democracyforcalifornia.com

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Well, on the plus side, almost everybody's gas prices are as high or higher than Hawaii's, for a change. On the minus side, the corporate pundits are all trumpeting the number Bin Laden was supposedly hoping for: $200/bbl oil. Don't worry, be happy: Dick (his actual name) Cheney has a plan for us. It involves enriching his cronies, but that's OK, right?

In the meantime, it would appear that those "kookie" San Franciscans have ushered in yet another New Age: No, not Aquarius. Gay marry-us! Yup, the shaky city by the Bay that they rebuilt, after a cataclysm, on rock'n'roll, with rice-a-roni and a side of beat poetry, has taken the next step toward full citizenship for homosexual human beings residing in the good old USA. (Which does NOT make up for rice-a-roni, btw. Stuff is gross.)

Did you see those old ladies makin' out on the steps of SF City Hall? They had signs saying "34 Years Together," etc. Thirty-four years of love and devotion to each other, and to the cause of equal rights. In defense of traditional marriage, I think we should send these dykes and fags out to edumacate the straight world on HOW THE HELL do you stay with one person for THIRTY YEARS!!!???

Now, remember, folks, Obama is the one who mentions gays & lesbians at every speech, everywhere. McCain will be the guy whose pastor said Nawlins got whacked cuz they wuz gawn hava gay pah-rade, yawl. Shoot, if Gawd A'mitey hated the original Sin City so much, why'd he make it such a great place to hang out? I bet, if He ever takes vacations, he's down there in the French Quarter, MAKIN' the good times roll. I b'lieve the Good Lord loves Him some GUMBO, baby!

So, now we'll see whether gay-bashing will be swept away like Storyville of old, and whether anti-gay-bashing won't sweep a dam' ol' mulatto into the formerly White House. Cuz, the innerestin' thang is, lotta them Fundies startin' to take a likin' to Al-Hussein, half-black like he is.

You see, if you wait long enough, righteousness will always win out. Even if it takes thirty-four years, or more. Congratulations & Best Wishes ladies & ladies and gentlemen & gentlemen. San Francisco, New Orleans, New York, LA, we're not bad people, America. We're America, America, just like you. The Big Quake, the War of 1812, 9/11, Cal Worthington, we done PAID our dues, America! Tell you what: You let us be who we are, and we'll be what you are, just like my personal savior, the all-devouring maw of nothingness, made us. Amen.
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Posted by: cosanostradamus at May 16, 2008 05:24 AM

I've heard $4 is normal for Hawaii. I'm sure all goods are pricey on the island state. The way prices are going, it will be normal for us too, then we'll all go poor together :)

There are so many misconceptions about oil, thanks to the politicians who never tell the truth about it. You would think that $126 barrel would sink the economy, and $200 would send us straight to hell (Bin Ladin's wish come true), but we seem to be holding up reasonably well, with just a little pain at the pump for those big SUV drivers filling their gas guzzling tanks at $80 a pop. The only people really suffering are the poor, but this country never gave a damn about them anyway. "Let them take the bus!" Marie Antoinette would say if she were alive today.

Actually, $200 a barrel oil would not bode well for Cheney's Big Oil cronies. Why people might get the idea we should conserve, or invest in alternative fuels. Gee, what a novel idea, eh? Where would oil companies be if we all drove electric cars? The plan was to invade Iraq, bring more oil on the market from Iraq's vast untapped oil fields to keep prices low in anticipation of higher demand, and thus ensure that Big Oil would stay in business at least another hundred years. But for a little thing like "unintended consequences" they might have pulled it off.

Likewise the oil producers - the Saudis, the Russians, the Venezuelans, the Emirates, et al that are raking in the big bucks are in a similar bind. If oil goes to $200 and stays there, they'd better save those windfall profits for a rainy day, or they'll be riding camels in the desert with Bin Ladin. Russia is talking about the need to diversify their economy, Iran is trying to build nuclear energy. This signals that the oil business is not long for this earth, and they know it. The great irony is that Saddam Hussein could read the signs before they did, and was already trying to use Iraq's oil wealth to diversify. The tragedy is that the U.S. wouldn't let him do so, anymore than they'll let Iran convert to nuclear energy, and it's not because of wmd.

So the world keeps turning -- California gays can marry legally now. My, oh my, what is the world coming to.

Cheers!

Posted by: Diana at May 19, 2008 02:47 PM

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What worries me, having suffered through the 70s, is the "pass-along" effect. Every little business reaches a breaking point when they can no longer absorb energy & related price hikes, and they have to start passing them along to their customers, plus a li'l sumpin' on the side. That's how stagflation got started: Pyramiding. And wages can never keep up. (Just ask the guys who BUILT the Pyramids!)

Working in alt-energies myself, I'm afraid it will be at least twenty or thirty years before any wholesale, large-scale, global mass-conversion from oil to [whatever] is possible, especially at the gas-pump. The world economy, and the various engines that run it, are oil-based. That gives the oil producers and distributors tremendous political power and economic leverage that can dramatically slow down, side-track, halt or even reverse any moves away from oil, as in the 70s. Prices shot up much faster and much higher, proprtionally, back then, but the move away from oil stalled when cheaper-running cars and lower gas prices came in.

The irony is that the higher the price of oil goes the more oil becomes available, from previously unprofitable sources. I've actually read news stories about NASA prospecting for oil on other planets. It's just a matter of whether the consumers will pay for it, and whether they will have any other choices. I also heard some dickhead Repuke Congressman on CSPAN with charts and graphs on the House floor, on some other subject, casually referring to our still using oil two hundred years from now. So, that's the plan. TWO CENTURIES!!!

By comparison, us greenies are hanging on for dear life, living from quarter to quarter, utterly dependent upon government tax credits for renewables. We never know if we'll still be here next year. Rising prices will help us, but not if they kill the economy, especially with the extraordinary amount of debt Americans are carrying now. If the tax credits get cut, trimmed, or targeted away from us or toward big corporations, green may not look so good. Think ethanol, for example: A taxpayer-supported US Govt/Agribusiness boondoggle that has sidetracked fuel cells, electric cars and higher mileage mandates.

The taxes & tax-breaks should have gone into infrastructure for all-electric battery-driven cars and/or hydrogen fuel-cell cars. Without a network of recharging stations, those technologies will never become mainstream. Without financial backing, there will be no such network. Without HUGE government incentives, there will be no financial backing for the network, ever. This is where our friends in Washington come in. If we ever have any friends in Washington.

I've heard that Big Oil owns a piece of every alternative energy technology. In Europe and Asia, they're diversifying into solar, etc, in a big way, esp. BP & Shell. Here in Bush Country, they're sitting on it, the other Three of the old Seven Sisters. I don't see any way of dislodging them, short of a revolution. So I honestly think we should simply sign all the best green technologies over to Big Oil, and make it more profitable --after taxes and incentives-- to do the right thing. They've certainly shown that they can develop and maintain a world energy distribution system. They are damned tenacious and tough about getting their way. If we could make it worth their while for that way to be genuinely green, maybe everybody could win, with toothy oversight & tough regulation. I mean, eventually, there has to be an alt-energy Rockefeller/ Ford/ Gates anyway, right? That's capitalism. Let's fix the energy & pollution thing now, and then we'll fix capitalism later.

I know, it's heresy. But all fat-cats are bastards, so who cares where they come from, as long as they get us off oil? This way, we won't have to waste energy fighting them. As to the oil-producing countries, one word: "Plastics."

Meanwhile, we have our funny-talking Mountain Men & Women calling the shots: Bluegrass State Hillbillies for Billary vs. Beaver State Hippies for Obama. Which candidate would actually be more likely to get us off oil? Well it should be finally decided by tonight. Unless, of course, Billary decides to hold out until the other three primaries in Puerto Rico on June 1, and Montana and South Dakota on June 3. Please, Gawd, NO!!!

Hang in there, sister! You, I mean, Diana, not that Hillary girl. It'll all be over soon for her. [prays]
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Posted by: cosanostradamus at May 20, 2008 06:13 AM

Well, it seems like you've got a good handle on the problem, and because you see it clearly you can offer some practical solutions. Your idea of helping Big Oil make the transition is spot on. That's what we need in Washington, a President who can clarify the problem for the American people, who can set an agenda and establish an energy task force to implement it. We will need something like a Manhattan project to get the job done. And we need someone like Obama who can work diplomatically with oil producers, including Iran, in a balanced way. That means helping and encouraging them to diversify their economies ( this would include allowing them to build nuclear plants), because I'll tell you what, if we manage to ween ourselves from fossil fuels, and if we do it too quickly before the oil producers can adjust, the damage to those economies can only exacerbate anti-American sentiment and embolden terrorists for years to come.

Now I'm no fan of James Baker, but his institute put a study on Cheney's desk in the spring of 2001, six months before 9/11, with some very cogent solutions that the Bush administration completely ignored. I guess they decided that invading a major oil producer was easier and quicker than the longterm goal of investing in alternative fuels, building a new transportation infrastructure, and leveling with the American people about conservation. For example, rather than give Humvee drivers a tax right off, they should have given people a tax incentive to buy more fuel efficient compact cars. Instead, they encouraged the automobile industry to build more and more SUV's that guzzle more gas, thereby enhancing Big Oil's profits. The folly of their plan to keep Big Oil in business is simply astounding. A much better plan would have been to encourage them to transition, as you said.

Here is the "Baker Institute Study" if you want to have a look.

http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:k-K7ZMHCcbEJ:www.bakerinstitute.org/publications/study_15.%20pdf+Strategic+Energy+Policy+Challenges+For+The+21s%3Cbr%20/%3Et+Century&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us&client=firefox-a

And finally, you hit on the 64 million dollar question:

"Meanwhile, we have our funny-talking Mountain Men & Women calling the shots: Bluegrass State Hillbillies for Billary vs. Beaver State Hippies for Obama. Which candidate would actually be more likely to get us off oil?"

The answer is clear and simple: Obama! First of all, the speculative Oil bubble will burst when he's elected. One main reason is that much of the rise in oil prices has been due to sabler-rattling against Iran. The market already knows he'll reduce tensions between the U.S. and Iran. They'll sell their long positions and go short, and crude oil prices will drop to at least $80, if not more (there is still the war premium built into the price, which I expect would remain until Iraq can bring the 1.5 million barrels they produced before the war back on the market). On the other hand, if BombbombbombIran- McCain or obliteratethem-Billary were to win, count on oil hitting $200. Though higher oil prices can be good because they force us to confront our dependency, they can also destroy our economy. It's a serious dilemma that can only be addressed by an administration that can mediate between different interests and not fall into the trap of short-term fixes.

I just read yesterday that Hillary promised the hicks in Kentucky that oil prices would fall if she were elected. That's just ludicrous and yet another instance of her shameless and desperate pandering. Listening to her speech, laying out her plan for energy, one would think she was just clueless, but knowing that she herself played the commodities market, it's quite obvious that she knows better and is just making empty promises. If she were ever to have the power to implement any of her bogus plans, assuming she actually believes them, she would become the most dangerous person on earth.

We should all be exceedingly grateful to Obama for answering the call to prevent the Billary/McCain disaster from happening.

The solutions won't be easy by any means. It will take the kind of unity that Obama's campaign has promoted and clear understanding of what's at stake.
The stakes are high, the problems almost insurmountable. We are at the precipice of an abyss. We either pull back from it collectively, or get sucked into the vortex. The situation really is that dire, and the worries you expressed are all too real. That's why Hillary and many others in congress on both sides of the isle are so dangerous. She perpetuates the ignorance of Americans, and emboldens them to believe in fallacies, rather than telling the truth and educating people. She flatters people with lies. Pandering to the ignorant for their votes is a prescription for disaster. We have a huge task ahead of us. Ideological and partisan thinking will only cripple our ability to meet those challenges.

I've been listening to Republicans in the senate whining about ANWR -- if only the Democrats would let us drill in pristine and protected lands, we'd have all the domestic oil we need, they complain. Yes, and perpetuate a fossil fuel based economy so that Big Oil can stay in the oil business, while we destroy the environment. Great plan guys.

We need a long-term energy plan, and we need an administration that is not afraid to tell Americans the hard truths.

The remaining question is, is it too late? I guess we won't know the answer until we try.

Thanks for the conversation Cosa. It's a pleasure to be able to discuss these issues with someone who has a real handle on the complexity of the problem.

Posted by: Diana at May 20, 2008 02:02 PM

Very interesting exchange. You guys should be blogging this stuff.

Speaking of James Baker, have you seen this?

James Baker: Talking To An Enemy Is Not Appeasement
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/20/james-baker-talking-to-an_n_102674.html

Posted by: Justin at May 20, 2008 04:38 PM

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Thanks.

Baker is right, twice. We need to be able to work with smart people on every side of every issue, including our corporate Vaders and political Palpatines (to go all nerdy), to get things done.

I pay absolutely no attention to the corporate media. It is sheer 100% propaganda with an all-too-obvious purpose: Support the corporatista status-quo. The way people parrot their talking points is nauseating.

I was always interested in history. I had a professor from Holland in school who had actually done the physical digging in Europe into Medieval, Renaissance and early modern business, government and Church records to follow the money. He was able to demonstrate the economic motivations of much of European history in a formative time. It made me always ask the question, cui bono?

I know I have to do a lot of things in my life just to survive. So I always assume it's the same for everybody else. Of course, if you're born rich, surviving just means preserving the status quo.

The system we live in now is based on money. To change it, we have to recognize that. And unless we are going to try a French or Russian style revolution, which never works, we will have to work with the powers that be. First we have to recognize what they already know: We, the People, are the ones with the most money and power, if we unite and act together. Second, we have to use our money and power constructively in ways that benefit as many people, and power-groups, as possible, while hurting or threatening as few as possible. Third, we have to take responsibility for the effects of the changes we bring, and not leave anyone suffering, like those Malthusians on the Right would. Everybody gets a place at the table, even if they are objectionable. Like a Thanksgiving dinner.

You're right about Hummer taxes: the incentives should be stronger than the disincentives. (But we still need both, or they'll take the money and do nothing for it. There has to be a very strong penalty for that. More costly than their potential gain for doing nothing or doing something bad.) It's not "State Planning" to incentivize good behavior: It's just good government. The alternative, as we've seen with Bushco, is chaos, backsliding, and sub-rosa favoritism for Bushies only, regardless of the consequences for the Rest Of Us. We have to stay active and involved in our government or Obama will end up like Clinton. Or Kennedy.

Just glancing over your Baker study. It's quite revealing as to their outlook, which they are trying to sell to the rest of us:

--"A crisis could erupt at any time from
any number of factors, from an accident on the Alaskan
pipeline to a revolution in a major oil-producing country."

Like Saudi Arabia. Which is why we are really in Iraq.

--"Ultimate resource levels are not a major factor in
the tightening of U.S. energy markets. Instead, the
problem is one of developing such resources and other
fuels and getting them to the consumer. U.S. investment
aimed at accomplishing this failed to keep pace
with rising demand in part because energy industry
PROFITS were dismal through much of the 1990s, hitting
bottom during the oil price collapse at the decade’s
end. The situation was exacerbated because LOW RETURNS
coincided with tightening ENVIRONMENTAL RESTRICTIONS
and an uneven REGULATORY process, especially in the electricity
sector. No new oil refineries are likely to be built
in the U.S. due to the high costs of ENVIRONMENTAL COMPLIANCE
and historically LOW RETURNS on investment.
Nuclear power faces other obstacles, ones related less to
ENVIRONMENT and more to SAFETY and, to a certain extent,
nonproliferation. Over the past twenty years, no
new nuclear plants have been added in the U.S., reflecting
the SOCIAL IMPACT of the major accidents at Three
Mile Island and Chernobyl.
Beyond nuclear power, ENVIRONMENTAL concerns in
some states like California have also raised the bar for
the siting of conventionally fueled electric power stations,
discouraging new facility construction. In U.S.
natural gas markets, low prices in the 1990s, adverse fiscal
REGULATIONS, interstate disputes about pipeline rights
of way, and RESTRICTIVE land access have undermined
growth in natural gas availability."
[my caps]

So, our petty "social" concerns are allowing "environmental restrictions" and "regulation" to trump the industry god of high "returns" and "profits." Well, Mr. Baker, speaking as a seasoned politician and diplomat, should we eliminate democracy and public health & safety standards for the benefit of the oily few? Or should those oily few STOP trying to subvert and undermine democracy and public health & safety, for the ultimate benefit of us all? I mean, you know, politically, and diplomatically? Is Big Awl ready to live as good corporate citizens in the 21st Century, or will they go on like sociopaths trying to drag us back into the 19th Century? Who will win that fight? Anyone? Or no one?

If you want our money, grow up and start acting like responsible adults, boys. If the rest of us have to obey the law, and deal realistically with the marketplace, so do you. Environmental and public health & safety concerns are real and of far greater importance than the obese car-bound gridlocked lifestyle, or your piggish profits. Get that through your numbed skulls, and maybe we can do bidniz, yawl. If you don't have the brains or the balls to adapt to changes in the marketplace, including serious public concerns, government regulations, and consumer preferences, step aside and let some real businessmen and women through to join the rest of the world in the 21st Century. Or are you hoping we'll nationalize you? What's Chavez's cell phone number, anybody?
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Posted by: cosanostradamus at May 20, 2008 06:48 PM

I see Big Oil as a bumbling old dinosaur that like many other large, centralized corporations simply cannot adapt to change. For over a century they have provided the lifeblood for that old beast, the military-industrial complex. They've fueled the massive expansion of suburbs by providing cheap gas for transportation to and from work, they've fueled distribution of food and other goods we take for granted. Wasn't that what the average American wanted? Isn't a house in the suburbs and cheap goods at the mall integral to the "American way of life" Cheney described as "non-negotiable?" Didn't Americans rush out to buy SUV's en masse in the last few years since the war in Iraq started precisely because they counted on Iraqi oil for cheap gas at the pump? Did they care that the U.S. was invading and destroying a whole country to perpetuate their petty, superficial lifestyles? Those $40 billion in profits Big oil made in the last quarter, where do Americans think they come from? They come from the consumer. They come from demand at the pump. They come from US. Yes, Pogo, "I have seen the enemy and it is US."

It's interesting to note how when Congress questions Big Oil on the source of their historic profits in the face of $130 barrel crude oil costs, they never mention SUV drivers. You can't drag the truth out of them. The reason they won't give a straight answer to that question should be obvious to anyone who looks closely -- they don't want to reveal that the real culprit is their best customer -- the millions of SUV drivers, guzzling huge amounts of their product.

Americans were all gungho for the war,now they've turned sour it. Why is that? Is it because they've suddenly found their conscience and a heart big enough to care about the 4,000 dead troops, or the million dead Iraqis? Or rather is it because instead of getting the cheap gas they expected, they're paying $4 a gallon to fill up their SUV's? Whaaa! Now commuting to and from work on bottlenecked freeways from their suburban homes in a secluded cul de sac is costing them $800 a month, the price of two car payments. They're not so much screaming "STOP THE WAR!" as they are griping "WHERE'S MY CHEAP GAS???"

Hence we hear the comforting words from "Big Daddy" in Washington "Dont worry, kids, the surge is working. You'll get your cheap gas, just be patient."

So who do we blame? Big Oil? That's like blaming the nail when we hammer our fingers. The "American Dream" as Arthur Miller's Willy Lohman showed us in "Death of a Salesman" is really the American nightmare. We've chased the wrong dream, and now we're paying for it. Maybe we should have listened to our artists and poets when they told us the truth about our lives, rather than listening to politicians who flatter our vanity with lies to get reelected.

Time for Americans to find a new dream, or perhaps remember and revive the old one.

We can stop blaming Big Oil. It's really pointless. They're just doing what they were designed to do, what we WANTED them to do, what we PAID them to do, for us. While Democrats in Congress are beating up on Big Oil, asking the wrong questions, based on the wrong assumptions, the solutions to this growing crisis lie elsewhere. The real danger is that by getting blindsided by our pet peeves and biases, we'll miss seeing the forest for the trees.

The fact is, we still need big oil during what will be a long transition period. We're not going to be able to quit our "addiction to oil" cold turkey. We need to work with big oil collaboratively to make the transition. More important we need to change our foreign policies and work with foreign oil producers in OPEC nations. Suing OPEC, as Congress proposes, just shows how clueless they are about how this whole industry works. Congress is utterly inept in this matter, we need new leadership in the White House, with a new vision, a new diplomacy, to steer the country in a new direction.

The Bush administration has been disastrous, McCain and Hillary would only make things worse.

God help us if Americans can't figure this out in time.

Posted by: Diana at May 22, 2008 02:28 PM

Hello Justin, good to see you pop back in.

I remember seeing that interview with James Baker about a year ago. How ironic is it that the Bush family consiglieri, considered to be the consummate diplomat by Republicans, and even by some across the aisle, is more in line with Obama on this important foreign policy matter than with G.W. and McCain. Too bad he's not coming out and saying this today, timed with their recent efforts to paint Obama as an appeaser for being willing to talk to our enemies. It would have a powerful impact.

Thanks for posting.

Posted by: Diana at May 23, 2008 02:12 PM