Still some good stuff left over from Christmas.... homemade cannoli!
... and Brie is starting out right with new tennis balls for Christmas. Can't really see it, but there is one in her mouth.By Murph
Finally the Christmas season is over. Now that my computer is back up and working right again, I can get back to the doomer reading and speculation.
Every once in a while I run into someone who wildly explains that I am crazy to believe or look seriously at some issue. Had an acquaintance not too long ago that declared, in a loud voice for all in the immediate area, that peak oil was a bunch of garbage, intimating of course that I had to be crazy to even consider it. It was pointed out to me that the huge reserves that have been found in the last few years would keep the U.S. running for the next 500 years or so, completely forgetting that domestic oil production is sold on the open market for whatever the market will pay. The most usual thing that is put in my face is the Baakan oil reserves in the U.S. The last time that was used, I asked what their source of information on that reserve was. I was told to just Google Baakan reserves and I would get all the info I needed. So, one more time I decided to see what the information was. The very first entry from Google was a forum where some guy wrote in wildly exclaiming that there was no shortage of oil in the U.S. because of the shale oil in the Baakan reserves, would feed the U.S. oil habit for the next 200 years. Then I found a bunch of states, mostly from the Oil Drum web site, but verified it from some other sites also. It seems that the recent USGS study, if they are to be believed, say that the recoverable oil from that site is 3.4 to 4.3 billion barrels. Frankly, that doesn’t even qualify as a super site. In fact, all the larger discoveries in the last 10 years have been in that range, or somewhat larger, but not a super site.
Some stats for your information; The U.S. has been using from 18-25 million barrels per day for the last 5 years. The 18 million barrels is from the last year stats. That works out to 6.8 BILLION barrels per year. Current U.S. oil production is around 5 million barrels per day. This means that the Baakan reserves if pulled out right now, would last the U.S. about 300 days at last years usage. Long way from 200 years plentiful and cheap supply. In fact, the total world oil production is around 3 billion barrels per year, Considering that they are trying to extract oil from more and more expensive and hard to maintain regions (like deep sea and shale and sands) it sure doesn’t appear that our usage is sustainable for much longer. Hmmm. And oil is now over $90/barrel and gas is over $3.00 per gallon.
So who is the crazy one here?
A very good friend of mine once suggested that one way of defining a crazy or insane person is that their brain processes information different than most of us. Of course, the popular idea is that a crazy person is not dealing with reality, not including just what in hell reality really is and if it even can be identified. When I read through history it often touches on the insane among the population. Interestingly, the insane can be right just enough to make a mockery of the “not dealing with reality’ crowd. Of course those really primitive people often revered the “crazy ones” among them for having communication with god or gods. But of course, we can’t take them primitive folks seriously now can we. We know better now, and you would have to be crazy to look at that seriously. By our present paradigm on the subject, the Old Testament prophets were flat out crazy, talking to god and such schizophrenic behavior.
Freeacre wants me to include my/our predictions for the next year and beyond. I’ve never offered something like this before but here goes.
Employment; won’t get better; in fact I predict unemployment is going to keep going up. I expect it to exceed 1930 levels of 20% in the next year. Only so much government hiring will take place and I figure we have just about reached the limit at this time. Lower level manufacturing jobs are not going to be coming back anywhere in the near future. College degrees, that used to insure high paying jobs, are going to be shown as having less of an impact on individual lives compared to our past. More and more hi tech jobs are going to be shipped somewhere else and the demand for degrees will go way down in this country. The few stats on this show it is already happening.
U.S. and world finances; they are going to get worse too. Dollar will eventually be devalued. Our business as usual paradigm is going to take some serious hits. What will result is pure speculation. The un-capitalized hedge funds are going to have to be absorbed one way or another. See next entry.
Government; it will become less and less important to individual lives and just plain become irrelevant, even if very dangerous. At every level of government, and particularly at state and local levels, look for some pretty shitty and unique ways they are going to try and skim even more money out of your pocket as the financial situation worsens, in the form of increased fees and more tickets etc. I don’t know how much longer we can expect government to take any action that maintains the safety nets and entitlements that are in place. If the government prints the money for distribution for these entitlements, we can expect run-away inflation which would just negate the value of the entitlements anyway. I do not expect the PTB to back off of the business as usual paradigm in the next year, they are going to defend it savagely down to the bitter end.
Education: going to continue to degrade, graduating even more really uninformed stupid people. Colleges and Universities will begin shutting down because lack of students, cost are out of reach except for the wealthy and jobs are scarce anyway. Plus we can expect next year big defaults on student loans. There will be a continuation of degrees being just another name for job training, having not much or nothing to do with being educated. Consequence will be an even more rapid decrease in logical thinking among the general population, and the inability to see consequences of actions taken and belief systems upheld.
Politics; it is already apparent that political parties have no relevance to the general population, but only to the elite power struggles. I expect that to become even more evident and the consequence to the general population is going to be even more negative. I also expect that the political infighting will become increasingly savage, disappearing or plain old assassinations of opponents more common, and excuse me on this, but more nut cases like Palin coming on line.
Food, shelter, and water; are going to become more expensive to obtain or maintain. Water is already becoming a problem and I expect food to be an even bigger problem than it already is this next year, expect a tightening of all kinds of silly shit, like the making illegal to collect rain water for your home. While housing purchases are much lower than in 2006, maintenance costs are going up with inflation. Some necessities for life are going to become out of reach for a lot of people, even more than it already is.
Travel; I expect travel to become ever more difficult and/or odious for most people, ie, the air travel screening. I expect to see more restrictions and stops on the roads, making travel even by auto more odious. Expect to see air travel screening applied to most bus and rail services also. Better learn to stay at home to have a life.
Standard of living; will be going down for most of the population. Get used to it now and avoid the rush.
Religion; is going to also become more radicalized and have less relevance to most people. Conflicts between sects and believers and unbelievers will increase. I expect some of these conflicts to become savage and violent.
Medical and health care; I expect higher prices and decreasing services except for the wealthy despite the new health care bill. Big up tick in non allopathic medicine I expect, more natural and herbal remedies, more practitioners of Chinese and related medicine. I also expect more incurable (probably genetically engineered) diseases coming at us. Less people will be kept artificially alive. I don’t expect a big surge in death rates, not this year anyway and in this country. The rest of the world is open to speculation.
Weather; I expect more violent and unusual weather world wide. Exact causes are being debated, as well as the nature of what to expect.
From freeacre:
I would add a couple of predictions:
The internet will be more regulated and under surveillance for "domestic terrorists." Anyone not supporting the corporate paradigm, including the resource wars, will be suspect. We may decide that keeping a blogsite is too dangerous for us and as a vehicle for our tribe.
If it looks like the sheeple are becoming restless in any big way, we may see an outbreak of war or some space based disclosures, such as alien bases on the moon or Mars, space battles, alien DNA in our genetic code, and whatnot.
I think that the consequences of the contamination of the Gulf of Mexico and the seafood from that area will be awful. The sicknesses that people are experiencing will become obvious even to the lamestream media.
It may be confirmed that the Gulf Stream has been interrupted and that is contributing to the unusually cold weather in Europe. We may not have much of a summer this year, and have to start building greenhouses in a big way. We should stock up on seeds that can be sprouted in that case.
Wilder and wilder speculations on "The End of the Mayan Calendar" and associated doom scenarios will be featured on cable TV and other popular sites. The magnetic pole keeps moving towards Moscow, and more and more near-miss asteroids may head our way, since our solar system actually is entering the galactic center.
Scalar weaponry and military uses of "new energy" might be rolled out as Peak Oil production can not be denied much longer. The Pentagon has already acknowledged it, so it's only a matter of time.
Fear and loathing are going to be fostered by all these fear tactics, and snitches and squid minions will be on the prowl. Our challenge will be to keep cool and try to remind people of the fact that the American Dream has been based on freedom, inclusion, justice, fair play, tolerance, and helping one's neighbors.
How’s that for doomer predictions? Lol
On the more optimistic front, I expect a whole lot more self reliance coming up next year, probably more communal living is in the works just for self preservation. I expect to see a turning away from the religiously organized con jobs that have been prolific for so many years. Probably a turning to more internal spiritual concerns by many. Not that I expect it to do much good in the immediate future to alleviate social distress and the physical demands of continuing on in this life but may allow people to exit graciously. I also see a good possibility of some of the older social organizations come back to life as our society gets mired down in all of the shit that is being heaped upon them. More groups will be formed for self protection and survival.
Overall, I am not optimistic about the near future but some good things may come out of it yet. For you and yours, we wish you all the very best. The more we cultivate our own lifestyles, the happier we will be.
