Alaskan Republican voters must really hate America and the whole concept of honor, since they overwhelmingly supported indicted Senator Ted “Internet is a series of Tubes” Stevens, giving him 63% of the votes against a field of six other republican challengers in that states recent primary election.

Really? Were none of those other six candidates crooked enough for the Alaskan GOP? Not enough bribes under theie belts? Not enough willingness to fleece American taxpayers out of tax revenue so another stupid bridge over an ice field could be built? Is this the best the Alaska GOP has to offer to the U.S. Senate?

Or maybe this is just indicitive of why the GOP in general is so rotten to the core. See, instead of opting for a clean start and gaining back some credibility as a party that wants to work FOR America, the GOP in Alaska prefers to try to hold on to their senatorial seniority so someone can keep bringing the pork back home.

The GOP is ripe with rotten fruit, and Stevens is just the lowest pit on the branch today. It would have been pretty easy to tell the old codger to take a hike and turn the page towards a better, more honorable representative, but the GOP will do anything to keep the Democrats from gaining a solid majority, even if that means holding on to a federally indicted bribe taker through the election.

Odds are that Stevens will be brought to justice sooner than later. But for the GOP, holding on to a loser is a way of life. One need look no farther than the White House to see how resistant the GOP is to saying, “We were wrong.”

What’s next? McCain-DeLay ’08 Bumper Stickers?

(cross posted at Bring It On!)

(photo credit www.werescrewed08.com)

Convention fever is lighting up the 2008 presidential elections here in the United States- the time for the major political parties to formally nominate their candidates for the general election, for the party faithful to gather and pat each other on the back while mending wounds inflicted during the primaries, and for the political poobahs to flower the nation with promises of a better world ahead. It is a time when the candidates will try and persuade us that they have the right vision and the right stuff to pull America out of the slump of economic decline, foreign war entanglements, and healthcare nightmares. It is a time when the Democrats and the Republicans will seek to prove that only they have the cure to America’s ills, the magic elixir that will make everything all right again.

As if…..

Folks, it’s time for a little reality check. This election is not about fixing America, per se, as much as it is about putting America on a new path forward. Truth of the matter is this: 8 years under George W. Bush (6 years with a compliant GOP Congress and the last 2 with a spineless DEM Congress) has turned the foundation of America on its head, divided the electorate more than ever before, created a less safe and more unstable world, bankrupted the national treasury, demolished our international reputation, and laid the path for continued ecologic and economic ruin and havoc. Of the two main choices for president this election year, one candidate will continue down this path with glee; the other, at best, can slow the forward momentum into the abyss and attempt to lay the groundwork for an altered tomorrow.

Here’s the rub…

Economic future- unless you are an oil company, or a high paid executive, or a politician, the economic outlook for the near future is gloomy. You’ve lost ground with the dollar, your property, and your wages at a time when energy costs have skyrocketed and boosted up the costs of all goods and services. Looking farther ahead, the treasury has reached record deficits and the congress keeps allowing themselves to spend more and raise the legal debt limits, meaning that your grandkids will be paying back China for the Iraq War and the recent questionable tax “rebates” among other things.  Social Security and Medicare are reaching insolvency.

Energy Supply- Despite spurious claims that drilling for oil in America will solve our short term energy problems, the fact is that our oil economy is headed for a brick wall. No amount of forewarning was heeded in America and the crux is that we will face serious lifestyle alterations fueled by an oil crisis. You think we have it tough now with gas at $4/gallon? If we continue to resist a changed course these may well seem like good times, vis-a-vis our energy needs. Our national ignorance and lassaiz-faire attitude towards oil usage and all that is incumbent on its availability will create a serious fault in the foundation of the American dream. It will happen, and the longer we delay real, serious alternatives, the worse the fall will be.

International relationships- The War in Iraq was by far the worst international ploy ever undertaken by an American administration. It has made an already dangerous region even more unstable, zapped American military strength and reputation to the point of paralysis when other world situations arise. Our presence in that debacle has emboldened Russia to return to its own empire building machinations and oil resource power plays. The Bush “with us or against us” mantra has alienated former allies and ignited other regions to become more active foes. And the duplicity with which this “policy” has been applied has further damaged our reputation as champions of freedom and democratic values.

Internal Damage- From illegal domestic spying to politicizing the Justice Department to appointing inept cronies to important positions of responsibility to outsourcing federal responsibilities to mercenary corporations to playing theater with national security….the damage Bush has done to America is both immense and self-perpetuating. Decades of dismantling the messes Bush has purposely created will be required to put this country back on an even keel.

Make no mistake- of the two plausible contenders for president, neither can come close to achieving the promises they put forth. No, wait a minute…actually McCain could. But that’s only because he promises to continue down the path Bush has forged. And with the reality being that the make-up and mental attitude of Congress will not change dramatically this election, a McCain presidency modeled after Bush would almost certainly accelerate the disaster we’re already ensconced in.

For Obama, the task is much harder. Campaigning on the mantle of change, he has raised the expectations of his base and the rest of the nation to a level of unreality. As usual, most Americans live on the sound bites without seeking to know or understand the reality behind the lens. Politicians know the reality but just don’t give much of a damn. They seek to get and hold power. And while Obama may indeed by a new breed of politician, one who actually cares about service over power and politics, his hands are as tied by Bush’s misdeeds as McCain’s mouth is watering to be the next big GOP failure.

In 2006, I wrote a post about what I expected from the Democrats once the regained a majority in Congress. To my chagrin, they have done nothing of substance to change our path and indeed have continued to abet Bush in his own calamitous course. These same folks will continue to make up the majority of our law making body. If McCain succeeds in the election, they will continue to bluster while making few efforts at change. They may stall some policy plans, but in the end, the will either acquiesce or spend time making political hay and further alienating Americans from their government. If Obama can win, he’ll spend the next four years having to explain why his promises haven’t become reality and fending off GOP attack dogs.

Don’t get me wrong…I’m going with Obama. I think that his view for the future is infinitely more palatable that that of McCain. But this time, when the Democrats regain the White House, and when they achieve a slightly larger congressional majority, the best I think I can hope for is 4 years of repair work. The real change I seek isn’t universal health care in 4 years or an immediate withdrawal from Iraq or a realistic and viable energy policy. And it’s not that these things aren’t desperately needed. It’s just that those aims aren’t realistic.

The best we can hope for is some restoration of common sense governance and principled public service. We need a leader who is not only willing to propose and make changes, but who can guide us through the painful times ahead…who can not only make this country understand the need for serious and drastic changes in the way things work, but who can bring us to accept those changes as necessary for a better future for our children and the dream of real freedom and democracy. In short, we need a leader who will make us finally face the truth that how we’ve been doing things can’t continue and then do something about it.

If McCain becomes the next president, we’re totally screwed. If Obama becomes the next president, we’re still screwed, but maybe less so. For at least Obama recognizes that the status quo is broken and seems willing to change things.

Hope and Change? More like hope FOR change. Our path is unsustainable by any measure. We need to abandon this path completely. McCain charges ahead down the path to ruin. Obama at least seems ready and willing to make a new path altogether.

(cross posted at Bring It On!)

John McCain is an idiot. He mocks that which is true and adores that which is not. John McCain is an idiot. And a liar. And he isn’t any better than Bush. John McCain is an idiot. A vote for John McCain is a vote for stupidity squared. Did I mention that John McCain is an idiot?

(cross posted at Bring It On!)

In 2006, voters turned out the Republican majority that had turned Congressinto a rubber-stamping machine for an idiot president. Their hope-no, their insistence- that our government stop the abuses of power perpetrated by an executive branch run amok, gave Democrats a slim majority in the Senate and a slightly larger majority in the House. The 2006 elections also swept into power this nations first female Speaker of the House-an historical event that in retrospect is more historical not for the gender barrier that had been broken, but for the total inadequacy displayed the entire Demcoratic leadership in the face of voter angst and demand for a changed course for this country.

So, what has the 110th Congress accomplished? Not a whole hell of a lot that’s been good. They have capitulated to the executive branch on all things related to the Iraq War, including belatedly excusing some of the most egregious lapses of legal action ever undertaken by a president and his administration. They have continued to allow unfettered waste of taxpayer dollars, they have emboldened our Lunatic-in-Chief in his quest to spread his “democracy building project” into Iran, and they have helped create this country’s largest ever deficit.

But wait- they haven’t done nothing…

Out of a total 260 laws this Congress has passed, 74 separate laws that had the effectof them were the naming of post offices. And they’ve been very busy passing non-binding resolutions, including one that declared soil an “essential resource” and another to congratulate the UC-Irvine volleyball team.

From Parade Magazine:

Rep. John Shimkus (R., Ill.) introduced a resolution to recognize June 30 as National Corvette Day. “It’s probably not the best use of our time,” he says, “but we have to do something. These resolutions make it look like we’re working.”

Shimkus blames the Democrats for failing to introduce more substantive legislation. Democrats, in turn, blame Republicans for blocking key votes, contending that Senate Republicans have attempted a record number of filibusters this session.

Enough of this bullshit already! We tossed out the Republicans for (among the many things) driving this nation into the wallets of corporate war profiteers and energy barons. We should toss the damn Democrats now too for being such worthless enablers.

Too bad the two parties have so successfully eliminated any chance of other parties breaking their do-nothing monopoly. What this government needs is an enema! Or at the very least a new breed of politicians with a spine, a sense of stewardship and service, and who aren’t for sale to the highest bidder.

 (cross psoted at Bring It On!)

Take a look at the following headlines:

Foiling Terror Plots Doesn’t Take An Army (August 10, 2006)

Law Enforcement Continuing To Succeed Where War Fails (October 4, 2006)

New Alleged Terror Plot Thwarted-Again Without Destroying A Foreign Country (June 2, 2007)

U.S. Should Rethink “War On Terrorism” Strategy to Deal with Resurgent Al Qaida (July 29, 2008)

These articles, covering a span of about two years, are all saying the same thing: fighting terrorism is better done through law enforcement than through war. Interesting enough, the first three articles were written by me and posted at Bring It On. The final article was published yesterday by the Rand Corporation, a think tank developed by the US Air Force after WWII and today a major supplier of policy advice to the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Staff, the unified commands and other defense agencies. Seems like the Rand Corporation is a little behind the “obvious curve.”

In it’s newly released report, the Rand Corporation says:

“Terrorists should be perceived and described as criminals, not holy warriors, and our analysis suggests that there is no battlefield solution to terrorism.” -Seth Jones, the study’s lead author and a political scientist at RAND, a nonprofit research organization.

Hmmmmm….sounds an awful lot like this:

“There are terrorists who want to harm the west, specifically killing as many civilians as they can. If they are determined enough, some will succeed. But through the application of solid investigative work and application of the rule of law, many of these folks have been stopped before reaching their murderous intentions.” – Ken Grandlund, 8-10-06

And this:

“Law enforcement, including cooperation with intelligence agencies and other countries, is more effective in breaking up terror cells than going to war.” – Ken Grandlund, 6-2-07

I’m not trying to brag here. I’m just pointing out that for over two years, I’ve been saying publically what the Rand Corporation (and presumably the folks who rely on its reports to craft policy) is only now figuring out. I’m no genius, but then again, it doesn’t take a genius to state the obvious. Apparently it just takes waiting for an idiot president who has squandered untold billions of dollars, thousands of American lives, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives, soiled the reputation of the United States of America and garnered the disgust of people everywhere to enter his final months in office for someone (in a position to be really heard) to finally stand up and state the obvious.

(Sarcastic) Kudos to the Rand Corporation and every other asshat politician, corporate executive, and neo-con ass-licker for finally facing the facts- namely that massive military action is a stupid way to deal with terrorists.

(cross posted at Bring It On!)

“Stop throwing the Constitution in my face. It’s just a goddamned piece of paper!” -George W. Bush, November, 2005

The context for the above quote lies in a meeting President Bush had with Congressional Republicans and aides back in 2005 when they were discussing how to renew the Patriot Act. His outburst came after an aide pointed out that certain provisions of the Patriot Act undermined the U.S. Constitution. Yet even without this quote, which has been vigorously denied by conservative lapdogs, a look at the Bush presidency reveals the disdain Bush has for our national charter, and by association, the concept of democratic governance.

When the American colonists broke the chains of servitude to the monarchy, they set out to create a government by, for, and of the people, modeled on the ancient Greek experiments with democracy. Having endured the abuses of power ubiquitous in a monarchical government, the framers of the U.S. Constitution sought to create a government whereby the people were to be protected from the abuses of governmental intrusion and largess. Under a monarch, there were no individual rights, no quarter from the dictates of the king, no protection from abusive or arbitrary rulings. When the king wanted money, he took it. When the king wanted to go to war, he conscripted his troops. When the king declared a law, there was no room for recourse or debate. This kind of rule offered no freedom, and it was this kind of rule that the Constitution was created to protect against.

And by and large, even with the imperfections and inequities of its origin, the U.S. Constitution has endured and even expanded the concept of freedom and equality over our 220+ years of existence. It has done so for one very important reason- successive generations of American citizens and political leaders have embraced its underlying and all encompassing central theme- government exists at the will of the people, to serve the needs and desires of the people, and must, in its course, be accountable and transparent to the people.

That is not to say that all American politicians throughout our history have embraced these concepts equally. It’s not hard to find dozens of examples of elected officials subverting democracy for personal gain or from a sense of historic necessity. And if the truth shall be told, a great many 20th century American politicians have been complicit in the erosion of a strong tripartite government, in the weakening of the power of the people, and of the overall dismantling of our carefully crafted charter. Indeed, were it not for complicit Congresses, no president alone could have managed to transform our democratic republic into an oligarchy. Regardless, before Geroge W. Bush had himself annointed “Decider in Charge,” most politicians still held that no one, not even the president, could be above the law and that even the president had to abide by the restrictions set forth in the Constitution. And with but a few notable exceptions, even during this country’s greatest challenges like the Civil War and World War II, presidents and congresspersons alike held fast to the provisions in our Constitution that guaranteed certain powers to each branch of government and guaranteed certain rights to American citizens.

I should concede right now that the general powers of our government today are very different than those originally anticipated by the writers of our Constitution. Our government is much more intrusive then they would have liked it to be. And the addition of layers of federal bureaucracy over the decades have grown the size of our government to enormous proportions. But with a few exceptions, governmental expansion, and with it an increase in the power of government and its various branches, has been codified into law with the consent of the governed. The New Deal programs that helped lift this country out of the Great Depression of the 1930’s greatly expanded the role of government into everyday life, but it did so under the support of the majority of Americans. The expansion of governmental services crafted under the Great Society were somewhat more controversial, but were still acted upon with the consent of a majority of Americans who sought to create a more enlightened government that would help its people achieve success without squashing their freedoms. While these governmental expansions clearly exceeded the original intent of the federal government, verbage in the preamble of the Constitution does indeed allow for government to act to “promote the general welfare” and under the sometimes silent direction of their constituents, elected politicians promoted and passed laws to cover a wide range of “public” issues. However, with each passage of a new program or policy, bureaucracies and departments had to be created to fulfill the various mandates, and by the nature of the Constitution, all those new bureaucracies and departments fell under the Executive branch, in essence giving more and more power to the president and his appointees. Most presidents tried to balance the addition of power with the constitutional theory of balance of power. And most congresses and Supreme Courts took pains to keep each branch of government in check. Even Richard Nixon found that the idea “if the president does it it isn’t illegal” didn’t hold water in American government and was forced to resign the presidency for abusing the powers of his office.

But something about following the rules just doesn’t seem to sit well with our current president, George W. Bush. And under the guise of “national security” and “terrorism,” and with our history’s most compliant and spineless Congresses, Bush has turned our government into a parady of its founders vision. Under Bush, not only has abuse of power run roughshod over the tenets of democratic governance, the very notion of government by the people has been corrupted to become government in spite of the people. Where once the Constitution was used to protect people from the abuses of government, now the Constitution is subverted to protect government from the people.

Consider the constant use of signing statements under Bush. While there is plenty of historical precedent for presidents to attach commentary to bills they sign, no president has done so with such frequency and vehemence than Bush. Where other presidents may have used the “signing statement” opportunity to clarify thoughts on laws, Bush has used them to justify ignoring or effectively anulling the law altogether.

Or consider Bush’s claims of executive privilege for anything under the sun, including applying it to instances where it has no legal basis. Executive privilege was designed to shield a president, their actions or words, from public scrutiny when the topic at hand required secrecy and the ability to drop diplomacy from the conversation. But Bush has extended “executive privilege” to cover any situation of any executive branch function, regardless of whether or not the president was involved in a particular conversation or not. The most recent and classic examples involve Bush’s order to former aides Harriet Miers and Josh Bolton to ignore a congressinal subpoena, and to his Justice department to refuse to act on the subsequent contempt of congress charges. Executive privilege was designed to shield a president, not every political hack he ever appointed to a position of incompetence.

Yet these transgressions (or rather, willful acts of constitutional subversion) are only the tip of an unwelcome iceburg of constitutional debasements perpetuated upon America by George W. Bush. Whereas previous presidents often had the public on their side for major governmental shifts on purpose, Bush and his congressional lackeys have not had large scale public support for their most odious and harmful actions. And such support as they may have originally held in the wake of the 9-11 attacks has withered away as presidential excess has destroyed American credibility and debased the Constitution to “just a goddamned piece of paper.”

Abuses of power and the dismantling of the Constitution under Bush has reached previously unknown heights, and our nations great founders are likely rolling in their graves. Among the most grevious transgressions:

Warrantless wiretapping and the presidential decree that private business be shielded from prosecution for abetting illegal governmental actions. The constitution forbids warrantless searches, but some have been allowed through subsequent legislation provided that certain steps are followed. Bush decided he didn’t even need to follow those rules and ordered the most massive warrantless spying program in history.

The introduction of presidentially approved torture, kidnapping and detention in the name of national security. Violating the Constitution is like Bush’s hobby. The Bill of Rights explicitly forbids punishment that is cruel and unusual (torture) as well as detention without charges or trial. And kidnapping is illegal pretty much throughout the civilized world. No amount of argument about how the “terrorists” do it so we will too is acceptable. Security does not require giving up your humanity.

Government secrecy, from Cheney’s secret energy meetings to covering up or ignoring the truth about Iraqi weapons programs to the world’s biggest “lost e-mail” treasure trove, in the Bush administration, information is not for public consumption. Our government was designed to be open and accountable, but to be so it requires that information be shared and public. Under Bush, accountability is non-existant, in part because the flow of information stops at the White House door.

The list could go on for pages and pages, but most of us, even the deniers and Bush lovers, are familiar with the multitude of constitutional transgressions put forth by George W. Bush. And while it is important to recoginze the shared culpability of all elected officials who have given this man-child free reign, it is even more important to recognize that had we not had a president of such pettiness and immaturity, a great many of these abuses would never have occurred and America might still have some standing on the world stage that was not accorded simply due to the might of our military.

Make no mistake- I allow no excuse for the elected Republican and Democrat leaders who have sat idly by and acquiesced or abetted Bush on his path of Constitutional destruction. They are all guilty of cowardice at best, of treason at worst. The congress has repeatedly abrogated its own responsibility as an equal branch of government and allowed these things to go unchallenged.

But it is Bush, and Bush alone, who is responsible for debasing our Constitution and for setting precedents that will make future presidents even less accountable to the people. Now, because of Geroge W. Bush, our only real hope in restoring the concepts and ideals of democracy is to actually get a president who respects not only the Constitution and its meaning and historical importance, but who respects the American people and is ready and willing to deconstruct the vile separation that has been built between the people and our government by George W. Bush.

(cross posted at Bring It On!)

So now the Pope is going green. Or at least that’s what he’d like for us to believe.

Speaking to a group of 200,000 people gathered in Sydney for the Roman Catholic Church’s youth festival, the Pope told followers that the world’s natural resources are being squandered by “insatiable consumption.”

Some excerpts from his chat:

“The concerns for nonviolence, sustainable development, justice and peace, and care for our environment are of vital importance for humanity.”

“Perhaps reluctantly we come to acknowledge that there are also scars which mark the surface of our Earth: erosion, deforestation, the squandering of the world’s mineral and ocean resources in order to fuel an insatiable consumption.”

True dat, Mr. Pope. But tell me please how your latest missive squares with Catholicism’s prohibition on contraception. After all, “insatiable consumption” can be blamed on a booming world population, something you seem to be all for.

Can anyone say cognitive dissonance?

If the Pope believes that people are using too many resources and leaving the world dangerously in peril, then perhaps he should quit telling his faithful to have more children.

Of course, in the good old U.S. of A.  we’re popping out babies like there’s no tomorrow. 4.3 million babies were born in the US in 2007, a number that hadn’t been seen since the 1950’s. Insatiable consumption? I guess we missed the memo.

The Pope should be proud…slightly conflicted perhaps, but proud nonetheless.

(cross posted at Bring It On!)

“Ours is a system of corporate socialism, where companies capitalize their profits and socialize their losses…in effect, they tax you for their accidents, bungling, boondoggles, and mismanagement, just like a government. We should be able to dis-elect them.”
– Ralph Nader

Conservatives hate socialism. We know this is true because they tell us how evil socialism really is every chance they get. According to many conservatives, socialist public policies are to blame for everything from the destruction of the American family (think welfare) to the crumbling of American manufacturing (think labor unions) to the financial straits of the American government (think Social Security, Medicare, and any non-defense related government spending). If there is a problem in America, odds are that some socialist policy is behind it, or so a conservative might assert.

Many conservatives insist that socialism will destroy America, that Democrats are really just socialists at heart, and therefore that Democrats destroy America. Even more, they confuse socialism and communism, and insist that Democrats are just communists bent on destroying the wonders of American capitalism by taking “our money” and giving it to the “worthless, lazy slobs” who are too stupid to grab a real chunk of the “American dream.” Conservatives are loathe to approve public policies that spend taxpayer money on healthcare or childcare or food assistance or anything that diverts tax money away from corporations and towards the citizens.

For conservatives, the notion of Capitalist Socialism is an oxymoron, an impossibility, an evil force of perveted economics. Unless you’re talking about the kind of socialism whereby the public has to bail out private corporations who have managed their affairs so badly that their collapse might have widespread economic implications. In that case, socialism is not only okay, it’s the only way to go.

The general public actually embraces some forms of Capitalist Socialism, like the ever popular Social Security program. Truth be told, most of our “public” institutions are funded through a form of socialism. When our taxes are spent on hospitals or schools or police departments, this is a form of socialism. We all pay for the services that we all receive. Our system of capitalism depends upon socialism in this form, as does any democratic country and government. But the conservatives ignore the fact of this kind of socialism because it provides them with billions of dollars to dispense annually, and they like to give our tax money to fat cat corporations by way of no-bid contracts or public bail-outs.

It is a hypocrisy that is lost on most people though, because of the demonized reputation the word “socialism” has gotten at the hands of the conservative political machine. Ask your average citizen how they feel about socialism and you’ll probably get an earful of criticism. But try to explain that we already live under a form of socialism and you’ll be speaking to deaf ears. We can’t be socialist! We’re a damn democracy, and we’re capitalists to boot.

Uh, yeah. Right.

I’m not against socialist programs per se. Our social safety net programs have helped millions of Americans over the years to avoid abject poverty. And to be fair, many of our socialist programs have not lived up to their potential, although I would insist that any failures lie at the hands of greedy politicians and political special interest groups more than in the design of the programs themselves. Social Security, one of the biggest socialist programs we have (in terms of overall cost) is nearing insolvency as much because of politicians raiding the fund as the rising population of retirees. But when it comes to corporate bail-outs where the failure lies in lax oversight or outright fraud, I have to say I’m not all that keen on corporate socialism. Especially when those individuals at the top of the corporate heap, who laugh all the way to their off-shore banks, are never held responsible in any meaningful way for their corrupt practices that result in massive financial loss to average working folks and end up costing us all when the government steps in to bail them out.

The current financial crisis in the mortgage industry is a direct result of the Bush administration’s laissez-faire attitude towards financial regulation and oversight. You’d have thought that the Enron collapse (and other corporate meltdowns over the last 7 years) would have opened the publics eyes, and maybe it did for a few minutes. But put a sweet, juicy apple in front of a horse and he may well forget that the last apple you  gave him was really just a piece of rotton fruit. When Bush proclaimed his desire to create “The Ownership Society” he was handing us an apple. It did taste pretty good for a few chews, but as we reach the core, we can see how rotton it really was. And the taste seems to be lingering far longer than it ever should.

By creating an atmosphere of lax enforcement and by stripping away funding for regulation and any sort of oversight, the mortgage industry called open season on America. They played fast and furious to get anyone into a home regardless of the financial realities such moves required. They got paid when the made the loan, then they sold the loan and got paid again. They didn’t give a crap about the people at the end of the trail though, those who would ultimately be left holding worthless loan notes because the original borrower would never be able to pay the full rates when the juicy apple revealed itself to be rotton.

And by and large, as the banking system is brought to its knees by its own greed, none of those folks who fueled the boom will be held responsible. Much like the German Army of the 19030’s and 1940’s, these fine folks were just following orders. They didn’t make the rules after all. Why should they be held responsible?

Socialism has some good qualities- like the collective payments for public institutions and infrastructure or social safety nets that promote work while offering a hand in hard times. But socialism also has an evil side, just like the conservatives tell us it does. It’s called corporate socialism. Isn’t it funny how it’s the only aspect of socialism that the conservatives really seem to love?

(cross posted at Bring It On!)

Concluding his final meeting with world leaders at the G8 summit, U.S. President George W. Bush pumped his fist into the air and boldly announced, “Goodbye from the world’s biggest polluter.”

Probably thinking he was being amusing, Bush got no props from the other world leaders who stood by with looks of shock on their faces.

It’s well known around the world that Bush cares little for the environmental well being of this (or probably any other) planet. He unilaterally withdrew the US from any kind of climate action treaties upon taking office and spent the first 6 years denying that the world faced any real threat from manmade pollution. He purposfully degraded the EPA and made attempts to politicize its findings. And when the EPA sent the president an e-mail report decrying the problems with greenhouse gas pollutants, Bush just ignored them altogether. He didn’t even open the report. 

As if to punctuate his public “Fuck Off World” message he left the G8 leaders with, US lawmakers announced today that no efforts to tackle greenhouse emissions will occur until AFTER Bush leaves office. This is a tacit acceptance by the EPA that Bush will only delay or deny efforts to reduce greenhouse pollution while still at the helm.

Here’s to hoping that all of Bush’s future progeny are born with extra limbs and deformed gonads.

(cross posted at Bring It On!)

It is a well known myth that while fires destroyed the great city of Rome, the emporer Nero sat on his rooftop playing his lyre and watching the flames engulf the heart of his empire. Whether true or not, the image persists and the popular saying “Nero fiddled while Rome burned” is readily applied to any governmental figure who does little in the face of disaster or looming disaster. Our most recent example of such governmental inadequacy was painted bright by the photo of President George W. Bush peeking down upon a hurricane ravaged New Orleans from the safety of his jumbo jet, thousands of feet overhead. That Bush acted so aloof in the face of monumental disaster should have been an eye-opener to everyone, and for a great many it was. However, despite being in a position of power to effect change, Bush is not alone in his ability to ignore oncoming strife and potential disaster. Quite frankly, most of the American public (and the western world at large) goes about their daily lives with blinders firmly in place and with a fiddle in every hand. It takes no great talent to view our world today and conclude that big changes are just ahead of us, and that the near future is bleaker than it has been for a thousand years or more.

If a perfect storm refers to the simultaneous occurrence of weather events which, taken individually, would be far less powerful than the storm resulting of their chance combination. Such occurrences are rare by their very nature, so that even a slight change in any one event contributing to the perfect storm would lessen its overall impact. Taken out of a weather context, our modern world is as close as ever to seeing a perfect storm of social, political, and economic upheaval that all but guarantees that life as we know it will be no more. The combination of resource scarcity, over-population, climate change, and globalized economics has put our modern world in a precarious position.

The rise in standards of living, scientific advancement, and population explosion can almost all be attributed to one primary resource-oil. Since its discovery as a source of fuel, the world has enjoyed an unprecedented era of cheap global travel and exchange of goods, an increase in agricultural productivity and economic growth, and a formidable advance in scientific knowledge and application. Cheap and plentiful oil made crops grow faster and more bountiful, allowing for the ability to increase populations around the world. Cheap and plentiful oil created and sustained global tourism, increasing our interdependence on each other as whole economies became based on catering to visitors from abroad. Oil drove manufacturing capabilities to previously unknown levels, creating entire industries devoted to creating modern amenities to make our lives easier and more entertaining. Very nearly everything we have or relate to modern society is derived upon the notion of cheap and plentiful oil.

Yet our dependence on and enslavement to cheap and plentiful oil has also helped to create a natural world on the brink of radical change. Pollution, whether directly from oil-related emissions or as a by-product of oil created consumer goods has spoiled our air and soils and water around the world. Changes to our atmosphere caused by unremitting releases of carbon based emissions are combining with naturally occuring forces to dramatically shift our weather patterns and yearly climate conditions. Cheap oil has led governments to expand their societies and strive for continual economic growth, which in turn has led to mass deforestation and land degradation as we search for precious metals and raw materials to sustain the unsustainable growth explosion. And as we continue to encroach upon the natural world to sustain our own, whole species have become extinct, thus changing the local ecologies of entire regions, which in turn create more changes to the environment at large.

And our love affair with oil has blinded or eyes (as love affairs so often do) to the reality of a globalized economy that is suited not to make the lives of everyone more equal and fulfilling, but rather to help enrich more modern societies at the expense of less modernized ones. But by obscuring this reality, most all societies have taken steps to become as modernized as the next, and whole populations have increased with the expectation that our modern world will find a way to not only sustain an ever growing influx of new people, but will indeed lift them up from poverty and create a level playing field the world over.

And despite occasional warnings from forward thinking people throughout the decades, by and large, we’ve been witnessing this great expansion of human prosperity with the impression that the end would never come, that human ingenuity would supplant the more rational notion that says a finite source will eventually run out. We’ve been playing Nero’s fiddle en masse.

I try to be optimistic about things when I can, but I’m primarily a realist. For many though, realism is synonymous to pessimism, meaning that to point out the obvious, especially when the obvious predicts bad times ahead, makes one a doomsayer at best. Yet at the risk of being labeled such, I’m putting my own fiddle down. Because regardless of the ultimate level of devolution modern society is facing, the facts remain clear- the way we are living now can not be sustained indefinitely, and in fact is on the brink of radical change.

The end of cheap and plentiful oil is upon us. Whether or not we have reached the point of peak oil production is still being debated by a few, but most oil industry experts agree that if we have not already reached this point, it will be upon us in mere years. We are seeing and feeling the effects now. As oil and oil derivatives become even more expensive, economies may well stop growing altogether and begin to seriously contract if not collapse. Governments will have to decide what is the more valuable use of oil-transportation or the chemical derivatives from oil that supply things like plastics and petrochemicals and petroleum based fertilizers. If transportation gets the nod, say goodbye to whole industries that depend on oil byproducts for their livelihood. Say goodbye to medical advances and higher yield crops. Say goodbye to ubiquitous electricity too.

Even as we make small strides to shift off of an oil-dependent economy (a near impossibility now, but let’s pretend for a moment), the state of our natural world is becoming overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of humans living on the planet. Potable water resources are not infinite either. Nor is the ability to produce enough food to feed each person. And without oil for transportation or electric generation, large scale water purification and food sharing become near impossibilities. Coupled with our overpopulation problem is the real fact of global climate shifts that are changing local weather patterns and decreasing the likelihood of future increases in food production. Starvation that we’ve grown accustomed to seeing from afar may soon be at a city near you.

I’ve never put much stock in “end times” philosophies, largely because they are predominantly based on religious mythology and doctrine. To assume that an omnipotent being has preordained the time and path of humanity seems more than a little absurd to me. But “end times” are a human reality and have been over and over throughout the eras of human history. Yet where religious “end times” focus on a final battle between good and evil for the souls of mankind, in reality most “end times” come to societies because of the faults of human beings themselves, and are usually fomented by over-population of a particular region, over-extension of governmental dictates, or a lack of natural resources to sustain a society. Large nations become over-reaching in their desires and expectations and collapse under the weight of their inefficient bureaucracies. Societies degrade and lose cohesion. Unlike religious based “end times” where all mankind ultimately perishes to the lakes of hell or the promises of heaven, most real-life “end times” represent little more than drastic change from what came before them. “End times” signify a passing of the guard, as it were, from one type of human condition to another.

And so as we approach another potential “end time” in human history, I can’t help but wonder how people will react when it becomes only too obvious to the majority that their fiddles can’t play fast enough or loud enough to drown out the reality of the situation.

As our perfect storm of resource scarcity, continued population growth, and interdependent economies based on cheap and plentiful oil converge, how will humanity fare? Will those who remain rise from the ashes of our near past to replicate the errors, taking advantage of a smaller population to extend the fragile resources left today? Will we devolve into another Dark Age period, ruled by superstitious and supercilious religious leaders?

In the possible (and perhaps even probable) face of such looming societal breakdown, it sometimes becomes hard to focus on the minutiae of current political desires or societal problems. In the face of potential societal collapse, how important really are the political problems of the day? Yet we can’t completely give up either, because we are human. And the human condition is one of hopefulness, creativity, and reactionism. Even when we can see intellectually that things are going sideways fast, we resist the temptation to throw in the towel and hide our heads in the sand. We infuse ourselves with the notion that our ingenuity will save us, despite some evidence to the contrary. And even with such troubling times ahead, even with great changes in lifestyle all but guaranteed, we continue to collectively play our fiddles. But not because we don’t actually care about what is happening. Rather, we play in the face of what is happening, because we see no ready solution to the end of cheap and plentiful oil and no interconnection between how we drive and what we eat. As a whole, we not only don’t believe the end is near, we deny that it can ever come. And so we continue to live as if things will all work out fine. Because if we let ourselves believe otherwise, we’d have a lot of scared, crazy people to deal with on top of the rest. But ignoring the problem doesn’t make it go away.

To the absolute deniers, I may be just another crock in the crazy world of internet doomsayers. But in all truth, I continue to play my fiddle too, albeit with less vigor than before and with only one eye on the sheet music. You see, I want society to figure things out. I want humanity to continue to exist, to improve, and to realize that as a species, we are not only intimately connected to each other, but to our planet as well. But I’m also taking small steps to prepare for economic collapse, making contingency plans, and looking at the evidence with eyes wide open. If really bad times do come to pass I don’t want to be caught completely uneprepared. And I don’t want you to be either.

I’m not trying to drive unsubstiantiated fear into your heart , dear reader. I’m not a Republican. I’m just calling it like it looks. And I’ve honestly never wanted to be more wrong about anything like I want to be wrong about this. So I continue to live from day to day, acting in one sense as if not much will really change. But I also am trying to make a plan because I just don’t see a way around it. And I don’t want the blinders on any more.

So go ahead and tell me I’m crazy-just give me the evidence to back it up. Like I said, I’d really like to be wrong.

(cross posted at Bring It On!)