Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Politics, Peak Oil, and Debt

"The American heritage was one of individual liberty, personal responsibility and freedom from government … Unfortunately … that heritage has been lost. Americans no longer have the freedom to direct their own lives … Today, it is the government that is free – free to do whatever it wants. There is no subject, no issue, no matter … that is not subject to legislation." – Harry Browne

This post has been corrected as some the verbiage did not transfer in the original posting.

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My most recent post had some really excellent points made in the comments section, not least of which was someone pointing out that I am a "self-educated, pro-life, anti-government red-neck". I corrected that commentator. I am NOT a red neck. Working class northeasterners are different from working class southerners, though the subtleties are small they are none the less there.

I began blogging because I had researched a great deal for a book idea that I had, that had it come to fruition would have been titled "Train wreck: The U.S. Housing Bubble meets the American Energy Crisis". One of my partners (Mikie T.) said that I was unlikely to get published and that events might unfold before I did so in any event... so why don't I publish a blog? That's how I got to be here in this forum.

Initially, blogged about Debt and Energy, eschewing politics... but as time wore on I came to the conclusion that the real disaster, should one befall us because of the Debt and Energy situation, would come about from policy and politics. So I tell this story from the Libertarian perspective.
Look, essentially ALL of the peak oil web sites are authored by the Left/Liberals/Socialists... and they have their perspective (and from my perspective they have most things completely wrong). Reading here gives one the Libertarian perspective from a 50 year-old guy with a great deal of experience...

(Since the age of 13 I have banged nails on roofs, pumped gas, programmed in C, washed dishes, caddied, served court summons, worked as a collection agent and repo man, dug ditches for sprinklers in the Florida sun (now, that job s*cked... but I needed the money...), worked at the Fulton Fish Market, parked cars and set up bowling pins for Mobsters (and some honest guys, too), painted, sold hotdogs, chauffeured a rich matron of the arts, worked in healthcare, finance, construction, and energy and even held elective office... ALL before going to work on Wall Street... did I mention I was a body guard? Yep. Worked for Charlie Daniels, Barry White, Johnny Mathis, Stephen Stills (I know I am dating myself here but this was 30 years ago) and quite a few others through Owl Investigations, Inc. (Now that was fun, especially Barry White... trying to keep him "safe" from beautiful women tearing their clothes off and throwing them at him is big fun when you are 19 years old), and I Worked for Fernando Puig, one of the officers leading the Bay of Pigs invasion (or whatever you want to call it) for a while, too... lost that job after he was assassinated in a Univ. of Miami parking lot (it was reported as a robbery gone wrong!)... BTW, I wasn't guarding him at the time. I worked for him at the world famous Mutiny Bay Hotel in Coconut Grove, Miami at the HEIGHT of the Mariel Boatlift. That movie "Scarface" simply does not do it justice. My sister and I both quit working there after the umpteenth murder and kidnapping... times being what they were I took up process service in New York, (that's the guy that brings you papers to appear in court). First day on the job? We were working a bad neighborhood and somebody lets their German Shepherd out to attack me, I drew a gun to fire, the dog saw the gun and put on the breaks and took almost 20 yards slipping and sliding to stop in the wet grass before hightailing it out of there... I turn to my brother Wayne who was with me and said "I guess dogs watch T.V. and understand guns, eh?". Still, we were FREAKED... I have a much different story to tell than the "I summered on the vineyard, then college, then Wall Street" pitch. All benefit of being a "working class, white trash, self- educated, pro-life, anti-government"... can't remember the rest...)

... and some success.

I very much enjoy the input of intelligent commentary. I would ask all comments to be well reasoned, germane to the conversation, and courteous.

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The world energy situation, debt, and globalization and arbitrage of labor are making for a very, very trying time here in America. For better or worse, when times get to be trying, American politicians get to be blaming. Left AND Right, North and South, Urban or Rural... the blame game goes on - or better yet, the politics of "making gains in order to force YOUR agenda through the system by Blaming others for systemic issues" game goes on.

Look what our politics has done to marriage, sex, drugs, debt, the military, and let's not leave out those lovely social programs that are going to be defaulted upon... now here comes a continuing decline in Oil imports into the U.S... are politicians going to work together on this common problem? NAFC!! They are going to try to gain advantage. This is neither good nor bad, right nor wrong... this is just the way it is. It then follows that since things are f*#@ed systemically that the best course of action is to reduce the system's impacts, leaving the individual to sort things out for themselves.

Of course, that is not what is going to happen necessarily... but we are here discussing the possibilities and the probabilities... I respectfully submit that our government and TPTB the entrenched political parties, etc... will do the same thing they did after the attacks of 9/11/2001; that is to use the circumstance to craft ways of fulfilling their agenda, using the people's emotions against them to further erode their freedoms and rights.

I find this to be more of threat than anything else "Peak Oil" could throw at us.

More soon.




12 comments:

bureaucrat said...

I started watching this blog to keep up to date on peak oil, and the energy/financial/political swirl that goes around it. And while I wish it would stick more to energy topics, I have myself driveled off topic on occasion.

When I finished my Masters in Public Administration (a wasted $17,000), I wanted to scream at the teachers that there should be one big rule in this program: NO ONE should ever write just about their jobs. You tell a bunch of cops, firemen and govt. administrators to write a paper about any topic, and they will write about fires, crimes and paper pushing. It's easy -- no research, and no learning.

So, being on topic and relevant means to me: lets try to stick with the energy-financial arena as much as possible.

Anonymous said...

Bur-
Here you are in the middle of a workday posting on internet blogs instead of doing your job- which the taxpayers pay you $90,000 dollars a year.

Got any good porn links to share?

Keep up the good work,
Marshall

PioneerPreppy said...

Interesting Bio there Greg

Of course the facts simply do not matter as my bio shows as well.

What matters is that you are white and male therefore you are an evil, southern bred, hillbilly, racist.

Unless you prove somehow your not. Usually these days by wearing an Obama t-shirt and repeating the progressive line of how evil you and your kind are ala Chris Mathews.

Listening to anyone say otherwise, whether you agree with them or not, puts you in the same camp as them.

Of course the good news is only an excess of cheap abundant energy can even allow such a warped world to come into being on such a large scale. Historically those who did not like the way things were going could isolate themselves from the madness. Not so today in the good ol USA with plenty of surplus energy to enforce their will with.

Things will and are changing as the surplus declines.

I worked in hotels while in school, talk about some strange things. I think it kinda warps your view into not being surprised by anything.

Dextred1 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Dextred1 said...

Jeffers,

I know a lot of people like to stick to just the oil, but I like the forays into other subjects.

“Experience: that most brutal of teachers. But you learn, my God do you learn.”

- C.S. Lewis

bureaucrat said...

If you think the private sector is slaving away 8 hours a day in their salt mines, you are delusional, Marshall. :) There's nothing new here. Tens of millions of public and private sector workers are sitting at desks just like me with LARGE swaths of free time for blogging, checking sports scores, Internet shopping, sending email to mistresses, etc. etc. It's American capitalism. :)

More going off topic .. grrrr!!

Donal Lang said...

hey Marshall, leave Bur be; at least while he's doing this he's not doing any damage! ;-)

Anonymous said...

Sounds like an interesting work life you had there Mr. Jeffers. I used to think I had seen most every crazy thing this world (people) had to offer, but after my daughter was born--my view changed.

Some things in life have an inertia that carrying them to the point where dissonance or destruction stop its course. The school of hard knocks is how people and culture seem to learn, proactive change without too much dissonance to spawn it--is rare indeed in both people/civilizations.

Let's hope that rational simplicity and relationships with people rather than objects become worthy goals, otherwise this next decade will be harsh if materialism is the only yardstick for the masses.

-Meiyo

Frito: "I can't believe you like money too. We should hang out."

A Quaker in a Strange Land said...

Pioneer:

I worked at the Holiday Inn in Elmsford NY, 10 miles north of NYC in the 1976 and/or 1977. I was 15 or 16 years old.

Hired as a dish washer, I quickly became "Chief, Cook, and Bottle Washer", room service, valet and anything else you can think of...

What a bizarre experience.

Dextred1 said...

Here is some oil news. A line blew in china and caused a pretty large spill.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100720/ap_on_bi_ge/as_china_pipeline_explosion;_ylt=Asdj4jumY3epNF67SumOPRhvaA8F;_ylu=X3oDMTMwbTBvOW1iBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwNzIwL2FzX2NoaW5hX3BpcGVsaW5lX2V4cGxvc2lvbgRwb3MDMQRzZWMDeW5fYXJ0aWNsZV9zdW1tYXJ5X2xpc3QEc2xrA2NoaW5hcnVzaGVzdA--

Dextred1 said...

100 ft flames, 70 square miles of oil slick.

One interesting quote

"The International Energy Agency said Tuesday that China has overtaken the United States as the world's largest energy consumer, using the equivalent of 2.252 billion tons of oil last year. China immediately questioned the calculation."

the link won't work on yahoo linked through http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/BreakingNews.html

bureaucrat said...

I am more concerned about Matt Simmons and his contention that there is an even BIGGER hole at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico, which is still leaking, that BP is either ignoring or something. This is a defining moment for Matt Simmons, one of the "peak oil pioneers." Either he has lost his marbles completely, or it is going to be a VERY interesting show in October at the World Oil Conference (formerly the ASPO conference) in Wash DC with him attending. In a month or so, we'll see if oil continues to flow into the Gulf or not. Search for "Matt Simmons July 2010" on Youtube, and see if you can figure out what he is talking about. I can't picture it in my mind at the moment. But if he's right ...