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279 comments on DrumBeat: August 22, 2006

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dinopello on August 22, 2006 - 9:07am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
The price could hit $300 as Simmons suggests or the price could hit $30 as the guy you mention suggests.  If the pipeline problems are epidemic, if there is a world-wide depression respectively.  It really doesn't change what we ought to be working on - and that is remaking and rebuilding a society that is not dependent on large amounts of energy to do basic stuff of living.  The speculators are interested in price of course, but the fundamental argument is between those that think we need to change the way we live before cicumstances force that change in an ugly way, and those that think we can either continue as we are on fossil fuels or with help of a techno fix.  I know, there are some that think techno fix can buy time while we change the lifestyle part. It could, but it also gives the impression that we can continue business as usual.  

I see Westtexas, you got a shout-out on Kunstler's Daily Grunt.  I'm jealous.  

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westexas on August 22, 2006 - 10:17am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
"I see Westtexas, you got a shout-out on Kunstler's Daily Grunt.  I'm jealous."

I guess that Jim and I are both now persona non grata in certain circles.  

In regard to the conventional wisdom stuff about oil prices,  I keep having this vision of the various members of the "Iron Triangle" linking hands and chanting "We have plenty of oil. .. We have plenty of oil," thinking if they repeat it often enough, it will be true.  

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dinopello on August 22, 2006 - 10:22am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
"When you wish upon a star, makes no difference who you are
Anything your heart desires will come to you

If your heart is in your dreams, no request is too extreme
When you wish upon a star as dreamers do

Like a bolt out of the blue, fate steps in and sees you thru
When you wish upon a star, your dreams come true"

-Jiminy Cricket

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step back on August 22, 2006 - 10:42am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
With respect to petroleum, America has been sleepwalking toward disaster for twenty years. The nation desperately needs a wakeup call, not a fairy tale masquerading as a forecast.

That is the way Simmons & Udall end their EB piece.

Our society is deeply infected with fairy tales. It starts at childhood and goes on and on: Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Beauty and the Beast, Jack and the Oil Beanstalk ...

Our beanstalk. Our Golden Goose: Oil gushing up from the ground, forever and happily ever after.

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fleam on August 22, 2006 - 4:06pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Why the hell is that kid holding a chicken? It is because a goose would be nearly as large as he is?
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step back on August 22, 2006 - 4:49pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
What? They gave him a "chicken"? I can't believe it!

Reminds me of a joke:

Two old friends bump into each other as they walk their dogs in a downtown area. "Hey, let's do drinks at that bar across the street," says one. "Can't, we got these dogs" the other explains. "No problem" says the first, "Still got your sunglasses? OK, then do as I do."

The second guy watches with amazement as his friend puts on a pair of sunglasses and approaches the bouncer. "No dogs allowed." "Oh, I'm sorry. I'm blind. This is my seeing eye dog." Oh sorry man, that's different, go on in.

Second guy tries the same thing. The bouncer says, No way dude, I've never seen a Chiwawa as a seeing eye dog.

What! They gave me a Chee wah wah?

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Leanan on August 22, 2006 - 6:51pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
The Oil Fairy will refill the oil wells after we empty them. But only if you believe! ;-)

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step back on August 22, 2006 - 7:13pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
where can I buy one of these?
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oldhippie on August 22, 2006 - 8:10pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
stepback you gotta move to urban America. I see that babe everyday here in Chicago and a while back I dated her (it was problematic).
Sur it's the same or better in LA San Fran NYC
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Dragonfly41 on August 22, 2006 - 8:14pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
OK Leanan...fess up.  That's really you isn't it.  That's how you can grab all these news articles before anyone else even wakes up every morning.
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dinopello on August 23, 2006 - 10:14am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I am enthralled with the oil fairy.  I would believe anything she told me :)
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step back on August 23, 2006 - 2:17pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Too late. I just spotted Sailorman slipping off from dock with her. He was using his slick (oil) toungue to make her gush and ooze for him. Oil's fair in love and war --war over the oil fairy that is. Better luck at your next bore site. ;-)
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Oil CEO on August 24, 2006 - 1:38am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Oh, man. Every pirate's dream come true. Long ago, and I'm talking long, long ago. I clicked on Leanan's user info and it led to some site with photos, and that was on it. And I always wondered why she hadn't posted it yet. I mean - it's the Oil Fairy. Why wouldn't she post it? It is totally appropriate. And everybody loves The Oil Fairy. My mother used to read me stories about her when I was a kid. Needless to say, I would only trust Leanan with the history and the truth surrounding The Oil Fairy.*

*better protect your rights to name. I've got a screen play almost finished and a comic-book in the works. I'm gonna be snapping up the copyright soon. Last chance.

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Mad Maxout on August 22, 2006 - 9:27pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Naahh. We havn't been sleepwalking toward disaster, but we all took a hit of Ambien and have been sleepdriving!
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westexas on August 22, 2006 - 11:26am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Re: CD of  Simmons/Kunstler Interview 11/1/05

I don't have the transcript yet, but you can now buy the CD (details follow).  Matt and Jim had never met until that night, and I don't think that they had even talked to each other.  Jim was in the studio with Glenn Mitchell at KERA (the local PBS station) and Matt was calling in on a phone line, after giving a speech at the Petroleum Club.  (The previous day, I had driven Jim and John Galvin, a reporter, all over the suburban wasteland that is the DFW Metroplex, in search of little pockets of New Urbanism--a memorable experience, I can assure you.)

In any case, Matt and Jim, coming from vastly different backgrounds, were basically finishing each other's sentences.  I highly recommend this CD.  It's about 50 minutes long, and it is a great way to introduce people to Peak Oil.  They can listen to the CD in their cars going to and from work (a little ironic don't you think?).  

From KERA 90.1:  

KERA 90.1 can provide additional CDs for $10 each. Interested parties should send a check or money order along with details about the program (date, etc.) to:

Talk Show CD Request
KERA 90.1
3000 Harry Hines Blvd.
Dallas, TX 75201

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rwmcalister on August 22, 2006 - 1:48pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
As Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's propaganda minister, famously said, "Repeat a lie often enough and the people will believe it!"
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Hurin on August 22, 2006 - 6:02pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
/I guess that Jim and I are both now persona non grata in certain circles. /

Congratulations.

About a decade ago a man named Alan Sokal became 'persona non grata' in postmodernist circles. In both cases these circles consisted of people believing themself morally superiour to the rest of us.

And in both cases these people are really nothing more than filth.

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Mad Maxout on August 22, 2006 - 9:25pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I just got done reading Geography of Nowhere and Home from Nowhere by Kunstler. Great books about the probrem of suburbanism. We have painted ourselves into a corner with inventing the drive-only society. It's an awful good thing gas don't cost 3 CENTS a gallon. We'd be driving Harriers to commute, and if sprawl is bad with cars, it would be 10 times worse with Harriers.

Compared to all pre-car transportation methods for personal use, it's tantamount to all of us being given pilots licenses and jets by comparison. Could someone with a 50 mile commute do it on a mere bicycle? No. The sheer speed created the sprawl we face today. For those who grew up in the suburbs, 10 miles is close while someone like me who grew up in a city with a carless family would call it appropriately far. But take away the car, and suburbanites are in for a shock! By public transit, a visit to my dad (after a divorce) took all day, but a car trip was like an hour to a town 70 miles away.

An interesting thing about my mindset comes up. As a kid, separated from my dad by the great distance, I developed an interest in aviation due to a wish to reconnect with him. I daydreamed of a car-sized jet plane to drive to that town!

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Leanan on August 23, 2006 - 6:24am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
It really is amazing, how it's changed.  My office is about four miles from the downtown of a small city.  It's surrounded by sprawl now: office buildings, strip malls, fast food joints, etc.  But many of the old-timers remember when the area was way out in the boonies.  It was all apple orchards then.  And a "speedway" (racetrack).  They remember occasionally visiting the speedway as kids, but very rarely, because it was so far away.

The "arterials" made a huge difference.  Two one-way, three-lane roads running through the city.   Many of the residents still harbor great resentment over those arterials.  They cut through many fine old neighborhoods, doing very bad things to property values and quality of life.  And of course, traffic has increased so much that it takes just about as long as before the arterials were built.

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westexas on August 22, 2006 - 1:50pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Re:  Jim Kunstler's blog

You never know who reads this stuff.  I just got an e-mail from a researcher at Sandia Labs.  They are deeply concerned about the energy situation.  From his e-mail:  'We are all researchers with strong interests in helping our nation with whatever challenges confront it.  Right now, we believe that is energy."

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dinopello on August 22, 2006 - 3:05pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Well, that's just a bit disconcerting that he felt the need to elaborate that - since they are under the Department of Energy (aren't they?)

Anyhow, ask him what he can do about people who drive 20 miles to work every day, drive their kids to school and to soccer practice, drive to the movies, drive to visit their friends, drive to get groceries, and have 3000+ sq ft homes.  How about moving all that stuff close enough together so that they can walk?  Can Sandia figure out a way to do that ?  Then we can get them started on how to grow food locally.  

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Mad Maxout on August 22, 2006 - 9:38pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Saw this on World News Tonight. A handful of suburbanites are growing gardens with veggies in their otherwise useless front yards. Mixing in indiginous vegitation with the food plants, they are on the vanguard of permaculture. I guess they have very lenient homeowners associations. (California) Now, to replace those cars....
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optimist on August 23, 2006 - 10:39am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Mad Maxout, some places don't have Homeowner's Associations. The neighborhood I live in, in the Southeast, I choose specifically because it lacked one. I have to much of the anarchist and rebel in me to stand for someone telling me what color I can paint my shutters and how I have to trim my bushes. This will come in handy next year, when I expand my garden to include my front yard!
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Mad Maxout on August 23, 2006 - 11:17pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Most (if not nearly all) newer developments do have associations. I wonder if the original developer gets a cut of the fees. While with condos associations are inevitable, the idea of associations remove half the point of homeownership. You may as well have a landlord!
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GreyZone on August 22, 2006 - 11:07pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
They are under the Department of Energy but heavily involved in weapons so the Pentagon has their hand in there too.
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279 comments on DrumBeat: August 22, 2006

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