my question: what should one invest in?

no one knows for certain, but my belief about the economic future is that the powers that be powers will do everything they can to keep the ponzi scheme going as long as possible, but eventually it will collapse in a kuntsler-esque fashion.  that suggests that for a period, imo 10-15 years, the "system" will remain in place essentially as is, but with big winners and big losers, then we all become losers.  in other words, for a certain period what one does with one's financial assets is relevant and important, after that real assets (land, tools) and skills will trump financial assets.

so during that bumby but recognizable period, what should one investment in?

i've read leeb's book and generally agree with the premise that it might be a long approximation of a '70's era energy crisis economy, but some of his assumptions do not necessarily make intuitive sense.  for example, if there is a real shortage in oil and directly related products, either due to field depletion or refinery capacity or war or whatever, rather than a mere politically caused shortage a la the embargos, will IOCs profit or lose out?  how can they profit as everyone seems to think if they can't get any oil, or if the cost/price leads to demand destruction?  how will the ADMs of the world (industrial farmers) fare? food will be in huge demand, but the cost of production and distribution will be huge, possibly huger than the demand.  what other companies, alt energy companies for example, are good investments?  commodities?  will gold really skyrocket defore teh collapse?  will it continue to have value in the LE/kunstler phase (part of me says no, but then gold has always been valuable, even in the pre-indusrial times).

what are all you smart and informed people doing?  reducing debt makes sense, but my mortgage is fixed at 5.37% -traditionally that ain't a debt that should be reduced, but should any/all debt be reduced.  

i feel that every day that passes without asset re-allocation is a wasted opportunity, and makes the cost of re-allocation higher, but i am not certain of where/how to re-allocate.

thoughts?

Fuel issues are regulated by the Interstate Oil Committee; for example the imposition of unleaded petrol in South Africa knocks on to SACU members who must follow suit because of supply and roads usage. Newer South African cars are fitted with catalytic converters that require unleaded petrol and must be available SACU-wide for visitors.

"It's quite a problem for some countries," says McClelland. "South Africans tourists with new cars simply can't go to those countries that don't have unleaded petrol available. So these issues need to be harmonised."

Fuels and Society B: 4. TEL Toxicity

Throughout 1922, as the first plans were made to develop tetraethyl lead, Midgley had received an alarming letter from Charles Kraus of Pottsdam in Germany. Kraus had worked on tetraethyl lead for many years and called it "a creeping and malicious poison" that had killed a senior scientist at his university.

Another warning came from a lab director in the Public Health Service (PHS.), who had heard about tetraethyl lead and wrote an October, 1922 memo to the assistant surgeon general warning of a "serious menace to public health."

...skip...

In March 1923 Thomas Midgley  had almost returned to normal after fighting a winter-long battle with lead poisoning. He and three other lab employees had experienced "digestive derangements, subnormal body temperatures and reduced blood pressure" from handling tetraethyl lead. He later wrote,"After about a year's work in organic lead I find that my lungs have been affected and that it is necessary to drop all work and get a large supply of fresh air."

Despite his own condition, Midgley was nonchalant about the dangers of tetraethyl lead. In a December 2, 1922 letter to A.W. Browne at Cornell, who had been contracted for some analytical work, Midgley said that tetraethyl lead was irritating to the skin and should not be breathed or taken in the mouth.

He added: "It would not surprise me if in the course of using tetraethyl lead for a year that some of your men would experience a slight case of painter's colic. This is nothing to worry about as several of our boys have it."

...skip...

The lead poisoning deaths of the first workers in Dayton, Ohio and Deepwater, N.J. had not attracted attention. But when the first Standard Oil Co. worker died on October 22, 1924, the Union County, N.J. medical examiner called for an investigation into the mysterious gas that was driving workers crazy. Within a few hours, GM.'s carefully contained secret had become front page news across the nation. To make matters worse, the chief chemist at the refinery told reporters: "These men probably went insane because they worked too hard."

...skip...

The levels of lead in the human body are usually measured by blood samples. In the 1950s and 60s, blood lead levels of less than 60 micrograms per deciliter were considered acceptable because obvious symptoms of lead poisoning like convulsions did not usually occur above that level.  Today the US Centers for Disease Conrol and Prevention (CDC) considers a level of 10 mcg/dl as a threshold of serious effects, especially in children.

In any case...whether Bush believes in peak oil or not, he's going to be a lot better off than most of us, with his solar heating, geothermal heat pumps, 40,000 gallon rainwater cistern, wastewater recycling system, and manmade pond stocked with bass and baitfish.

Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld (BCR) have probably created a win/win situation for Iran.  They took out Iran's chief enemy and rival.  From here, if BCR back down, it makes Iran appear more powerful. If BCR attack Iran, it will inflame the entire Moslem world (even more) against the US.

Unfortunately, I think that the Iranian leadership--certainly not the Iranian people--welcome an attack because it would solidify their hold on power, while inflaming the entire Moslem world against the US.  

There is a corollary to the Iranian political situation:  domestic US midterm elections.  If the Democrats gain control of either the House or the Senate, they will gain subpoena power, which will allow them to investigate all kinds of things that have heretofore been swept under the rug by the lapdog Republicans in Congress.  BCR are determined to prevent this.  The obvious solution?  A war.

The long term goal is control of the Middle Eastern oil fields.  The short term goal is to hold on to political power.

So, we have two unpopular presidents who both need a war to solidify their hold on power.  This seems to suggest that we will have a war.

However, I think that we are seeing worldwide resistance to the Neocon fantasies of BCR--from the halls of the Pentagon to Europe to the Middle East. The Joint Chiefs of Staff and a group of retired generals seem to be launching a coordinated attack on BCR.   They seem to be sending a message that they don't want anymore Americans and Middle Easterners to die needlessly on the alter of Neocon fantasies.

Following is an excerpt from a New York Times article on retired three star Marine General Newbold.  Pay very careful attention to the following four words:  "The distinction is important."  This is a retired three star general sending a message that the officer corps owes its allegiance to the Constitution--not to Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld.

From the New York Times:

A leader's responsibility "is to give voice to those who can't -- or don't have the opportunity to -- speak," General Newbold wrote. "Enlisted members of the armed forces swear their oath to those appointed over them; an officer swears an oath not to a person but to the Constitution. The distinction is important." A leader's responsibility "is to give voice to those who can't -- or don't have the opportunity to -- speak," General Newbold wrote. "Enlisted members of the armed forces swear their oath to those appointed over them; an officer swears an oath not to a person but to the Constitution. The distinction is important."

The decision to invade Iraq, he wrote, "was done with a casualness and swagger that are the special province of those who have never had to execute these missions -- or bury the results."

As for the "last man standing" thing, I don't know if this crowd is thinking even that far ahead.  I think they're just looking at what we need to keep afloat and not giving a rat's asterisk for anyone else.

I agree.  The instant TPTB abandoned what Prez Carter kickstarted with his 'Sweater Speech'-- it has been the elite-driven 'last man standing' mindset.  I originally posted this years ago-->Yucca Mountain, Nevada is a taxpayer-funded super-bunker for the Topdogs, with Area 51 providing defense.  We'll see if my WAG comes true.

National Powerdown is the better alternative if we can somehow motivate the unwashed masses in time.

Bob Shaw in Phx,AZ  Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?

(1)  No one knows what percentage of the build in inventories (or of current imports) consists of light, sweet versus heavy, sour crude oil.  The historically high spread between light, sweet and heavy, sour suggests that light, sweet supplies are far tighter than heavy, sour supplies.  Which would peak first:  light, sweet or heavy, sour?

(2)  Of the four large oil fields currently producing one mbpd or more, three are known to be in decline (Cantarell, the second largest producing field in the world, is facing a catastrophic decline).  The only remaining question is Ghawar, and given its age and recent development history, it could start showing a catastrophic decline any day now.  

(3)  The following regions all had production declines in the vicinity of 50% of Qt, based on the HL method:  Texas; Lower 48; total US; Russia and the North Sea.   Two later showed increases:  Total US, because of Alaska, and Russia, because of a rebound from the post-Soviet collapse.  In neither case did production ever equal the peak production in the vicinity of 50% of Qt.  The world is at 50% of Qt.    Texas, the Lower 48 and the North Sea serve as excellent models for the world.  There were no new producing provinces just coming on line and there were no political problems.  In all three cases, when the three regions hit about 50%, it was all downhill.  

(4)  Saudi Arabia, based on the HL method, is precisely at the same point at which Texas, the prior swing producer, peaked in 1972.   I'm sure Texas oilmen were also confident of their continued ability to grow production--right on the threshold of a permanent and irreversible production decline, despite a 1,000% increase in oil prices, a record drilling boom and an increase in the number of producing oil wells.    

The conclusion is obvious to anyone who bothers to think. We've had demand destruction, starting in the very poorest nations first so that the wealthy nations can continue driving their SUVs and living in McMansions. The evidence is all around us if you bother to look. This does not mean that there is going to be a growth in capacity or that oil prices will come down. If they drop, the poorer nations will resume buying again which puts us right back in the demand destruction scenario until there is excess capacity. What we're going to get, Robert, is volatility.

However, this raises a point that I've not seen considered so far. Why does oil have to jump to $200 or $300 per barrel anytime in the near term? On the road from $20 per barrel oil to $69 per barrel oil we've seen many poorer players bow out. How many more will bow out if oil rises another $10? $20?

It's not clear to me at all that even in the event of losing 25% of the world's oil through the Straits of Hormuz due to open warfare (should that occur) that oil would have to rise so far. I don't think we have a global model to predict how much demand would be cut from the market by various price increases. It might be entirely possible that as much as a third of global consumption might be driven out of the market by as little as $30 per barrel more and at $100 per barrel, most of the first world could still continue to function (with adaptive behaviors kicking in).

It may be that $200 per barrel oil is where the cut line comes if we lose 25% of global production due to war. But that's clearly just a WAG. Has anyone found a way to model this question? I know we talk about how US consumption growth was nearly flat in the late 70s throug mid 80s due to the price shocks of the 70s but has anyone looked at global consumption for the same periods and extrapolated that to current consumption?

Could we see $50 crude and $4 gasoline? New refinery capacity cant be built too fast, and refiners are aware of peak oil so they are unlikely to build out something to meet your excess capacity if its only going to be there for a few years...?

Reading between the lines, you are implicitly advocating a short crude/long gasoline futures spread as a profitable trade... I happen to agree but wanted your thoughts (not on the investment but the theory)
thanks

Also,
you mentioned that the EROI of oil to gas was 10:1. Do you have any recent links to that? Because combined with EROI of oil at 10:1, you end up with EROI of 5-1 as finished gasoline product and the Brazilians are saying sugar cane ethanol is 8:1. (which would be better than gasoline). This I found intriguing as the data Ive seen show 53,000 square miles of brazil devoted to production with potential of 1,000,000 sq kms. An increase of almost 20x..

I am well aware that corn-to-ethanol is a hoax. but what about sugar cane? We already grow lots of it in Louisiana and other states - could we replace some southern midwest corn with sugarcane?

long post - thanks in advance.

Before I start on my list of additional factors consider that old Oil Drum favorite [maybe it is turning into a "meme"!], the relative inventory levels / prices of sweet light versus heavy sour crudes. The price spread is much larger than it has traditionally been indicating potentially at least two things [perhaps more or maybe in combination] --- your point concerning refining constraints --- but also and perhap more importantly a shortage of the light sweet stuff in a world of refining constraints.

You have noted in earlier posts that the EIA collects data on the relative stock levels, but you have never reported on the absolute or relative levels of light sweet versus heavy sour over time. I haven't seen this information anywhere, but I believe that it might resolve a lot of what you believe to be a market mystery. If I can buy light sweet stuff at a price ... or heavy stuff at a much lower price but which I as a refiner can only process in greatly reduced volumes or must blend to process at all, which do I buy? An absolute shortage of oil .... or maybe just a shortage of the stuff that refineries actually want ... given the time it takes to build or modify a refinery does it matter over the intermediate term? For what it is worth, with the reduced production from Nigeria is appears to be highly likely that the average grade of crude on the world market just became heavier for at least a while.

On to the wonderful world of futures. Let me state up front that there are a lot of individuals and entities trading incredible volumes on the futures exchanges that have no intention of taking or making deliveries. It has always been that way and always will be. Some of these are naked shorts or naked longs. However, there likewise numerous ways to hedge and exercise arbitrage opportunities based on delivery dates and geography that you seem to be ignoring. Most of these trades tend to make what you view as irrationally narrow spreads converge even further ... "yes" markets can be irrational, but look to other factors before you attribute a market that is behaving [in your opinion] strangely to an excess of animal spirits.

"People pay too much for things all the time. I have been predicting for a while that what we should see is a divergence between oil and gasoline. Oil prices should drop back in the short term, and gasoline prices should rise (given that there is a true shortage)."

Both are represented in the futures market and based on history / conventional wisdom pricing should revert to the mean differential given that refinery change overs and other limitations normally ease / correct over time. Likewise, demand from the refiners for crude could reasonably be expected to directly lead to a rise as demand for crude as the ability to produce product increases. Is the balance in crude / product inventories likely to increase of decrease under a summer driving season scenario? Is it likely to normalize at some future point in time. There is probably money to be made on this bet as it has always worked out in the past provided the arb has sufficient staying power.

Also, have you been paying any attention to Brent. The usual premium for WTI versus Brent that has been present for most of the recent past is gone with Brent now mostly at slight premium. Maybe too much gasoline in Europe and too much crude in the U.S.? Maybe your divergence is there but masked / mitigated by arbritrage Brent and WTI and related product futures? I don't really know, but I do know that tankers of North Sea crude making the trip across the pond from the point of delivery [a terminal in the Shetlands?] are incurring costs and delivering at a net economic loss. At some point of supply imbalance in a perfect world you would expect to see crude in storage exported from the U.S.A. to Europe. :-) Do I really expect this to occur in any significant volume? Not really, but the East to West volume could dry up rather quickly couldn't it?

"No. It's not because I can call someone and get oil. I can call almost any supplier and get oil. There is a big difference. When you start having a number of suppliers say that supplies are tight, or suppliers start to put refiners on allocation, that will be an indicator that there is a supply problem."

What you are describing is a functioning market. Goods are being sold in quantity by willing sellers to willing buyers. Being "on allocation" is an attempt by a seller to warp the normal pricing mechanism by creating a stable but out of balance transaction price. This is not a shortage in the sense that crude is not available, it is a scenario where willing sellers are lacking at the price being set by a dominant intermediary.

"I want to make a few additional points. Refiners are spending billions to expand refineries. Do you think they would be doing that if they had not secured their supplies? Do you think Saudi would be building a big new refining complex if they thought they were about to peak?"

Why wouldn't an exporting country want a value added activity within the country of origin? Also please refer to the earlier comments concerning light sweet versus heavy sour. "Yes" there probably is some spare production capacity and a shortage of refining capacity now for the heavier crudes. If I was a the head of state of a country with lots of the heavy stuff I would be inclined to build refineries rather that wait for permiting process in the good old U.S.A. I could always elect to give preference in supply to my refinery even if an extreme shortage developed.

"Also, you had mentioned margins. I just ran across this in the Kansas City Star: "But the refineries have seen their margins increase dramatically. This week the margin, which is the difference between the cost of crude oil and the cost of gasoline, rose to 43 cents a gallon, nearly double the margins of a year ago."

Sweet light versus heavy sour again ... and ask yourself what the change in the differential between spot and even close in futures does to the spread where a refiner used to be able to operate on spot oil and buy the future. In and era of very low interest rates [and from the view point of a commercial in control of a tank farm] when the future is higher than the spot, do I buy / hold physical and sell the future to lock in the spread? I don't know for certain, but I am certain that every financial game that can be modeled for crude has been modeled and probably at the rate of several times per minute.

"I will make a prediction. One of these days, you will look back and say "Well, I guess Robert was right". "

Yup and until then Robert will be wrong. The questions that come to mind are how long until "one of these days," and when you turn out to be correct why is it that you turn out to be correct.

As I noted earlier, you seem to have thought a lot of this through and have given me some angles for further consideration. I am not trying to start a flame war. :-)

How much more production would you guess, say, over the next three years?

Watch how oil has slid all the Way to $68.55($69.40 UK).
Both Record Sustained Prices.

Watch the 10% Ethanol/Gasoline Blend debate.
You won't see it.

The Media have mentioned gas shortages this
Summer, even as AAA says Consumers will be traveling
just as much and demand will be 1.5% higher.

And Ethanol does not travel well, so we're back to rail
tanks and trucks to deliver and just in time blend this
fuel at Tanker farms.

In 30 days! and no one I talk to has even heard that this is coming. Why!?

And what were those rail tankers and trucks carrying
before they began running 10% of our daily fuel consumption across the US.

The United States consumes almost 9 million barrels of gasoline daily so almost 1 million bbls will be
ethanol (we might be making 275k bbls today-CNBC)

We're there. $4-7 per gal this Summer.

And we attack Iran Venezuela

James

going  

Their commentry finishes with this:

'Serious efforts to wean our societies of this pernicious dependency on oil and other fossil fuels cannot be delayed. The growing scarcity of oil must be a wakeup call. Let us hope it will not require a global energy crisis or an environmental catastrophe to finally spur us into action.'

References to Peak Oil are now appearing regularly in the UK Independent and Guardian newspapers.

 Back in the 1980s there was a firm in Alberta that sought to dispose of hazardous materials by pumping them down a deep wellbore so that the high heat would neutralize the hazard. I'll try and find data on this but as I remember it the temperatures at depth were very high.

 Couple this with some microturbine generator and Allans modern PCC car and you have the makings of a possible transport solution.

http://www.renewableenergyaccess.com/rea/news/story?id=24450

It still blows my mind that it actually works.

solid rock -- the ultimate insulator

That is one of the silliest statements I have seen for a while. I advise the writer of the text to hug a hot or a cold rock and then contemplate how fast the rock surface temperature equalizes with his or her skin. Then go and hug som hot or cold foamed insulation.

Heat storage in a mass of underground rock only works well if you have neglible ground water movement.

Loading a borehole for a heat pump with energy from a solar collector during summertime is sometimes used to get electricity free hot water during summertime and compensate for a too shallow borehole. It only works if the ground water movement is neglible, but on the other hand, large ground water movements bring in fresh low grade heat so those boreholes work even if they are a little short.

I have done a few numbers for my own house and wish I had the personal energy left to make a couple of big holes in my back yard as an example of how to do it around here.  Then I could quit burning wood- except for that electricity from my stirling engine, of course.

Truth to tell, if you use insulation right, you almost don't need any heating system at all.  But that's so dull!

http://www.aspo-usa.com/proceedings/powerpoint/

Indeed, the great strength of your platform is that you have stolen the best and most solid ideas rather than dreaming up pie-in-the-sky "innovative" plans. None of your ideas is new, but all of them are good--and, equally important, can readily seen to be good ideas.

Now, how can we sell this platform to political candidates?

"Commonsense Freedom" Party, now that has a ring to it and sounds less jingoistic than "Freedom America" Party.

Or maybe just "Common Sense" for a party name?  . . . no, lacks pizzaz.

Also, what animal for our mascot--NOT a lumbering elephant nor a stubborn donkey nor a scavanging bald eagle . . . how about a turkey--which is the animal Ben Franklin wanted for our national symbol? But domestic turkeys are so damn dumb . . . would have to be a wild turkey, but that symbol has been appropriated by a fine beverage . . . c'mon, let's have some help here: What animal can outwit both pachyderms and Democrats?

I would add in Westexas and Kebab's idea of replacing the income taxes with a consumption tax.

It might help focus people locally if they declared a temporary moratorium on all greenfield development for 90 days until each locality can formulate a land use plan that encourages brownfield development, protects productive farmland from development, only allows new development near existing transportation connections or future rail links.

Leadership and some incentives from the national level will help, but the nuts and bolts will be settled at the local level.

As a European-, as well as Worldcitizen, I must disagree. Common sense and sustainability is not exclusively for the US. Stop the looting! Live local!

... can I still consider myself to be a small "l" libertarian!?! Clearly some dinking around with markets, but the U.S. Constitution authorizes "post offices and post roads" which fits a strict constructionist view much better IMO than torturing the Interstate Commerce Clause to cover transportation. Combined with mostly direct / usage based taxes so I suppose I haven't gone that far off the reservation.

The one thing I do not understand on the list is: "The US shall build a nationwide High Voltage DC network with nodes every 500 or so miles. At least two East-West links combined with at least three North-South connections, with spurs to Canada and Mexico if they want to be involved.

I understand why a more robust grid is desirable. What I don't understand the advantage of a DC grid. I thought Westinghouse and Edison duked this one out a long time ago with AC [Westinghouse] being the winner based on both transmission efficiency and safety. What I am I missing?

Well, for propaganda to be effective it is OK for it to be refuted as long as the volume of coverage of the initial propaganda substantially exceeds the volume of coverage of the subsequent refutation.

This  54,000 centrifuges producing enough enriched uranium in 16 days has grabbed the headlines, and the IF/THEN nature of the statement gets lost as this statement gets replayed and recycled. I've even seem one internet headline stating that Iran could have The Bomb in 16 days.

Permit me to also make an equally valid statement:

 IF within the next year Haiti builds 12 supercarrier battle groups, each  complete with all the latest fighters, cruise missiles, and all the required escorting Aegis missile-defense frigates, attack submarines, etc, THEN within the year Haiti will be a threat to US naval supremacy in the Caribbean!

Silly?  Of course. But not a whole hell of a lot sillier than this 54,000 centrifuges/16 days business.

So why are both Bush and Ahmadinejad making such a big deal over it right now?  Why is Bush choosing now to draw his line in the sand, and why is Ahmadinejad shouting about their new enrichment prowess.  All I see is that they are making steady progress in the technology, and whether it is for energy or weapons is still just guessing.

Clearly, neither side is being shy.  I don't feel like they are bluffing, so it must mean they both think they have something to gain.  They are both rapidly painting themselves into a corner, where they cannot easily back down without committing political suicide - which makes it increasingly dangerous.  

IMHO, Iran is convinced that Bush intends to go in no matter what (as am I).  They probably figure there's nothing they can do to stop it (and survive politically), so they're hoping to survive the attack and that we'll over-extend and hurt ourselves.  

Take all your overgrown infants away somewhere
and build them a home a little place of their own
the Fletcher memorial
home for incurable tyrants and kings
and they can appear to themselves every day
on closed circuit TV
to make sure they're still real
it's the only connection they feel

-Pink Floyd

Tom Bevan Thu Apr 13, 3:46 PM ET

Consider the following two headlines appearing today:

"Analysts Say a Nuclear Iran Is Years Away" - New York Times

"Iran Could Produce Nuclear Bomb in 16 Days, U.S. Says" - Bloomberg

Obviously, somebody got it wrong. Turns out it's Bloomberg, which should be excoriated not only for running a factually false headline -
Iran could not produce a nuclear bomb in sixteen days - but also for compounding the error with a grossly misleading report:

    "Iran, defying
    United Nations Security Council demands to halt its nuclear program, may be capable of making a nuclear bomb within 16 days, a U.S. State Department official said.

    Iran will move to ``industrial scale'' uranium enrichment involving 54,000 centrifuges at its Natanz plant, the Associated Press quoted deputy nuclear chief Mohammad Saeedi as telling state-run television today.

    ``Using those 50,000 centrifuges they could produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon in 16 days,'' Stephen Rademaker, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Security and Nonproliferation, told reporters today in Moscow.

So what's the problem? The problem is that Iran only has 164 centrifuges in operation today. Rademaker was responding to a question about how quickly Iran could produce a nuclear weapon once it reached industrial scale capacity. As we learn much later down in the Bloomberg piece, experts estimate it would take more than 13 years to produce enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon using just those 164 centrifuges.

There is no mention of how long it would take for Iran to construct and bring online the 54,000 centrifuges needed to build a nuke in sixteen days, though Bloomberg does report that Iran "plans to construct 3,000 centrifuges at Natanz next year" (The NY Times differs by reporting that Iran will begin "operating the first of 3,000 centrifuges at Natanz by late 2006").

So Bloomberg built its news report around a highly sensational, but essentially theoretical, estimate of how quickly Iran could produce a nuclear weapon if it only had 53,836 more centrifuges in operation than it does today. That's sloppy journalism, and it does a great disservice to readers trying to get a better understanding of a most important issue.

 Social Security is underfunded due to foreigners unwilling to further finance our debt. With 50,000,000 retirees the dollar drops to $0.00 within 16 days.

 Those pesky foreigners up to no good again.

There is a question on my part as to whether free market policies would devolve thusly. Give the govt power to plan for you and they will take away more freedoms. Saying there is "no question" is intellectual cowardice. Quit sucking on momma's tit and grow up.

These latest military 'exercises' in the Carrribean only illustrate the point. The more the US engages in this infantile saber-ratttling and intimidation,  the stronger Chavez gets with his base, which appears to be not the employees of Petroleos de Venezuela but rather what could be accurately described as  the 'wretched of the earth'.

Like all revolutionaries, Chavez probably has already sown the seeds of his own destruction. But I don't think it will come from a US-backed coupe. Rather, from rival factions within his own government.

Still, Chavez appears to be the heir-apparent to Castro's role as Latin American bad-boy.

I predict the US will screw up this situation, too.

You are looking at June futures.

I ended up owing more than I expected.  I think my withholdings were actually lower this year, though it may have been a fluke of the calendar rather than a change in the withholding tables.  

My bailing out of the stock market last summer, short-term gains and all, probably didn't help...

80% of homes destroyed, lives rent asunder and in turmoil, uncertainity in MANY dimensions (one certainity, Bush was lying through his teeth in Jackson Square).

Personal risks, also is several dimensions.

The difference between us ?

Perhaps I am more focused on others and the "Greater Good".

Perhaps I will be one of the maintenance workers in the basement of World Trade Center Towers, struggling to get power back to the escalators and elevators.  If so, so be it.

There is comfort in knowing that I am not alone.

As bad as things could get, I assure you, there are positive externalities and silver linings that TOD readers/posters cant envision as of yet. I have recently been part of something organic organized and developed by 3 people that I wouldnt have thought possible - humans, when properly motivated and working together can overcome amazing obstacles, even in the face of declining energy per capita.

So now I am at the point of giving up tryng
to wake the sleepwalkers who are headed for
the precipice and am devoting most of my time
to strategies for personal survival.

There is no question that the standard of
living peaked between 1955 and 1985
(depending on location) and that we are
slipping downwards. As I have mentioned
before, the Genuine Progress Index
highlights the fact that society peaked
a number of years ago, which is why the
powers that be won't have a bar of GPI
and continue to promote GDP.

The crucial point is, financial collaspe
is survivable (consider Korea or
Argentina). Even energy collapse is to a
degree suvivable. Environmental collapse
is not survivable, however.

But courtesy of our so-called leaders,
we face financial collapse, energy
collapse and environmental collapse,
essentially all at the same time.
Surely that is a perfect storm.  

The solution is to stop looking at energy,
financial and environmental information
and spend ones free time following the
antics of golf players, footballers, film
stars etc. and become one of the sleepwalkers
headed for the precipice, oblivious that the
next footstep may be into thin air.      

Just kidding.  I think the key thing is that while all of those problems exist, it might be an echo-chamber thing to think they all have to crash at the same time.  They don't have to.  Basically, if there was some sort of rule that deficits and mismanagement bring crashes, it would have happened already.

I think maybe the echo-chamber gloom works because it is easier to visualize all that hitting the fan at once, and harder to think about them happening in a random order (with some not happening at all).

I honestly think this is a somewhat typical human failure of probabilities and prediction.  We cannot see what will happen, and so it is tempting to visualize that all the bad stuff will.

Take heart.

There is hope, and the fact that more people are recognizing the problem means there will be more willing minds and bodies trying to fix things.  The future the experts point to is one possible future.  It doesn't have to unwind in the worst possible way.  An ounce of prevention can go a long way in mitigating an energy crisis.

I also went through all the stages of grief learning that our easy lifestyle is coming to and end because of peak oil and our impact on the climate.  I'm in acceptance now.  But not everything will collapse instantly.  There will be transition periods and people will still need houses to live in.  Even a cold house without lights is better than being outside in the winter.

Working towards sustainability and low/no debt means you will be way ahead of most people.  Ultimately the cruel fact is that everything is reletive, and if you are way more prepared than your neighbors you will make the transition in reletively good shape compared to them.  You can't sacrifice everything you deem important to help society as a whole.

Figure out what you can't live without and determine how to hold onto it.  What things could you give up and still be okay with?  What things would you regret giviong up?

For me it is my family and my house/grounds.  I don't want a new wife and I don't want to live someplace else.  Pretty much everything thing else is luxuries I can do without.  If need be we will add more people into the same living space, do cooperative arrangements on money and supplies but the area I live, because of the physical soundness of the structure, are worth holding onto.  I could give up the cars (with all their expenses) toys, eating out, and still have a high quality of life.

I agree with you that life is probably going to be a lot simpler and physically harder for all of us.  But maybe that won't be such a bad thing if we have the right mindset going in.

Take care.

NC.

"There's a huge psychological tipping point that many people fear to cross when discussing peak oil. That point comes when you realize that, if you are going to plan for a future of any kind, you must choose between believing that the "system" (good and bad, all of it) will survive or not survive. When I say "system", I do not mean anything necessarily derogatory but rather that our entire modern world is a system that must function in order for us to live within its boundaries, to reap its benefits, and to suffer its limitations whatever they may be. If you believe that this system will survive the coming of peak oil and remain mostly intact, any plans you make would be colored by this assumption. But if you believed the system would not survive, your plans would undoubtedly be different."

And it's not just peak oil, it's the entire array of issues facing the "system" as a whole. It just doesn't look to me like it can stay on the tracks much longer.

Once you come to a conclusion, you have to decide if you can do anything about it. For far too many people, life is paycheck to paycheck and they can't make gigantic changes. They are trapped within the system even as it careens towards what appears to be a terrible end. But if you can get out, at least in some degree, then that might be a wise choice. Just be careful and remember who the meanest predator on the planet is and why.

The Hersh article is so yesterday, man. Get with it. We are already wrapping up Salisbury's Rademaker quote. Too bad, Rademaker was such a great name for your purposes.

Love,
Margaret Thatcher aka "V"