What about green jobs? Will scary high energy prices not stimulate this sector? We live in a country where there is so much waste. Which means there is a lot we can afford to throw away. Isn't it a good thing if we are forced to be more conservative and resourceful? Can a crisis not present an opportunity to radically restructure our priorities.
I'm not advocating for Shock Doctrine. The shock is already here. Do we try to undo it and return to the status quo, which is frankly going to lead to more shock? "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
I've even heard someone talking about starting a turbine industry in Detroit to replace jobs lost from the auto industry.
There has to still be a handful of visionaries who are looking for long-term investments. The 20th Century had its Fords. The 21st has its Guillets. Right? "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
Green for All "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
I'm not delighting in people being financially slaughtered.
Sorry, should've been more clear: I wasn't suggesting you were delighting in it. Rest assured that there was a lot of self-criticism in my comment, because I'm probably more guilty than most when it comes to not considering how other parts of the world are not able to cope with it while enjoying listening to energy slobs here squeal about gas prices.
I'm not sure I agree that high gas prices have sent the country into a "going green" frenzy. We've spent a week talking about drilling off the coast of Florida. I think they'll push green energy eventually, but the country has a way to go before it gets religion on this. I'm sure there's a disconnect, as seems to be a constant this year, between discussion at the national level in the press and what's going on at the local level.
And things are probably different in Chicago from DC. Here people are still in the Bitch & Moan stage of energy consciousness. More people are taking public transit, but many are not, and many still believe cheap energy will return.
I'm glad to see higher energy. That's the only way we're going to get green energy to market. The dirty shit has to be made too expensive. Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers. - George Carlin
The shock is already here.
You know, I've the creeping suspicion it's not. It's still coming. What the world is currently seeing could be the proverbial iceberg tip.
Not that I'm pessimist - yet. I think an energy crisis does have the potential to reshape western consumerism dramatically. For better, or worse.
(Like the sig!)
What's the scenario where we stop using obscene amounts of pollution-producing energy and we all live? Appealing to the goodness of people's hearts seems to have a lower success rate than appealing to their pocket books. "Pretending that you already know the answer when you don't is not actually very helpful." ~Migeru.
As will global warming.
What's it going to take? Losing New Orleans didn't do anything to spark a conversation, let alone spur action. Atlanta and Charlotte coming pretty damned close to running out of drinking water didn't do anything but lead the wingers to stand in front of the Georgia State House to pray. Australia is now in what seems to be a permanent state of drought.
People aren't going to get climate change until West Antarctica or Greenland go, and have Wolf Blitzer leading us with video of the Potomac reaching the White House steps. Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers. - George Carlin
One shudders to think of the consequences of submerging much of the Jersey shore, home as it is to refineries, chemical plants and old manufactures. Same for Texas City and the Houston Ship Channel. Somehow I doubt that a bath is what the environmental doctor ordered here. As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
$300 a barrel will very likely kill people if it happens suddenly.
It is precisely if we go green that we'll avoid the worse fates you mention. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
