America, meet our ‘long emergency’

In a week when the American economic system reeled and the largest government bailout in the history of planet Earth had begun, and the PG led with a story on the Steelers, I decided to reach out to the man who saw all but the football bit coming, James Howard Kunstler.

Mr. Kunstler’s 2005 book, “The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the 21st Century,” predicted that oil would soar above $100 a barrel, that the real estate bubble would burst, that our financial system would implode, and that there would be scattered food shortages across the world.


If that ain’t a quick summary of 2008, you haven’t been paying attention.

A reader mailed me “The Long Emergency” in February and after I read it, I loaned it to someone and now I can’t remember whom. I hope it’s being read because though most likely will disagree with Mr. Kunstler’s apocalyptic conclusion — that the world economic system will indeed implode, and we’re going back to an economy of small farms — Mr. Kunstler sees clearly that America has arranged its communities and transportation system almost exactly wrong for an age of high-cost fuel.

It’s noteworthy that he began writing his book in 2004, when oil could be had for about $35 a barrel, a third of its current price. The “rough ride through uncharted territory” certainly has come to pass.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette