“Okay, you’ve made your point. So what do we do about it?” John Michael Greer, speaking rhetorically to the Peak Oil "movement", et al.
That's the correct question, isn't it? Oil has now cleared $89 for every delivery month from February 2010 onward, and is over $90 for every delivery month from July 2010 onward, and this is still technically a "shoulder period" for petroleum demand. This at a time when nearly 20% of Americans are not working (that is U6 unemployment, not the completely FOS U3).
The debate is over. Even the IEA has cried "Uncle!" Now what?
Greer was speaking in the rhetorical. There is very little left to do. The American body "politic" has shown quite clearly that it is incapable of rising to ANY OCCASION, and individuals have either made their moves years ago... or are going to work around the circumstances that they find themselves in. As Ruth Gordon of "Harold and Maude" fame (if you have never seen this cult classic, you are operating without a proper education) famously said when asked the secret to aging gracefully - "Money helps". If you sold your house in 2005 at the top of the market and invested it all in precious metals... good for you! That does not cover most of us... and for 20% of the population, the "collapse" is already very much here and very real.
To me, this is an intellectual exercise. Something to bear witness to; a spectacle. I freely admit I have no idea what I would do if I were in the POTUS's shoes (but I do wish him G-dspeed).
(Any REAL Peaknik, the kind of guy that writes a thousand plus blog posts on for zero monetary compensation, that does not have his doomer homestead stocked and prepped is nothing more than a "poser".)
The following is from my October 17, 2007 post on what Peak Oil will mean to Americans:
1. New Orleans will never be rebuilt, nor will any other future major natural disaster of similar scale (are you listening Florida and California?).
2. American children born in 2007 will not need a driver’s license when they are 30.
3. Your 401k will become a 201k, and then a 101k, and then just a k…
4. Social Security and Medicare will fail.
5. America’s farm labor workforce will be 33% of the population by 2030, not the 1.5% of 2007 (Texas A&M might actually be a better bet than Harvard for junior after all).
6. Student loans will be a future credit crisis. (Borrowing $200k for a literature degree will, in retrospect, not appear to be an intelligent investment.)
7. The luxury car you now drive will be a very nice pottery holder in your garden.
8. But, your milk goat is really going to appreciate those fine leather seats, and your chickens will really enjoy perching on the engraved wood steering wheel.
9. You’ll be using dollar bills to light candles on your birthday cake because they are cheaper than matches.
10. Homes will come with only 1 zone heating and AC - your bedroom.
11. You’ll be thin again!
12. Home cooking!
13. Your wife’s depression/personality disorder, junior’s ADHD, and your alcohol problem… cured, with all that fresh air and sunshine instead of driving everywhere.
14. South Florida’s housing crisis will never be resolved.
15. The Southwest water problem will no longer be academic.
16. You won’t feel so rushed anymore. You won’t be spending time going to the gym, filling up the car, commuting…
17. No problem not fulfilling your new year’s fitness resolution as walking and biking will no longer be optional means of transportation.
18. You will care far more about who is Mayor than who is President.
19. You will get to know the neighbors, one way or another.
20. Conspicuous displays of consumption or wealth will not be good for your health.
21. The response time for 911 is going to be a great deal longer than it is now.
22. The end of Feminism, Liberalism, Conservatism, etc… these were luxuries of the cheap fossil fuel era.
23. No more keeping up with the Jones’. Keeping up will be quite enough.
24. Flush it and forget it will be replaced by compost it and fertilize with it.
25. You will never have to mow the lawn again, ‘cause your gonna need that hay.
26. You won’t have any trouble finding a parking space.
27. No more road rage, you will truly appreciate the use a of vehicle.
28. You are going to look fabulous in designer jeans while working in your garden, fixing your bike, etc…
29. Golf courses will become community gardens or farms and that home on the 9th hole will likely become a home in the Spinach field or pumpkin patch... and you will be working on your swing all right – for your hoe, your scythe, your axe…
30. The demand for lawyers, stockbrokers, accountants, insurance agents, realtors, hair -dressers, massage therapists, psychologists, etc… is going to dry up in ways I am not poetic enough to describe (and I own a brokerage firm).
No, this won’t happen overnight, but that is not the point. The point is that it WILL happen. Things will change, and since “for the better” or “for the worse” is an abstract I have no comment on either. Things will change and some people will be the “winners” in the new paradigm, while others will be the “losers” (sorry, more abstractions), and it is up to you to decide where it is you would like to be and what actions you plan to take to execute your plan.
end of re-post
Not a few of those items have already come to pass, most of the balance are on their way... but there will still be cold beer, great food, and fun to be had.
More soon.