Re question 1: They would be escorted away in straight jackets.

Re question 2: It certainly is a relief valve for me personally, it's one of the few places where I get a least a sense of not being the only one who thinks we have a problem.

Re question 3: I defer to Donella Meadows:

So how do you change paradigms? Thomas Kuhn, who wrote the seminal book about the great paradigm shifts of science, has a lot to say about that. In a nutshell, you keep pointing at the anomalies and failures in the old paradigm, you come yourself, loudly, with assurance, from the new one, you insert people with the new paradigm in places of public visibility and power. You don't waste time with reactionaries; rather you work with active change agents and with the vast middle ground of people who are open-minded.

Donella Meadows: Leverage Points - Places To Intervene In A System

Nate,
I was totally bowled over by how many "buffettisms" you listed when you created the fictional interview! nice work! As a huge Warren Buffett fan, I was laughing in recognition all the way through!

I think your characterization is buffett is mostly correct. I think he'd agree with all of that BUT, he would also say, we've had many seemingly insurmountable challenges before, and we have managed to find a way. While we do face some dire ecological challenges, I'm optimistic about our prospects.

In case anyone is interested, here is probably the most comprehensive list of books recommended for reading by Warren Buffett

61 Book Recommendations from Warren Buffett

The health care debate currently taking place in the US might be an instructive example (if I correctly understood your question). Obama is trying a new paradigm for healthcare (the society should be responsible for ensuring that everyone gets access to healthcare) and he is getting pretty much attacked as a "socialist" and a "commie" by some people who can`t tolerate a paradigm shift.

Or how about the Americans who told a woman who did a walk to raise awareness of climate change, "don`t worry! God would never let our planet heat up!"

It`s very tough to change minds when a paradigm shift is inherent in the next step of awareness. Most people can`t re-think their assumptions. Governments are probably banking on that fact as they decide what to do next....Most people will understand only simple and recognizable messages. It`s worse than useless to try logic.

Thus Obama should try something else to get people to listen to him on healthcare: "EVIL SPACE ALIENS/ A SATANIC CULT/ COMMIES HAVE TAKEN OVER OUR US HEALTHCARE SYSTEM AND THEY WON`T LET US EXTEND CARE TO EVERYONE REGARDLESS OF ABILITY TO PAY!"

If he tried this he might actually get somewhere.

And, come to think of it, the same logic might be applied to PO: "evil space aliens have decimated our oil supplies and left us with hard-to-get expensive stuff."

Actually, probably a version of this will be tried, (slightly off topic, but newspapers are reporting that Netanyahu visited Russia "secretly" this month to discuss attacking Iran.) Space aliens being in short supply!

(checks calendar)

No, we are nowhere near Apr 1.

So that's it then, we're all going to die!

TSHTF, TEOTWAWKI, etc. How will I break the news to my wife?

[edit] oh, a FICTIONAL account ... nevermind [/edit]

To have authorities admit our position upon the precipice while we are teetering on the edge may not be productive. Instead of leading us back towards sustainability, the newfound knowledge could just as well send us plunging into the depths of economic collapse. In addition, it doesn't provide them any return on investment to warn the general public. Their capital outlays can only provide an adequate return over many years. They have to keep the game going to earn back their investments and reposition capital.

Abraham Lincoln expressed his dislike of the dying paradigm of the economic system of slavery. The North could easily accept his message as they were avidly substituting the new fossil fuel and mechanical slaves for the human variety ( the North also relied upon indentured servants and tenant farmers). The rural South had not been as great a beneficiary of industrialism. Perhaps the objections to slavery will wane as we lose our industrial slaves although I hope this is not the case.

Wealthy slave owners of the South thought they needed slavery to maintain their privileged lifestyles but learned that their rich lives could be sustained by allowing their former human slaves to work the tool factories that would eventually turn out tractors, pesticides and fertilizers.

Unfortunately I don't think most people have enough knowledge to separate fact from fantasy and therefore opt for the most desirable ideas or constructions. Blogging is as effective at turning the direction of society as a squirt gun is at putting out a house fire. A large water cannon is needed. In addition, there are so many institutional bastions of disinformation in our society that distilling the truth is much more than the average J6P is capable of, even if they were willing to give up the next tent revival, Nascar, and Dancing with the Stars to do so. It takes a long time and much effort to get things straight and it's an ongoing battle.

One thing is certain-if those characters ever give such a press conference, they stand to make major bucks from whatever they are promoting. The thing is, there really aren't that many powerful or influential Americans who aren't grifters at this point-pretty well everyone important is for sale or has already been purchased. That would be an interesting campfire-who are the top 10 or 20 Americans that haven't been purchased yet?

Is blogging, public analysis, social critique, etc. found on the internet, more of a social relief valve than a real attempt at changing the future? In other words, is the vast undercurrent of angst and opinions of what is wrong with our trajectory just a 21st century passive variety of self-expression, ineffectual at impacting real events?

I have no doubt that it is considered an attempt to change the future by many who do it. It's easy to rationalize that "the easier thing to do is the appropriate thing", which is pretty close to our de facto cultural motto.

It is certainly not impossible to change the future by doing X thing. Flagpole sitting had its heyday. Nascar drivers earn social capital by driving in circles really fast. Nichiren Buddhists believe that they change the world substantially by continually chanting namu myoho renge kyo, and it would churlish of me to suggest they're wasting their time. They point to many successes.

The cockroach in this particular soup is that many such approaches give short shrift to causality, the actual sequence of dance steps necessary in the real complex world to achieve a particular something.

I'd say that IF a specific timetable and sequence of planned events includes a specific goal to be accomplished by blogging to X audience, it's valid as a plausible world-changer. However, to the extent which people blog instead of formulating and putting into practice specific plans, it is acting primarily to quash dissonance between the feeling that something should be done, and their own non-doing of it.

Of course, many people may wish to do something concrete but just not see a way to do it, and thus blog out of frustration, or to get help finding a way forward. Hopefully, blogging will for them be a good intermediate step on the journey.

I think bloggers can positively affect some issues, but not peak oil and climate change. The only "solution" to these predicaments is for everyone to have fewer children and to consume less of everything. The vast majority will not voluntarily do this.

For me the value of blogs is truth seeking, mental preparedness, and ideas for living in the coming new paradigm.

The "Overview to Belief Systems" mentions Global Warming and the impact of CO2. Here's a recent update on the subject of modeling such esoteric non-linear systems.

As common sense would strongly suggest, new Climate Change models show the sun is the source of observed Global Warming, NOT CO2.

“Previously, the direct impact of increased irradiance on global average temperature has been estimated at around 0.25°C last century—a threefold amplifying effect would raise that to 0.75°C. This leaves practically no warming effect for CO2 to account for and renders the whole anthropogenic global warming argument moot. In other words, if the atmospheric solar amplifier theory is correct anthropogenic global warming is wrong, a useless theory describing a nonexistent phenomenon. It seems like poetic justice that a modeling experiment may point the way to discrediting global warming once and for all.”

See http://solarcycle25.com/?id=84 for details.

Well, Nate is the king of wishful thinking on this Saturday. FMagyar closes out the conversation in one post, so maybe we need to think of different questions to ask regarding his happy dream. A wise man once said, it's not the answers that science finds, but rather which questions that science chooses to ask, that are the most important.

Regarding the questions, I would only add:

1. If such an unlikely press conference were to take place, with the icons of modern industry and intellect doing a complete about face on resource availability and limits to growth, what would happen? If you wait long enough, the strait jackets turn into nobel prizes. Schopenhauer said, All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident. We're on the verge of the third stage, with these three clown as representatives of stage two.

2. Is blogging, public analysis, social critique, etc. found on the internet, more of a social relief valve than a real attempt at changing the future? In other words, is the vast undercurrent of angst and opinions of what is wrong with our trajectory just a 21st century passive variety of self-expression, ineffectual at impacting real events? Blogging on the internet is both high quality embodied information (in the form of subversive paradigm-changing communication that contradicts the MSM power elite) and also random, spurious entropic heat release of a civilization that doesn't know what to do with too much energy at their disposal, so to speak. The problem is the differentiation of the two when there's a firehose of information coming at you, especially if you don't have a functional conceptual framework on which to hang the cogent pieces as you sift through the mess.

3. Is there any time in history in the liminal space between paradigms, where the most authoritative voices of the dying model were the ones to articulate the model was dying? IOW, if things are badly wrong, wouldn't listening to the most successful people at the top be the wrong strategy, as they got to that position from being the most ambitious/skillful/invested in the current paradigm? Uh, no. Einstein agreed, with his quote about not being able to change from within the paradigm. That's why collapse is such an effective tool for cleaning the house.

Mr. Lehrer, I'd like to pose an additional question to your august panel, particularly Mr. Buffet, who is a particular hero of mine [gag]. Mr. Buffet, you're good with numbers, and are known as a savvy investor. What's the best way out of our economic mess?

Mr Buffett's reply: Well little girl, I would like to add some comments that further describe our Ponzi economy, and suggest a solution that transcends the current paradigm. There is a long tradition of financial entities only holding symbolic representational metals and then currency that in no way matches the dollar value of holdings. This tradition dates back to the 1600s, when banks first started fractional reserve lending. As the process worked and the bankers gained power, the process intensified, and was extended, again and again, until we do truly have a Ponzi scheme of endlessly leveraged paper products and a financial-insurance-real estate economy of useless eaters and paper pushers getting rich off of the backs of the real economy, fueled by a massive store of ancient sunlight, in a massive, blow-off top.

Not only are the big banks horribly leveraged with 100 times as many liabilities as assets; the government is quickly headed the same way, with IOUs supporting IOUs which support more IOUs. Derivatives and securitized assets, most of which are worthless, overhang the real productive economy's net worth by 40-50 times. This game will be a very short one. It has been suggested that the big 5 banks hold 95%+ of all derivatives out there (although since it is all over-the-counter, we may never know how many are out there).

I would propose that the best way forward out of this mess for us as a country would be to do the Jedi thing. Step back, holster the light saber stimuli, and allow the big 5 to crash. All of the derivatives and many of the securitized assets would disappear, along with many of the multinational agreements. Holdings of derivatives by innocent bystanders such as municipalities and pension funds would experience massive destruction, and perhaps some of the debt would need to be defaulted/forgiven selectively to protect critical entities integral to the social fabric of the country. Deflation would hurt the big guys much more than the little guys. Me, I'm willing to lose my companies, my fortune, default on all of my swaps, and start over so that this country can have a chance building a real economy at the local level with a philosophy of descent and simple living. Yes, holstering our stimulus light saber would mean my head would come off, but I've lived a good long life, and I'm willing to forfeit the rest of it for the good of the little people and the real economy and the hope of a new way of life to go with it.

We could then rebuild regional economies with new currencies and new systems dependent on less energy inputs. That would reestablish/reboot the power base and reduce the GINI coefficient. We have gotten too far out of line with the power imbalances in this country; democracy no longer works, and if the supreme court votes this week to allow corporate personhood through unlimited campaign finance, I fear that that will be the last nail in our coffin. The power differential continues to grow unchecked, moral hazards are rewarded, positive feedback loops intensify, just like a hurricane. The next thing you know, the system is totally undone, and because of the disparity between the haves and have nots, it creates a revolution, rather than a peaceful collapse more on the lines of Russia in the 1990s.

But, as I have said previously, I have no hope at all that we will choose the deflation/default action that protects the base and perhaps the real economy at the local level. I am positioned for inflationary destruction of the global economy as we all go down in flames together, but from the bottom up, which is much more destructive in the long run. This path is a given, because of the power imbalances and the positive feedback loops that are driving them, among many other causes. Derivatives truly are WMDs, as our means of exchange becomes more and more disembodied from energy and production/consumption. Since I'm positioned for politicians to do that thing they do, which is to kick the can down the road and create massive inflation, I'm going to get richer. I win, you lose. Write me a letter from the new Debtor's Army, little girl. Too bad.

2. Is blogging, public analysis, social critique, etc. found on the internet, more of a social relief valve than a real attempt at changing the future?

I would say yes, otherwise, for one example, there would be at least an internet attack on Henry Paulsons blogsite.

Ohmygoodness, snakes alive!!, Wrong Paulson!! Sorry there Henry, but gee won't the real Paulson please stand up?

"...fiat marker capital accurately reflects remaining available flow rates of natural resources..."

Somehow it seems just a bit jarring even to imagine Jim Lehrer painfully extracting that sort of lingo from the jargonic infundibulum of academia, much less actually saying it with a straight face... ;)

Excellent interview. I was just a bit puzzled as I hadn't heard about it in the mainstream media before.
How about getting it into one of these, for example the next Yes Men edition of the New York Times?

Sorry to write this Nate, drivel sums it up.
My English teacher pulled me up for writing such nonsense at 10 years old, you know lots of long words, oh, ah ;¬)
Get yourself an education scientific preferably.
Worst of both worlds:
I am all for using literacy to interest and amuse thereby getting logical or scientific method theories to a jaded reader.

1. The current paradigm will continue until it's absolutely impossible to continue any longer. The wheels need to come off completely before most people are willing to recognize the problems; not just getting a wee bit stuck as we have so far. It matters little who speaks up about the problems, they will be ignored until things have completely failed.

2.It will do much to help prepare a minority of people. But it will not influence the majority because it is so easy for most people to completely ignore.

3. Everyone sees the issues through the filter of their own experience and self interest. Thus, those at the top in Business have virtually no chance of seeing our problems as they really are (though they may recognize certain aspects, they will not have the full picture). Those at the top in Academia do have a small chance because criticism is not always completely discouraged and they generally do not have a small fortune to guide their thought processes. If Jesus said you cannot serve both God and Money, I'll add that you cannot serve both Truth and Money.

3. Is there any time in history in the liminal space between paradigms, where the most authoritative voices of the dying model were the ones to articulate the model was dying? IOW, if things are badly wrong, wouldn't listening to the most successful people at the top be the wrong strategy, as they got to that position from being the most ambitious/skillful/invested in the current paradigm?

The fall of the Soviet Union would be the place to look for this. It's my understanding that the KGB which, through it's network of spies, had a better understanding of the system's failure than others, were among the strongest supporters of Gorbachev's reforms.

There was growing disillusionment with the Communist dogma among the elites since the violent suppression of the Hungarian revolt which the suppression of Prague Spring only deepened.

I don't know if any of them ever articulated this. Perhaps Yeltsin? But there was an erosion of the ruling paradigm that helped bring down the Communist state.

Nate, this is a great piece. My loudest LOL was triggered by Yergin's "Asian Phoenix" reference. The irony here in Australia is that the economics guru (and China officionado) advising our government on its climate change response included a "Platinum Age" in his reference case emissions and economics scenario. We wrote to him before he finalised his report, to no avail. His first draft included a withering attack on Limits to Growth. Another irony is that, if world oil production did actually peak mid last year, his final report was released after the peak.

One of the hardest of all things is to imagine a new paradigm so different from the present, when so much of our language, social customs, ideas of wealth and scientific beliefs are arranged to only talk about the old one. Part of what you hang onto are glaring contrasts, like the evident physical resource depletion and the present paradigm's faith in limitless resource substitution. That helps anchor people to the new reality as they grope for how to build a new paradigm for it that can spread. I've been anchoring my thinking that way using the contradiction between organizing everything to stabilize growth and the evident growing unmanageability of things it naturally produces.

Still, people all tend to get caught in their own "little worlds", the hives of like minded people and the group-think they develop together. We have all these little closed cells of self-fulfilling world views, all seeing "the truth" as whatever point of view has been profitable for them in their own little sphere... To break through that what is needed is to craft the new paradigm out of the contradictions that aren't hidden from them, using whatever "glue" one can find in the common traditions worth saving, and make little pieces of a new view that can become contagious. Then they'll spread and leak through the cracks. One can't predict response patterns, but contagion is how nature begins all kinds of lasting organizational changes I think.

1. I can imagine Krugman, possibly, writing a column saying

"there's something I've been really missing that has to be talked about... we seem to be running into a physical wall of complications"

for example. He might have that level of intellect and daring, I don't know.

2. Most blogging communities don't have strong traditions of literacy, numeracy and critical thinking about history and change. I think the time scale and complexity of the issues about the oil bubble fosters that, though. Still, we're all a bit like ants, somewhat erratically running around bumping into things, waiting for nature to show us the new pattern everyone is picking up on.

3. It could happen. People have death bed conversion all the time it seems, and designers commonly spend months of effort on things only to throw the whole mess out once they understand they should have been asking a different question. This shift is bigger than most though, seeming to require people figuring out why their belief in the long standing "tried and true rules" has been missing the reality.

"Suppose that there was a technology that could be deployed at the push of a button and it would randomly decimate the human population, the button pusher would be equally at risk, but the planet would be saved and the survivors would have a decent chance of building a sustainable world. Would you be willing to push the button?"

There is a button. Its name is entropy. The button has been pushed--by Mother Nature. Behold--the Second Law of Thermodynamics. It's the ultimate Ponzi Scheme.

Firstly, it's remarkable how well you've channeled Buffet. His turns of phrase are his signature, and you've nailed that totally. How did you do it?

I love this Campfire question because, as far as I'm aware, the entire subject of how one should go-a-prospecting among the public is not dealt with yet, as far as I know, outside of marketing.

You can go to TED, for example, and get all sorts of answers on how to launch ideas more effectively to the public. I enjoyed talks by Godin et al, but Dave Eggers' talk on the viral nature of pairing volunteer tudoring storefronts with pirate shops is really quite remarkable. (imo this is a vaguely reliable principle of surrealism, which we must remember prior to popular useage was actually an art technique). The specific Eggers talk is here.

Now to answer your campfire questions more specifically: 1. If such a press conference were to take place, then it would be taken very seriously and it would be a significant news lead for several weeks. The reason: they are authorities and it is law that we are persuaded by authority. That does not change, when authority figures change their mind. However, there would within several weeks of such a press conference be a blowback from many quarters. 2. It's not clear what does impact real events so it's not clear what doesn't. I don't trust alot of the certitude in this area. I'll just mention one point: repressive governments have historically feared one medium more than all the other: writing. 3. Usually only in art do you see authority figures not only ready but horny to give up the old paradigm, as creative destruction is of course the name of the game. It's much easier to be free when you only need a marginal audience to sustain yourself. Once you need a good chunk of the public to stay afloat, you are sunk--or--you simply have to wait for them to make a shift. It's a hard question to answer: the most clever will always deliver a one-two punch - they will sell you on killing the old paradigm, but then maintain it cleverly in a new guise. My real answer is that it's not a choice authority figures can generally make. When you are deep inside the paradigm, you can't see any light from the outside. If Buffet thought the next wave was some new form of capital-ism he'd surely pounce on it. I just don't think (he) can see it. There is also the problem of branding. So when authority figures renounce the paradigm, many in the public have the following reaction: Oh I guess he's gone all potty and soft on us.

G

Some paradigms change very rapidly - others are very change adverse.

I submit that the combination of a modern bicycle and a pathway of smooth asphalt is the most important technological achievement of mankind (ever - for all of recorded history). Bicycles (actually human powered vehicles - HPV) could save humanity from the 4 horsemen.

China was known as a nation of cyclists. In a wink of the eye, China has embraced the car culture - perhaps very soon selling more cars than the US. The personal transportation paradigm shift was abrupt and universal for most Chinse people.

In the US, nearly every attempt to promote utilitarian cycling is met with huge opposition. In my county, it took over 10 years to get a bridge on our bike path. Zero county dollars will ever be spent for bikes - this is a stated policy of the county board of supervisiors. Of couse, there are counties, in other states, that have a different record regarding bike accommodation - but not many.

Trying to convince the average person to ride a bike to the supermarket is a totally lost cause. The reality is that HPVs are totally rational from a number of perspectives. But the idea (even among TOD folks) that we should use a bike in place of the car for local shopping is basically unacceptable (and, of course, that motorists should embrace cyclists as planet saviors).

A possible paradigm shift from a motor powered vehicle to a HPV has nothing to do with science and logic - it has everything to do with the folks who mold our thinking processes. It has everything to do with a variety of emotional factors.

Watch this BBC documentary:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8953172273825999151#

It wouldn't matter what a handful of people said in an interview. It is not enough to recreate reality for the mass. With the power of the media a new "zeitgeist" can be manufactured but it would have to leave the current power structure intact. Those in power now will never voluntarily give up their power.

I think Huxley's world has been here for quite some time. It is the silence about the truth that allows those in power to maintain it. The western world is population of slaves and they love it. Huxley could see it for what it was.

With the limits of growth pressing down on all of us I think the question that needs to be addressed is this:

If we are living in Huxley's vision of the world, due to the limits of growth, are we about to transition into an Orwellian world where overt force is going to be needed to maintain the power structure?

Emmanuel Goldstein [Bin Laden] is already on the job.

“A really efficient totalitarian state would be one in which the all-powerful executive of political bosses and their army of managers control a population of slaves who do not have to be coerced, because they love their servitude. To make them love it is the task assigned, in present-day totalitarian states, to ministries of propaganda, newspaper editors and school teachers.... The greatest triumphs of propaganda have been accomplished, not by doing something, but by refraining from doing. Great is truth, but still greater, from a practical point of view, is silence about truth."
~Aldous Huxley Brave New World

Great Huxley interview:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scN70fd1rSc&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AU23W_8Jqsk&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Zmg7WzHKGs&feature=related

==AC

So let's continue the show...:

Jim Lehrer: Now that the station break is over, my thanks to the older panelists' discussion. We now move on to a younger generation that is equally aware of the coming Paradigm Shift.

Please welcome Tiger Woods, Justin Timberlake, and Hannah Montana [Miley Cyrus] to the show..[audience applauds].

Jim continues: In earlier pre-show discussions with these youngsters, they jointly asked me to specifically mention first the unique ecological quality to their names, as this was key to their self-recognition and self-revelation to what lies ahead. Tiger, will you please kickstart us off...

Tiger: Thxs, Jim. As most know, I have two youngsters now. I also intensely considered my future destiny as prophesied by the key figure in my life, my dear, departed Father, Earl Woods...

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/features/1996/sportsman/1996.html
--------------------------
The Chosen One

.."Tiger will do more than any other man in history to change the course of humanity," Earl says.

Sports history, Mr. Woods? Do you mean more than Joe Louis and Jackie Robinson, more than Muhammad Ali and Arthur Ashe? "More than any of them because he's more charismatic, more educated, more prepared for this than anyone."

Anyone, Mr. Woods? Your son will have more impact than Nelson Mandela, more than Gandhi, more than Buddha?

"Yes, because he has a larger forum than any of them. Because he's playing a sport that's international. Because he's qualified through his ethnicity to accomplish miracles. He's the bridge between the East and the West. There is no limit because he has the guidance. I don't know yet exactly what form this will take. But he is the Chosen One. He'll have the power to impact nations. Not people. Nations. The world is just getting a taste of his power."
------------------------------

Tiger continues..: As most know, golf is a doomed activity as we go postPeak, and more courses and resorts are closing daily as they go belly-up financially. At my level, we already see corporate sponsorship funds rapidly shrinking and Pro-Events being eliminated from the Pro-Tour. I can see the writing on the wall quite clearly, even my golf-resort development company is struggling. My global Tiger-brand is not enough as BAU collapses.

I realized my first name would be a sad ecologic mocking if tiger habitats and tigers go extinct, and a human-managed golf course is the exact ecologic opposite of a natural and vibrant woodland.

Thus, I am announcing my allegiance to Optimal Overshoot Decline where we, the younger generation, need to go to provide the best chance for reshaping the Dieoff Bottleneck. My company is already buying tractors and plows for permaculture conversion of golf courses, and we will soon be announcing the 'Tiger Tools' brand of home gardening equipment as we cease our money-losing production of golf equipment. My initial 'Tiger Signature' product will be a high-tech, lightweight, but very strong and durable wheelbarrow made of carbon-fiber, titanium, aluminum, and other human-powered tool-innovations are forthcoming as developed by my company.

Justin, why don't explain our joint collaboration?

Justin Timberlake: Thxs, Tiger. Just like Tiger, I too realized that we would be likely and easy targets by enraged, cold & starving postPeak mobs, as defined by the anarchy of Jay Hanson's Thermo/Gene fast-crash scenario. Again, same as for Tiger, my legions of global fans would quickly become my tormentors...

http://www.warsocialism.com/thermogenecollision.pdf
---------------------
..If you were born after 1960, you will probably die of violence, starvation or contagious disease...
---------------------

Justin continues: ...as my vast fortune would provide no protection from the Overshoot. I realized that pledging my wealth towards mitigation, and my art towards 'Peak Outreach for All' is the best strategy going forward.

My next album, to be released next week, is entitled, "Little Blue Marble', and includes songs to best awaken the young to their transformational task ahead. I hope many volunteers, of all ages, will join me as I work with Tiger plowing golf courses and carefully dis-assembling abandoned big-box malls so that the steel can be used for both standard and narrow gauge buildouts. IMO, it will be great fun working and dancing in the fields singing the key songs, "Earthmarines" and "SpiderWebs", along with my cover version of the Harry Chapin Classic, "Remember when the Music".

Okay, enough from me for right now. Miley, go ahead...

Miley Cyrus: Thxs guys. I think I have the toughest Overshoot task of all, which is convincing women of all ages, but especially the young and reproductively fertile, that the most important, overarching goal is negative population growth to match the negative sum game of all resources being depleted. My 'Hannah Montana' fortune is thus pledged towards reaching this end so that we can postPeak minimize the numbers of mothers crying as their babies are dying...

Jim Lehrer: I'm sorry Miley, but we need to momentarily pause for a Yeasty beverage commercial that again highlights doing the famous tradition of the Peakoil Shoutout. This is of course known to all from the Presidential Directive mandated recently...we will return in a few moments to continue this discussion with Tiger, Justin, and Hannah Montana.

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

This could happen and nobody would notice anyway.
Lehrer and PBS have already gone in depth on how the financial system really is a ponzi scheme that was committing mass insurance fraud and repackaging assets they knew were bad. But the mainstream didn't pay any attention.
This interview could happen in real life exactly like this, and still only we would be talking about it.
The mainstream media would ignore it, regardless of the high profile people. Why broadcast coverage on something that's not really entertaining and is going to upset your customers, especially if it's something that's easy to ignore in the short term.
It would take the president to give a speech and explain it to the public. But Carter already tried something like that, and he was voted out.
Obama is a peak oiler, it's pretty clear when he's said quotes like this in his campaign.
"Without a doubt, this addiction is one of the most dangerous and urgent threats this nation has ever faced. We know that we can't sustain a future powered by a fuel that's rapidly disappearing, not when we purchase $700 million worth of oil every single day from some of the world's most unstable and hostile nations, Middle Eastern regimes that [will] control nearly all of the world's oil by 2030...We know that we can't sustain this kind of future."
"Breaking our oil addiction is one of the greatest challenges our generation will ever face. It is going to take nothing less than the complete transformation of our economy. The transformation is going to be costly, and given the fiscal disaster we'll inherit from the last administration, it will likely require us to defer some other priorities. It's also a transformation that will require more than just a few government programs. Energy independence will require an all hands on deck effort from America."

But he's an intelligent pragmatic politician as well and he knows he can't openly say to the public civilisation is in danger of collapsing. He knows how to handle the media, he knows he can talk about peak oil using language well beyond what can fit in a soundbyte or he'll be attacked as a peak oil nutball. But at the same time he knows how to say to peak oiler he's on their side.
The real challenge is congress, expect most of the efforts to deal with peak oil, being marketed under the guise of climate change and energy security.

I urge you guys to calm down some what. I think our message is getting through to the elites, it's the general public that is totally oblivious and that's a real problem.

Norman Borlaug RIP

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jj4yj37U9DWYfLMh8iNpt2...

Quoted in the Atlantic Monthly Jan 1997

...Borlaug has long warned of the dangers of population growth. "In my Nobel lecture," Borlaug says, "I suggested we had until the year 2000 to tame the population monster, and then food shortages would take us under. Now I believe we have a little longer."

http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/97jan/borlaug/borlaug.htm

There's a crucial change in UK govt (lab/con) policy.
Instead of trying to reverse the "recession" by boosting public spending (Keynsianism), they are preparing to make major cuts instead.

Keynsianism is now dead. The end is seemingly nigh.

Looking ahead to Copenhagen, this is only going to work with serious money on the table.

The UK has made a start - but $100bn is just a drop in the ocean.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=688HLeGghXs

When will the US stump up?