This government? BS I have seen US governments in action for the last 50 years and they are ALL beholding to business and special interests (farming etc.). The talk may differ but the walk is the same.

Why haven't we had an energy policy for 50 years? We knew of peak oil in 1968. This is nothing new.

Gov't is not gov't. Gov't can be used to promote interests -- either private or public, common interests. There is no such thing as no gov't, or less gov't. That's not possible anymore, and has not been for a long time. What is possible is to have a gov't that tries to look ahead, tries to foresee and uses its power to protect the interests of the majority and ios responsive to that majority. That's not what we have -- but it is what we need. People should oppose THE gov't, but not oppose gov't in general -- they need to take it back from the private interests that control it now. To disavow gov't is too walk away from that and guarantee that gov't will continue to remain in the hands of those who control it now -- continuing disaster.

It's funny how on a site like this - which predicts that nothing will help except returning America to what it was in 1905 (although there are articles here stating more like 1800 or even 300.000 BC* ie without any humans) comments like these are to be found.

The intrest of the majority has the problem that there's a fucking lot of majority. The only thing the majority's interested in is watchin tv on the new 500 inch plasma, a new cell phone every week and daily restaurant visits.

In other words, let's reduce energy to 1930 levels is nice. And the current "oh-no-co2" campaign is convincing people it's wise. However me (and you), and the majority are going to scream bloody murder once supplies are cut.

Lots of people will realise that a 50% cut in petroleum supply is going to fucking hurt, and they will lynch whoever's in the white house (if this guy isn't hurt by it himself, both barack's and maccain's heating bills are enormous on a warm summer's eve), for that last second of delay.

We all know "increasing efficiency" has yielded it's greatest fruits already. It can maybe cut our usage 10%, perhaps even 20%. But no more. So that type of policies is out. So you need the government to force people to "save energy".

What would "mandatory saving" policies entail ? Letting people starve ? Letting poeple freeze ? Letting people be left behind in the dark ?

That's exactly what "saving" policies entail. How exactly is cutting energy supply, even partly, better than the engineered famines comitted by the Soviets ?