Like the illusion of Wall Street, with its vast and powerful investment banks, now shuttered, China too is an illusion perpetuated by the Globalists that gave us the 15,000 mile Caesar salad, poisoned cat food and lead based paint on babies' pacifiers. Like the illusion that money would come from thin air to always push housing prices higher, China has spent a generation pursuing its illusion. Pursuing an unattainable dream to be like the West, while 6000 years of its carefully shepherded top soil blows into the sea.
The period from 1950 to 2000 will be remembered as the Golden Era of modern civilization, the pinnacle reached by humans after a million years of evolution. This brilliant half-century was sponsored largely by fossil fuels, especially oil, which brought unprecedented economic growth, plentiful transportation and a rich and diverse lifestyle.
But the new millennium has brought the end of cheap oil, and civilization is suddenly teetering on the edge of collapse. Even if we manage to scrape through (and it would require heroic efforts), life will change. We're at one of the most important turning points in history, yet we persistently ignore the coming meltdown and just want to party on. Nero would be proud.
So, why is civilization teetering? First, peak oil has arrived. There is no better signal than the price of oil, which has skyrocketed past $130 and shows no sign of slowing. Some shrug and claim there's still a lot left, technology will find it and extract it. Others, as represented by the editors of Maclean's magazine, feel that we have grappled with costly oil before and by applying determined conservation and new efficiencies, we will cope.
Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Peak oil, this two-syllable piece of jargon, is another way of saying we are on the threshold of a major crisis. From now on the supply of oil will diminish each year, but population and demand will continue to grow. This is truly frightening because our modern industrial society is built on and totally dependent on this versatile fuel. It is the foundation for transportation, industry, agriculture, fishing and much more. As the gap between what economies and nations need and what they can get widens, bidding wars will erupt (they already have) and then shooting wars (one already has).
-snip-
As frank an assessment of the current situation as I've come across. 2 pages and covers food shortages also. _________________ My new Peak Oil T-Shirt Design
Joined: Jun 30, 2005 Posts: 769 Location: northern California
Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2008 6:52 pm Post subject: Re: Civilization's golden era is teetering on collapse
Here's some more doomer porn, provided by Leanan at the Oildrum Drumbeat, today:
"U.S. 'meltdown' Imminent says Fortis
June 28 08, 09:10
by our correspondent
BRUSSELS / AMSTERDAM (DFT) - Fortis expects within the next few days to weeks the complete collapse of the U.S. financial markets. That explains the bank insurers € 8 billion intervention Thursday. "We are ready at the last minute. What's happening in the United States is much worse than we thought," said Fortis chairman Maurice Lippens. Fortis expects bankruptcies of 6000 U.S. banks that now lack coverage. "But Citigroup, General Motors, there begins a complete meltdown."Fortis announcement _________________ "When men yield up the privilege of thinking, the last shadow of liberty quits the horizon."
Thomas Paine
Joined: Aug 11, 2005 Posts: 253 Location: Vancouver, BC
Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2008 10:15 pm Post subject: Re: Civilization's golden era is teetering on collapse
I live within the readership of the Vancouver Sun. Last year my city had community workshop and ads for peak oil preparation. We have known about it and talked about it for a few years now.
Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2008 11:12 pm Post subject: Re: Civilization's golden era is teetering on collapse
Do folks think we have really reached peak oil (in general not just for light sweet crude)? Do they expect more of a choppy plateau or a fall-off behavior coming up. The famous chart indicates an all-liquids peak by 2010 so we are just about there now. I think we have 18 months until things get interesting.
g
Joined: Aug 03, 2006 Posts: 4338 Location: Graceland
Posted: Sat Jun 28, 2008 11:29 pm Post subject: Re: Civilization's golden era is teetering on collapse
TreebeardsUncle wrote:
Do folks think we have really reached peak oil (in general not just for light sweet crude)? Do they expect more of a choppy plateau or a fall-off behavior coming up. The famous chart indicates an all-liquids peak by 2010 so we are just about there now. I think we have 18 months until things get interesting.
g
9/11 was really the turning point. Things have been deteriorating since then.
It was 9/11 and after when pretty much all of the tailwinds turned into headwinds. The peak oil story is only one of several long term sweet deals that are now in the process of unwinding.
I don't think that 9/11 was designed to be a turning point in history, but it really was.
Peak oil obviously doesn't have a whole lot to do with terrorism (the peak of oil production would occur whether terrorists were operating or not), but the fact that these happen to be the bad guys that the keystone cops are chasing around right now is weaving itself into the peak oil story in a way that will make it appear as if 9/11 was the tipping point, and whether this is coincidental or not, that event is probably going to be seen as the point when the world took a turn for the worse and things never really got better after that.
Remember that peak oil is not a calamity that will unfold in isolation. Peak oil travels with a rough crowd, which includes:
- environmental destruction
- overpopulation leading to mass starvation
- resource wars
- hyperinflation/destruction of fiat currencies
- economic recession/depression on global scale
It would be possible to argue that the tipping point was the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, but I wouldn't put the date that things started to really come apart much later than that. _________________
Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2008 12:29 am Post subject: Re: Civilization's golden era is teetering on collapse
BigTex wrote,
Quote:
Peak oil travels with a rough crowd, which includes:
- environmental destruction
- overpopulation leading to mass starvation
- resource wars
- hyperinflation/destruction of fiat currencies
- economic recession/depression on global scale
I'm going to do a George Carlins (with the 10 commandments) on you here and reduce your rough crowd of 6 to 4.
Joined: May 06, 2006 Posts: 873 Location: Tustin, CA
Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2008 12:45 am Post subject: Re: Civilization's golden era is teetering on collapse
dunewalker wrote:
Here's some more doomer porn, provided by Leanan at the Oildrum Drumbeat, today:
"U.S. 'meltdown' Imminent says Fortis
June 28 08, 09:10
by our correspondent
BRUSSELS / AMSTERDAM (DFT) - Fortis expects within the next few days to weeks the complete collapse of the U.S. financial markets. That explains the bank insurers € 8 billion intervention Thursday. "We are ready at the last minute. What's happening in the United States is much worse than we thought," said Fortis chairman Maurice Lippens. Fortis expects bankruptcies of 6000 U.S. banks that now lack coverage. "But Citigroup, General Motors, there begins a complete meltdown."Fortis announcement
Is the Fortis post available in english? _________________ Skeptical scrutiny in both Science and Religion is the means by which deep thoughts are winnowed from deep nonsense-Carl Sagan
Joined: May 10, 2007 Posts: 3358 Location: Resiliency Farm
Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2008 12:51 am Post subject: Re: Civilization's golden era is teetering on collapse
SILENTTODD wrote:
dunewalker wrote:
Here's some more doomer porn, provided by Leanan at the Oildrum Drumbeat, today:
"U.S. 'meltdown' Imminent says Fortis
June 28 08, 09:10
by our correspondent
BRUSSELS / AMSTERDAM (DFT) - Fortis expects within the next few days to weeks the complete collapse of the U.S. financial markets. That explains the bank insurers € 8 billion intervention Thursday. "We are ready at the last minute. What's happening in the United States is much worse than we thought," said Fortis chairman Maurice Lippens. Fortis expects bankruptcies of 6000 U.S. banks that now lack coverage. "But Citigroup, General Motors, there begins a complete meltdown."Fortis announcement
Posted: Sun Jun 29, 2008 1:52 am Post subject: Re: Civilization's golden era is teetering on collapse
TreebeardsUncle wrote:
Do folks think we have really reached peak oil (in general not just for light sweet crude)? Do they expect more of a choppy plateau or a fall-off behavior coming up. The famous chart indicates an all-liquids peak by 2010 so we are just about there now. I think we have 18 months until things get interesting.
g
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