamrock to incur the cost of digging up their tanks and lining them after it was discovered our drinking water from the acquifer was being contaminated by leakage. Guess we really were pretty damned unAmerican on that issue and shouldn’t have oughta hurt their profits for that year, but, don’t you know, that water belonged to all of us, not just the Diamond Shamrock store owner, and most of the folks who went to court were Republican (of course most of this county is Republican). What do you make of that? Such alarmist behavior and sky is falling activity by otherwise really fine folk, eh?
Posted by: David R. Remer at February 21, 2004 03:01 AM
