[aahala]

I think the President's response was that this is hard work, tough work. We
are making great progress on the topic and we need to stay the course.

[Eli]

Bush and TPTB already know about PO. Whoever is in office is going to face terrible decisions.

What can be done? admit that we are facing huge shortages and throw the economy into early reccesion?

How about remove Sadam Husein from power and try to bring stability to the ME. So that the area that produces Oil is stabilized politically to prevent horendous supply disruptions that are projected not interms of causing long gas lines but in numbers of deaths. This is their plan for PO, it is just not going according to the plan.

So lets say Bush is gone and the US takes the lead on PO and starts ween it self through dramatic reductions in use. Is China going to stop what they are doing? India?

[Leo123]

It's unfortunate that Bartlett couldn't be a bit more forthcoming with information from the meeting. Perhaps, Bartlett succumbed to the power of the dark side with Bush's promises to extend his wife's lifespan a la Revenge of the Sith. Or more likely, there were concessions offerred to his district.
Who knows? Maybe there is something genuinely positive in the works that we might not know about, but that Bartlett now knows about. I wish I knew what happened in that meeting.

[Leanan]

Agree that Bush knows about peak oil. Simmons says he's advised both Bush and Clinton about it. And Cheney certainly understands the problem, oil man that he is.

I'm sure they know about peak oil, and believe in it, but I'm not sure what they are doing about it. (Besides invading oil-producing countries, that is.) Do they really believe the invisible hand of the marketplace will provide? Or are they just trying to grab all the wealth and power they can, because they know we are screwed?

[Eli]

My guess is that they know exactly what we do here, that we are pretty much screwed 7 ways till Sunday.

This board has some pretty bright minds on it and most of them have come to think of PO as doomsday kind of event. Because the reality of the decline of cheap energy is horrible for mankind as whole and insermontible for human nature. When things get low it will be like dogs fighting over the last scraps of food.

What if the truth is there has to be a great die off of mankind with PO?

What if the most intelligent and forward thinkers in the world have come to the same conclusion that we have that we are totally screwed. And that mankind is in for wars and lots and lots of deaths because of the constriction of energy resources and world wide depression.

If the above is true ignoring PO may be the best thing to do.Trying to put PO off into the future and maintain the status quo for as long as possible would be a reasonable thing. If PO was seen as such a serious problem that 4 billion people would have to die just to keep any kind of living standard.

if PO is like a huge asteroid that is guaranteed to destroy life on earth as we know it sometime in the next 0 to 5 years. There would be no point in saying "hey everybody the party is over and most of you are going to die". Panic would set in and people would suffer before the event even happened and it would'nt change one damn thing.

The PTB would just let the music play right up till impact all the time saying "they are better off not knowing look how happy they are".

[Ludi]

It is utter political suicide to suggest to the American people that they have to change their way of life, unless there is an immediate threat situation such as war. So TPTB will not suggest such a thing. War is a much more popular solution and even that isn't very popular anymore. I believe we absolutely cannot expect anyone in power to do anything significant about the situation, and this goes all the way down to the local governmental level. Local politics is all about making money in the short term for the folks in office and their cronies. So we can just forget about anyone "in charge" doing a darn thing. They just won't. Period.

[Grimnir]

Watch what Barlett does now. If he drops the issue, it probably means that there is some sort of plan in the works, or that Bush convinced him it wasn't a serious problem. If he keeps talking, then we can probably conclude that Bush is not sufficiently concerned to raise the issue himself.

[RonMN]

Let's see...what could be said???
My fellow Americans, If you want to stay warm in the winter and cool in the summer you must begin living underground, because there is no more energy. If you'd like to continue living you must grow your own food, provide your own medical, filter & boil your own water, and give up on any transportation other than a horse or canoe.

That'd go over like a fart in church!

[Eli]

Yeah exactly Ron

How about this one

"My fellow Americans I have something very important to discuss with you tonight. Basically it is this, we are completely and totally screwed.

You see the problem we are facing is this our whole way of life was built on cheap energy and we have run out of cheap energy. And Most of you are so heavily in debt that there is no hope for you, in just a few years you will wish you were dead and will have trouble feeding yourselves.

Those of you who were counting on pension funds from large corporations like GM and Ford or the airlines, well I have tough news for you as well they are bankrupt and thanks to changes in the law they are not required to pay you the pension that you were going to retire on. Again it is probably best for you just to roll over and die.

But take solace in the fact that you are not in China or India where a billion of them will stave in the street. Here we will only have 100 million starving!

In the next few years there will also be wars for control over the remaining energy resources. A Nuclear exchange with Russia, China or Iran or maybe even all three at once is also likely to happen in you or your children's lifetime over the remaining finite energy. This war may not be all bad news though, because our scientist and researchers tell us that the earth cannot support the current number of people on this planet without abundant cheap energy like we have had in the past, so 3 or 4 billion dying is in some ways a very good thing.

We could not tell you this before but now we can say that yes we went to war in Iraq to stabilize and secure oil. It was determined that Sadam Husein would pose to much of a danger to our friends in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia once he really started to get rich with oil at 150 or 200 dollars a barrel.
and

Well my fellow Americans the long and short of it is you and your children are virtually guaranteed a life of increasing hard ship with death and disease becoming part of your daily lives. This all may start happening tomorrow or maybe in the next five ten years tops we aren't really sure, so please just go about your daily lives and do not panic. May God have Mercy on us all."

[Tyler_JC]

You forgot the key section!

"Additionally, I and several hundred of my key advisors are going to be spending the next few decades in Guam trying to decide on the best course of action for America. In the mean time, please continue sending your checks to my slush fund...err, the IRS on a timely basis. Thank you, and good luck."

[physicsperspective]

I think it's a fairly absurd notion that the Bush administration isn't aware of PO and doesn't have a strategy for it. Accepting this fact, the question remains why haven't they publicized how serious the situation may be and started pushing heavily for conservation and alternatives? I believe that the simple answer is China. The Bush administration knows that in the long run the US cannot compete with a communist nation with over 1 billion well educated people. Right now China’s economy is racing, not only to manufacture exports but also rapidly expanding their base infrastructure - transportation, electrical production, and general construction (the cement consumption numbers alone are quite staggering). The US has very few economic tools to try to slow the Chinese down except one that has worked well in the past – overproduction. If you read Duncan’s book “The Dollar Crisis” you see that what derailed Japan in 92, and Southern Asia in 97 was that their economies got a bit too hot and when there was the slightest dip in demand, production raced ahead and the price of everything bottomed out. Ironically even though those countries had invested the majority of their export profits in US bonds, the US was largely unaffected by their collapse. Obviously if PO hits, the US will be affected but not nearly as badly as China. In the US (and the majority of other developed nations of the world that are perhaps going along with the consumption “plan”) much infrastructure is already in place and aside from transportation we are fairly efficient. This is reflected in GDP/energy consumption numbers where the US is double that of China. In short the only way to cause China to stumble is to bump up energy costs until they can no longer buy oil and sell good based on the cheap pegged Yaun. Perhaps an analogy is in order.

Imagine you (the US and the rest of the developed world) are stuck on an island with another castaway (China, India, and Asia). Neither you nor your island mate know much about hunting or scavenging for food but you have both discovered that there are a collection of coconut trees that provide an easy alternative to the difficult task of developing long term nourishment sources. At first there seems to be plenty of coconuts on the ground and you get along reasonable well. You happen to be quite a bit fatter than your skinny neighbor and figure that if the coconut diet suddenly disappeared you’d at least have a cushion of time to look for alternatives. After some time you both (quietly) notice that the remaining coconuts are greener and higher in the trees and that at some point will run out. You have a few choices:

1) Look for other options by learning how to hunt or by spending time collecting berries. Both of these options require a great deal of energy and it seems unfair that you should do all the work experimenting on hunting techniques and exploring the island while the skinny guy gets fatter eating all the remaining coconuts. Additionally, he’ll probably just copy you’re hunting techniques and scrounging locations when there are no more tasty coconuts to eat.

2) You could kill him. This wouldn’t be too difficult from a physical standpoint seeing how you are significantly larger than him. This would have the advantage of making the remaining coconuts last longer AND you could ration them while trying to look for alternatives. However, you have a conscience (democracy) and realize that you probably couldn’t sleep at night if you took such harsh actions.

3) You could out eat him. It’s binge time because if the coconuts are going to run out you might as well make sure you put on a few pounds (strategic petroleum reserve) or find a few more secret trees that your friend won’t have access to (ANWR) before the happy days run out. Plus there’s a good chance that the other guy won’t be able to last very long once his daily nourishment runs out. With this approach you may be killing him indirectly, but hey, these are trying times and you can probably live with that outcome.

Yep, it’s defiantly going to be number 3… And that’s how I see it going down.**

You can make all the Bush monkey jokes you want but I think “Machiavellian” is a more accurate adjective than stupid and I think he’s going for option 3. Below are some additional advantages to the current blissful ignorance of the problem:

Advantages:
1) The administration can claim ignorance after the fact and all the bad things that happen in the third world will be seen as unfortunate rather than malicious
2) He’ll be seen as heroic for getting the US beyond fossil fuels in a comparably less painful fashion
3) With the collapse of China’s economy will come a collapse in their consumption which will buy time to move towards sustainable solutions.

**Notice I didn’t say that I prefer this path. I currently work on photovoltaics research and would love to see the US lead the way with number 1 but the realist in me doesn’t see it happening.

[bart]

Despite my 1000s of words of reservations about Geo. Bush & Co., I have to applaud this development. And hats off to Roscoe Bartlett for continuing to talk about peak oil.

It would be better for us all if the facts about PO were out there and accepted. Yes, we'd still have disagreements, but at least we'd have a common understanding of the situation and be able to co-operate.

Kurt Cobb had a great post about left-right co-operation last week:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')hat we are witnessing is the collapse of the politics of left and right and the replacement of those politics with what I call the politics of survival. Those who come to understand the gravity of our energy situation quickly abandon their previous political views and instead focus pragmatically on how we can make a successful energy transition. They do so because they know the cost of failure is too high a price to pay for ideology. In the politics of survival ideology counts for almost nothing. Pragmatic plans count for everything.

[url=http://resourceinsights.blogspot.com/2005/06/politics-of-survival.html]
"The Politics of Survival"[/url]

[Zentric]

Mr. Physics-perspective and Bart:

I disagree with what you posted - not out of principle, but for lack of evidence.

Physics: If Bush and the other Machiavellians are truly trying to save our country through advocating domestic consumption and the assumption of crushing debt - all to derail the greater evil of China - wouldn't it be possible to accomplish this very same objective better by not giving tax cuts for Hummers and encouraging everyone to buy soon-to-be-worthless McMansions? Wouldn't it make much more sense instead if our national effort was dedicated to increasing infrastructure efficiency? - high speed railways, as an example, since we could consume a whole lot of steel, concrete and fuel building those!

Also, regarding Iraq. I'm sure giving most of the contracts to Halliburton was brilliant in its own right. But shouldn't we pause to realize that we went to war there without a coherent plan to win the peace, where the result now is that Iraq is a hornets' nest - with America now weakened - economically, militarily and spiritually? Even desperate, perhaps? Machiavelli was shrewd. And let me tell you, George Bush is no Machiavelli. Or maybe there is some master-master-master plan I'm not aware of? - where I've only been made aware of the master-master plan, which makes me feel that GWB is an idiot.

Bart: For the same reasons above, are we really getting 'pragmatism' from the policies of GWB? Yes, I understand the argument how some silly debate about Gay Marriage or Affirmative Action doesn't amount to a hill of beans in relation to the tsunami about to crash down on us, but is BushCo pragmatic? I certainly wouldn't want him facilitating any discussion group I attended.

P.S. Physics: May I assume that if I do go out and buy a McMansion tomorrow on 100% credit to fulfill my patriotic duty, that being so loyal to this cause of freedom will somehow put me in good stead with the commandant at my debtors' prison?

[physicsperspective]

Zentric: I agree with you that the current course isn't the most efficient course of action. Implementing massive efficiency now WOULD be the best course of action but 1) it has the undesirable consequence of demonstrating that the administration is aware of the problem and 2)it's not really necessary. I really think that all this "after the crash" and "clusterfuck" talk is over done and that people will manage to get by. The current inefficiencies that are being pushed, while absurd, aren't a step off a cliff and can be scrapped when then need to be. High speed rail would be a great way to burn some energy to race towards the cliff but to be of any significance it would have to be done on a scale that would seem unnecessary for the current "lack of a problem". Furthermore if the economy really tanks, perhaps building this type of infrastructure post peak will be just the sort of new-deal project the country needs to pull out of the depression.

Regarding the war, while I deplore the human costs over the past two year, the monetary costs while staggering perhaps won't all be sitting in Iraq. Much of the money spent on the War actually boomerangs back into the US economy. The fact that Bush doesn't have an exit strategy may seem like incompetence, but in fact I think it's an excuse to maintain a large number of troops in a geopolitical hotspot. I'm not sure how the Iraq will play out but I do know that if shit gets bad, the American people will not complain about Bush enforcing the Carter doctrine even to the extent of outright theft of Iraqi oil. (Look at their oil exports have fallen sharply in the past 2 years. This could be a coincidence that their fields went into decline right as the US invaded, or that insurgents are preventing the system from operating flat out or that the Iraqi's were damaging the fields by producing at the previous rate, but the conspiritist in me** thinks it could be a way to throttle back production so there's more left in the ground when we need it).

Regarding the McMansion: I won't get into the debate that new McMansion's like SUVs are targets of misplaced anger (traffic congestion, and throwaway mentalities would be better places to start) but to address your question - no, buying into this over-consumption plan will get you anywhere. You don't have a contract with anybody saying that they are going to bail you out later for helping them with their problem. The US isn't explicitly asking you to help with anything. Your actions will be just that - YOURS - and if the actions are to buy into huge inefficiencies then whoever is in the whitehouse will have no qualms about pointing out that you are the problem. The only love you'd be getting in debtors' prison would be of the bum variety.

**I truly don't consider myself a conspiracy theorist. I acknowledge that many technological problems simply are difficult, that economic modeling is complex, and that bureaucracies make mistakes and are slow to react. But in the specific case of Bush Vrs PO I just can't believe that there isn't logic to the administrations actions. While the average micromanaged conspiracy is exceedingly difficult for anybody to pull off, the current macroscopic subtle conspiracy of "business as usual" is reasonably easy to sell (especially when the world is pumping more oil than ever before which IS the first order argument that will satisfy the American public - just look at the global warming debate.) Lastly, please don't take the strong tone of my post as me being headstrong. I’d like to hear another explanation of the administration’s response to the PO evidence but for now this is the only one I’m buying.

[Doly]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('physicsperspective', 'L')ook at their oil exports have fallen sharply in the past 2 years. This could be a coincidence that their fields went into decline right as the US invaded, or that insurgents are preventing the system from operating flat out or that the Iraqi's were damaging the fields by producing at the previous rate, but the conspiritist in me** thinks it could be a way to throttle back production so there's more left in the ground when we need it.

[cammo2004]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('physicsperspective', ' ') Furthermore if the economy really tanks, perhaps building this type of infrastructure post peak will be just the sort of new-deal project the country needs to pull out of the depression.

[Eli]

Pete you said$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')here really is a better way.

"My name is George Bush and I am an oil man. I don't want to live holed up in a fortified mansion any more than you want to die like dogs in the street. Why don't we all get together and build a sustainable future. Thank you and good night."

[Zentric]

Physics: What I like about science-dudes, even the ones with crazy hypotheses , is that there is bound to be order to their reasoning. If it turns out that we have a major disagreement, even after turning over every rock in this debate, I feel it will be mostly for a lack of substantial proof of the other's assertions. At the same time, if we argue well and agree on what the facts are telling us, then we should, at least grudgingly, accept the possibility that the other could be largely correct. I will rattle off a proposed GWB 'belief system', that might also be reasonable for you or I to agree with (that is, that GWB might actually hold these views) as well. Please correct me where I go astray with respect to your own assessment of GWB and/or Co.

(1) GWB and Co., from long ago, saw their situation -- both with respect to the oil supply and the emergence of China -- as dire. And, for that reason, began an Orwellian campaign of left is right, up is down to "hoodwink" the American people and, to a lesser extent, much of the rest of the world that God is with the US and against the terrorists, and we're consequently going to take the fight global in order to "secure freedom" (where, between you and me, "freedom" means "oil".)

(2) GWB mainly wishes to serve the interests of those in his administration. Next most important are wealthy campaign contributors, large American/multinational corporations, ultra-conservative Republicans/Christian Right, the European elite, maybe a step down from them are the are the Japanese elite. Further down still are Mom and Pop America. And way, way down the list are Asians, South Americans, Africans and other perishable third-worlders. And, at the very bottom, intellectuals and gypsies.

(3) George Bush realizes that since "sin" resides in the hearts of all humanity, that people cannot and will not voluntarily "power down" - so it is therefore understood that, until further notice, we are to continue consuming and wasting resources like idiots.

(4) If the rag-tag third-worlders wish to oppose us in our appetite for oil (whether we plan to pay for it or not), we will lay demographic waste to these their populations with our "good" WMDs. And I imagine, that our weapons of choice here would be of the "boutique variety", where the germ strain would effectively lose its virulence after a few human-to-human retransmissions, and that the radiation bombs would employ a type of blast and radioactivity that would substantially kill the inhabitants, yet would leave important infrastructure behind, while potentially allowing these nuclear wastelands to be reoccupied in short order.

(5) That, deep in his heart, GWB, like Roosevelt is a New Dealer, although he won't admit it at the moment.

Note: But on the other hand (please help me here!), Maybe New Deal socialism won't be the any part of the NWO, since there will be a ton of debtors, criminals or possibly just-plain ethnics who are going to be perfectly suited to build our railways, bridges and post-post-modern apartment flats.

(6) Out of a shrewd understanding of the human condition (see my comments in item #3, above), non-elite Americans are to be summarily judged by this administration as unworthy of Constitutional protections, while the rest of the world is found to be unworthy of high-minded American ideals. America becomes more of a totalitarian, cronied plutocracy. No need to vote on it. No need for you or I to express our approval - although, at some point, I could well see the need for you and I not to express our disapproval .

The conundrum is that there are 6.5 Billion people on a planet that probably can only support less than half that number. This invites questions like:

Is it okay to "act crazy" with respect to preserving our accustomed lifestyle or the kicking of the ass of others in order to head off China in a resource war?

And once China is properly disposed of, is it then okay to decimate other peoples and other cultures in order to make our own lifestyle more sustainable?

Since GWB's master-master-master plan is fated to turn American culture on its head, is it honest at all to label the measures that we are ostensibly prepared to embark upon as "necessary to preserve the American Way of Life?" Or are you and I just fodder here for the American elite?

It would seem that GWB's vision is all about global ass-kicking and various forms of slavery. According to GWB's possible plan, things may go slightly better for us here in America than for those poor denizens living or working nearby the third-world oil infrastructure (on the other hand, let me just say I would also fear for dwellers of the more already-dystopian cities inside America.)

I wish to reiterate. None of these views are necessarily yours, mine or GWB's. I'm just wondering whether:

a. you and I can converge upon what we might agree is GWB's view.

b. this ostensible view of GWB could actually have appeal to you, me or to (alas, murderous -whether or not the murder can be morally justified) Americans as a whole.

Thank you.