So I guess my question to the TOD Overlords is: do you folks have any plans in the works for your own survival? And do you forsee leveraging TOD be it for financing, contacts, whatever, to implement your lifeboat strategy?

Few if any of us on TOD staff are as doomerish as you are. Everyone has their own view, of course, but I would say on average TOD staff tends towards believing the right political and techno-fixes will save us.

Ahhh. . . the trusty hybrid calvary.

Hopefully a series of technological solutions will be as successfull at mitigating oil shortages and economic unraveling here at home as they have been at preventing oil wars abroad!

I'm in the "catabolic collapse" camp myself, and am probably more pessimistic than most.