A once in the History of Mankind Event

Posted on November 28, 2009
Filed Under General Insanity |

The nice thing about owning your own website, is you can post pretty much anything of interest to you. This is the case now. Where I typically post information supported by other informed or official sources, this posting is going to be strictly my opinion based on virtually the thousands of articles I have read over the last year.

The thing that we as Americans need to come to grips with is the fact we are living in a “once in a lifetime event.”

By this I mean, our entire society, economy and civilization is completely supported by a diminishing resource: oil. Never before in the history of mankind have we on the planet earth, used up our natural oil resources as we have for the last 100 years. Everything we do from energy generation, to transportation, to technology and communications, to farming relies upon oil. As it runs out, so does our ability to sustain our way of life. I think we are in the beginning throes of the end of that way of life even as you read this posting.

I truly believe that World War II was a Pyrrhic victory for the Allied countries. The USA lead their allies to a lopsided and complete victory over the other industrialized nations making up the Axis powers, but in the process the Allies really sowed the seeds to the end of our civilization at the same time. After the war we set ourselves up to fully capitalize on “cheap oil” resources that then allowed us to over-populate the planet. This then allowed us to consume a disproportionate amount of all the other world resources both farm and mining based. The problem most of us humans have, is we base our life decisions on our life experiences. When this goes on for multiple generations, we fall into the trap that what we have will continue on forever ignoring the history of what may have happened to civilizations in eons past. That basic concept of the human psyche has landed us where we are today; in serious trouble. What will we do when the once in history event of the end of cheap oil occurs? I think this event is occurring right now and we have way too many people on this planet to feed and house if that is true.

I am sorry to say, the Industrial Revolution is over. Where I have been a firm believer in education all my life, I now realize for the post-industrial world, skills will be much more valuable than education. Right now the industrialized world is overloaded with overqualified salesmen and managers where now what we will really need are farmers, carpenters and plumbers. Except for a few rare exceptions, those overqualified and over educated people, including myself, will likely not find work in their fields ever again. I think you see this already occurring when you read about people holding advanced college degrees only able to find work as shelf-stockers and cashiers at local lumberyards and warehouses. The real rub will occur when we can no longer financially support cheap food with fertilizers and insecticides made from cheap oil. That is when the overpopulation problem will get severe. When worldwide, crop yields plummet, as is occurring right now.

Clearly we cannot go to the level of such draconian (Chinese) measures of limiting households to only one child for example. We cannot set up a “population police” that shoots newborn babies, but short of that how do you stop people from breeding? Stopping humans from breeding is a tough nut. Fortunately, I think this required depopulation of the planet is going to occur on its own anyway. It will take several generations of famine and disease to do this, making life miserable in the process for everyone, but this is clearly where the world is heading. The planet simply does not have the resources left to support uncontrolled population growth especially as we run out of oil.

Knowing what the future holds, the question is then, what can we do to help ease our way through this mess? Are you listening Washington? Because I have here your answer. The one thing I have always hated in my life is when someone throws out a picture of a debilitating problem and then offers no solutions. Well, I am going to offer up some solutions to this bleak, once in the history of mankind future.

Most alternative energy solutions such as solar and wind really do not offer viable solutions to the replacement of oil. Though the US, Canada and China has plenty of coal we could use, most of the rest of the world does not and further, I have yet to see an automobile that runs on coal. It also makes lousy fertilizer, so that is not a good solution either. The only energy source I see that has the technology and would be big enough to replace oil as a generation source for electricity is not nuclear power but geothermal power. I have written about this in previous blog posts so I will not get into details here, but this is how I would do this had I the powers of the President of the United States.

First, understand I am a big supporter of “government make-work” programs. Such programs built the Hoover Dam, the Tennessee Valley Authority and the US Highway system. Knowing that our national electrical grid in the US is outmoded, worn down and pathetic, our first make-work program would be a massive upgrade to the entire US electric grid system.

The second make-work program would be to work with electric companies around the country to build and start up geothermal electrical generating facilities. This would be a combination of government loans, tax write-offs and more make-work programs.

The third thing I would do is while these other make-work programs were going on, I would plan for and then implement a North American wide mag-lift, high-speed rail system. This would include the major cities in Mexico and Canada and would also require their cooperation and support. I would do this under NAFTA protocols. Clearly another government make-work program and I would run it under Amtrak. Perhaps they may even become profitable under this plan, wouldn’t that be nice.

To finance all this, I would declare a military victory in Iran and Afghanistan, bring home our troops and shut down US bases around the world from the current 800 bases to around 200. I would not cut back technology or high tech armaments for the military, but I would reduce our standing army by about one third. The fact is we should not be the world’s policemen and frankly, we can no longer afford it. Let the EU, China and Russia step up to the plate and keep world order for a while.

I would then offer huge tax incentives and grants to automotive manufacturers and car buyers to move car production to 100% electric vehicles (not hybrids). There is still some technology issues to be resolved on battery design for cars yet, but huge headway has already been made in that field and there would be a 10-year window for further development as the electrical systems and geothermal plants were implemented nationwide anyway.

Taking these steps would eliminate our reliance on oil, extend our ability to make petroleum based fertilizers for centuries and clean up our air and water around the planet all at the same time. Are you listening Washington? You do not need draconian measures to solve our problems, you just need to get smarter. Hey, I am unemployed with advanced engineering degrees. Let me know if you need some help on this Mr. President as I am available.

Clayton

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