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.