I'm one of millions in the northeast U.S. tonight 'enjoying' the wind and snow from a nasty nor'easter, the first really big winter storm some of us have seen this winter. (I've also got a family member going to school in Oswego, NY, so it's not like it hasn't been happening already for some of us.) As the wind howls around the house, I've been reflecting on the situation.
Sara Robinson over at Orcinus linked to an interview with Thomas Homer-Dixon about "Is the Deadly Crash of Our Civilization Inevitable?"
Sitting here semi-warm while the wind howls thanks to fuel oil refined from stocks imported from who knows where, and electricity provided by a vast international conglomerate, I'm very aware how delicate is the barrier between my comfortable life and freezing in the dark.
While Congress debates a non-binding resolution which may finally open the door to admitting our president is an incompetent fool who has sunk us into a morass in the middle east, I can't help but think this is only the latest diversion from the much greater crises lurking in the wings. As Homer-Dixon puts it:
My latest book — The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization — was released on October 31 in Canada and November 1 in the United States. It will be published in June in the United Kingdom and in July in Australia.
The book sets out a theory of the growth, crisis, and renewal of societies, arguing that today's converging energy, environmental, and political-economic stresses could cause a breakdown of national and global order. Yet there are things we can do now to keep such a breakdown from being catastrophic. And some kinds of breakdown could even open up extraordinary opportunities for creative, bold reform of our societies, if we're prepared to exploit these opportunities when they arise.
Somehow, I'm not terribly sanguine that our vaunted American democracy has a really good chance of pulling this off, not given our track record. Looking at facts dispassionately, making long-term plans, and carrying them out effectively is one of the hardest human activities to practice as a group or society.
For every person who seems to get it, there are at least ten who are in active denial or deliberately choosing to make the situation worse. And why not? People doing well under the Way Things Are have a vested interest in prolonging them as long as possible, despite the eventual results. Take this person here, FOX News David Asman essentially claiming that the scientists warning of climate change are part of an establishment cashing in on a popular belief. It's not about science in other words, it's all about the Benjamins.
Jared Diamond has laid out a collection of case studies that show that societies fail or succeed based on how they respond to changes in the world around them and the choices they make. What happened in New Orleans had been anticipated for years. There were plenty of warnings, and any number of things that might have been done - but in the end it was easier and cheaper to ignore all of that. Until Katrina hit. New Orleans shows just how badly our society failed what may prove to be only the preliminary round in a series of even greater challenges to come.
The people currently running this country have demonstrated very clearly that they do not give a damn about the rest of America or the world as long as they remain in charge and have to make no sacrifices of their own. Paris Hilton has come to be the poster girl for that mind set; George W. Bush is the embodiment of all they believe.
My current electricity provider bought out a regional power provider that had been a semi-public utility for decades. They 'rationalized' its operations for profitability and slashed the payroll. Where once the power company had crews that could do moderate tree trimming on a regular basis, they now have a policy that imported work crews from God knows where to clear-cut trees from around power lines on my street. (Most of the crews - working under contract - spoke little English.)
If my power goes out tonight, is there going to be anyone locally on call to do repairs, or will I have to wait until the lowest bidding contractors can be brought in from elsewhere? The people running the company won't even notice - their HQ is somewhere in England. The people in the midwest hit a few weeks ago by blizzards and massive power outages that lasted days no doubt took great comfort in knowing deregulating the power industry had made it so much more profitable responsive and efficient while they froze in the dark. I shouldn't be too critical though. If my power DOES go out, they have a web page that tells what to do....
Meanwhile, the produce in my refrigerator may well have come via this operation. My food supply is based on everything going right over a span of several thousand miles. Does that really make sense or seem like a secure situation? At that, RailEx is a step in the right direction in one regard. It uses a lot less fuel to move that food than the fleet of trucks that would otherwise be doing so. It's a good thing we have such sensible transportation policies in this country, right?
The Department of Transportation's discretionary budget authority would decrease 6.7 percent to $11.8 billion under the president's proposal. Total budget resources, however, which include trust funds for certain transportation modes, would increase slightly to $59.5 billion from $58.7 billion.
Much of the decrease in funding comes from Bush's plan to withhold nearly all money for Amtrak, the government's passenger railroad. The administration has been trying to encourage Amtrak to reorganize itself so that it can become financially self-sustaining. The budget would provide $360 million to support local commuter rail systems that partner with Amtrak but no money for other Amtrak operations.
"It is clear the current model of passenger rail services is flawed and unsustainable," Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta said today.
The administration's budget would provide funds for the Federal Aviation Administration to hire 1,249 new air traffic controllers to replace those in the agency's aging workforce who are expected to retire. Surface transportation would receive a $28 billion increase over six years through Safe Accountable Flexible and Efficient Transportation Equity Act (SAFETEA).
The Bush budget also calls for the elimination of the Railroad Rehabilitation and Improvement Financing program, a government loan program that Mineta said was redundant. A next-generation high-speed rail research program would also be eliminated.
So, what are you doing where you are? Are you working to get people elected who can see beyond their own immediate self interest? What kind of economic choices are you making? The Republican mantra of "Freedom" and "Moral Values" have proven to be nothing more than fancy camoflage around core values that essentially mean the rest of us A) are on our own, and B) should just shut up and do what they tell us. They rail against the idea that a society is only as strong as its weakest members, and while they fund creationists to destroy our schools, they practice Social Darwinism of the worst sort.
When they say Government is not the Answer, Government is the Problem, they are doubly wrong. Government is neither; it is a TOOL that is neither good nor bad in itself - it's how it is used that matters, and for whose benefit. It can be a club, a crutch, a stumbling block, or a bulwark, a refuge, a secure foundation. One of the things that Jared Diamond shows in Collapse is that a variety of governments/social orders have failed at meeting the challenges of their day. Democracy does not get a free pass or an automatic examption. The laws of Nature are apolitical - what matters is getting the right answers and acting on them.
Right now, the race for the White House in 2008 is revolving around Iraq (and maybe Iran Real Soon Now.) Until we deal with that, it's going to be hard to almost impossible to think about anything else - but we need to elect someone who can do that. Let's keep that in mind while we watch the MSM be "really stupid, but entertaining" as the candidates pander to the focus-grouped audiences, and no one pays attention to the Big Picture.
This video from Thomas Homer-Dixon does a nice job of summarizing what's coming. Keep in mind he's trying to be optimistic, because - despite faith in American Exceptionalism - there's no guarantees in this world. It is going to take every bit of ingenuity and rationality we can muster to preserve what can be saved of our way of life, and that's going to mean some tough choices. Worst case scenario? We're going to end up fighting over lifeboat rules. It can make for some thought provoking fiction, but it's not a place we want to go if we can avoid it - and we can't avoid it unless we face up to it.
It's something to think about while the wind howls tonight.