As the world is slowly waking up to the fact that our behaviour is killing us, things from the mists of time come back to me.
While President Carter was having solar panels installed on the roof of the White House we were building a passive solar house in the Okanagan Valley in British Columbia, in company with friends and neighbours - the Okanagan Solar Energy Society. Sort of like a barn raising gig - we helped each others' families out.
At that time of the oil importation crisis President Carter was trying to get Congress to pass legislation that would encourage the development of alternative sources of fuel, to no avail - even then the power of the fossil fuel industry was too much to overcome.
Then during the election campaign Ronald Reagan famously said "government isn't the solution, its the problem". And we Canadians said "Whuh???? Don't we need government regulations to make sure that the oil companies don't destroy the planet just so they can make more money?"
And when Reagan was elected he had the solar panels taken down. That really hurt.
So here we are 32 years later, having missed the opportunity of our lifetimes, with the fossil fuel industry still controlling Congress and state legislatures, poisoning the air and water, bamboozling the public into thinking that natural gas reserves will save America and creating another stock market bubble. And blocking subsidies for the creation of alternative energy sources while throwing billions of our tax dollars at the oil, gas and coal industries.
And its not just us - in Australia there is a titanic battle between the extraction industry and environmentalists (you are an environmentalist if you are pissed that someone has drilled a coal seam gas well on your property and your kids are dying of cancer) while the country is in flames because of a catastrophic drought.
In Canada the illegally elected Conservative government led by Stephen Harper is destroying environmental protections and screwing First Nations people out of their land so the Chinese can come in and extract resources without any regulation or oversight.
Someone please tell me - why are we so stupid as to allow those who enable this destruction to have even one iota of power in our governance.