The Oil Drum

My take on "Seven Tomorrows":

During the Carter administration, the US had started down the "Mature Calm" pathway.

"Apocalyptic Transformation" was kind of thrown in largely on the strength of the Evangelical revival then underway. In retrospect, it largely describes a path not taken, as that movement largely got captured and subverted by extreme right-wing elements. The evangelical movement was largely seduced into serving Mammon rather than God. This resulted in the evangelical movement being largely marginalized rather than being transformative, and thus reduced to not much more than a historical footnote.

With the Reagan, there was a very conscious and deliberate effort to move the US back on to the "Official Future" pathway.

We stayed on the "Official Future" pathway for about two decades. Then the Bush II administration came along, and 9/11, and the whole world started coming apart and becoming more dangerous. Welcome to "The Center Holds". This perfectly describes Dick Cheney's USA.

The center isn't going to hold, of course, we all know that. Even as I write, it is quite obvious now that we are moving rapidly into "Chronic Breakdown".

The next few years are going to be a massive struggle to try to at least keep it at the "Chronic Breakdown" stage, or maybe even turn things around. Sadly, "The Beginnings of Sorrow" describes what actually may be a slightly optimistic vision of our likely future.

The other path we won't be taking would have lead us to "Living within our means". That is the scenario that I suspect that a lot of us are hoping for. Unfortunately, I doubt that you can get there from here. If we had kept on the "Mature Calm" pathway, then "Living within our means" would have been the logical next step (assuming that "Apocalypic Transformation" was improbable). Since we reversed course and turned our backs on "Mature Calm", though, the preconditions have not been created that would be necessary for an evolution into "Living within our means".

Thus, "Chronic Breakdown" describes our immediate future about as well as any 25+ year old scenario could, and "Beginnings of Sorrow" comes close to describing what we have to look forward to in another decade or two.

Pretty bleak thought, I'm afraid.

There seems that there are quite a few who have looked at the same issue as JK with very interesting insights. I find JK's writing is hilarious though. Have you ever heard of the Plan B series?:

http://www.earth-policy.org/Books/PB3/index.htm

Teoc - Thank-you for the referral for Seven Tomorrows. That is now on my reading list.

I have tried to consider life as I have observed it in America from a personal perspective. Growing up in the 60's and 70's in a nation dominated by "car culture". I remember being a child seeing orchards and large open areas around LA that are now paved over as far as the eye can see. Until you witness the I-10 and I-405 Interchange at 4 p.m. on a Friday (24 lanes of traffic that have stopped moving) you can't fathom despair!

I think the notion of the U.S.A. getting a Marshall Plan together to herald our national might to the challenge is niave. When the Marshall Plan was put in place there were a fraction of the world's population and we were climbing up the Big Rock Candy Mountain (Peak Oil). The "Psycology of Previous Investment" will prevent us from acting either in a timely or effective fashion. As a society we are now so fragmented that consensus on anything is impossible. By the time the population at large "get it" I think it will be far too late and Kunstlers' notion of "The Long Emergency" will be playing out in a thousand different ways simultaneously.