Big Bad Don
Maybe the Big Don wants his Big Wall boondoggle because he thinks the Presidency is a bigger, better than reality TV show. Maybe he thinks it’s also the ultimate game show. I wonder.
Does he enjoy imagining other people wondering if he could get away with one of the sins he never tried getting away with before: murder, and on a massive, thermonuclear scale?
Hmmm… I would bet he enjoys that sense of fearsome power more than all his other escapades combined. Yet, I am truly grateful for Don’s performance. His ongoing exposure of our vast bamboozlement, kleptocratic evil and incompetent government is a great public service. No one before our new Clown Prince could or would do that. Who else could motivate up to half of us (who can vote) to do it?
Still, at this stage of our game, I have no idea what good that will do.
The Alternatives
I see no news of Democrats (nor El Don) talking about walls to protect all our cities, towns, hospitals, schools, malls, office buildings, hotels, casinos and nuclear power plants along the East and West coastlines of North America. If they were realistic, or even just cautious, they would be discussing or planning giant seawalls by now. Really, by the time all those cities, towns, roads and nukes are flooded regularly--or badly by storm surges—it will be too late for best-case results.
For example, the best Earth science now proves that the most likely sea-level in 2050 will be at least 60 feet (19 meters) higher. With super-storm surges, seawalls would need to be about 26 meters (80 feet) tall, but that would not be a sustainable solution. All the geologic & thermodynamic processes interacting now, causing an unpredictable rate of accelerating meltdown of glaciers & polar ice.
The most potent meltdown accelerator may be the increasing release of methane, more than 22 times more potent than CO2. The more CO2 & methane released, the faster more methane builds up and the faster the global meltdown.
When polar ice and glaciers are gone, then—as in the last Warm-age that ended 3 million years ago—the sea-level will reach more than 360 feet higher, possibly by 2100, if not sooner. So, with storm surge flooding and erosion problems, cities, towns, homes, roads and nuclear power plants, etc., should be at least 380 feet (122 meters) above today’s sea-level. Building thousands of miles sea-wall that tall seems extremely impractical or simply impossible now.
That is not our only severe, time-critical problem that calls for prepping and mass-action now.
Real News
Trumpies and radical CC-deniers may not keep up with the latest Earth science news, but by 2030—those who live in or depend on food from the Midwest—may wish they had. The best estimates of hydrologists say that the Ogalala aquifer will be dry by 2030 or so. Now, envision food riots and mass-migration emptying Midwestern cities & towns. Now, ask yourself where those millions of thirsty, hungry, angry refugees will go?
Without a fleet of SeaArks, they may as well avoid the coastal areas. By 2030 we may have several more nuke plant disasters, worse than Chernoble-scale Fukushima-type catastrophes. Then, without effective planning and preventation, most of the world’s 400+ nuke plants could blowup & meltdown for thousands of years. Part of the cause would be meltdown of the world’s power-grids after flooding of all coastal megacities, metroplexes and power stations.
The midwestern water crisis could turn into a food crisis, amplified by losing our super cargo ports. Without imported food from offshore AgriBiz, losing low-lying coastal agricultural land will make the food crisis much more severe. For example, California’s South Central Ag-land would disappear, along with most of our domestic fruit & veggies. Gulfcoast growers and Mexico’s coastal growers could be submerged.
As you surely know, the power grids going down would kill many millions of us who depend on electricity, refrigeration, hospitals, sanitation systems, fuel pumps, computers and so on & so forth. Within 2 weeks, many millions of urbanites & suburbanites would suffer severe malnutrition, epidemics, starvation and horrific death, possibly without burial. What’s left of national power grids could then take more than 2 years to repair and restart.
Choices
Can we overcome such massive threats in so little time? Yes, but, will politicians help?
If they are too scared to talk about all the above, or fail to care enough, they will do nothing but than political crisis management. Yet, post-catastrophe crisis management is rarely the best, or even good management. Clearly, the worse the crisis, the harder the solution.
Remember, corrupt politicians, profiteers, petty tyrants, war lords and world-class megalomaniacs love social chaos, disasters and mass-terror. They make us easier to control and exploit, more easily terrorized, divided and conquered.
Over 2,600 years ago, Chinese leaders knew that the best time to manage huge problems is at the beginning, when they are small. Those leaders would also see a gram of prevention being worth more than a kilogram of cure. Obviously, this stage of our civilization game is far beyond either of those best-case options. Yet, with effective initiation of a transitional development alliance, a sustainable civilization with a Greener future is possible.
Really, yes, from 1941 to 1945, with a workforce of 93 million or so, the USA became the world’s first super-industrial super-power. With massive disasters and mass-death facing at least 70% us within 10 to 20 years or so, what could we do in 4 years, between 2021 and 2025?
Big Problem, Big Solution
With our current industrial and construction technologies, plus effective planning, management and mass-cooperation of 140 million of us (with the help of the US Army Corps of Engineers), the USA can start construction of floating H2O desalinization plants that become a fleet of 20 ecopark-like SeaArk cities. We could also start building a national network of H2O pipelines and start shutting-down coastal nukes and moving the nuclear fuel & waste inland or into space or onto SeaArks (for power). With the help of migrant workers and robotic manufacturing tech, our problems could be solved—worst-case national catastrophe could be avoided—within 5 to 10 years.
Would a fleet of SeaArks for 200 or 340 million US citizens be affordable? It will be far less expensive than trying to complete a 380 foot tall seawall around thousands of miles of our coasts without shutting down coastal businesses and ruining beachfront real estate. That makes the fleet less politically challenging.
Ecotopian Options & Benefits
A growing fleet of expanding SeaArks will also provide a huge number of good jobs, countless new business opportunities, surplus power, fish farm products, pearls, massive quantities of clean fresh water for inland agriculture and habitat restoration, while cleaning the ocean and restoring marine species. Reefs will form in and around SeaArks and their interior lagoons and canals. That will provide beautiful diving experiences and job opportunities for trainers and guides.
Homes and businesses will be much safer on ultraGreen SeaArks, totally safe from wildfires, earthquakes, tsunamis, tornados and hurricanes. SeaArks will navigate away from and around hurricanes.
For example, a giant SeaArk for 10 million former residents and visitors of the New York City metroplex—possibly named New York Island—might travel at up to 25 knots (28.769 MPH, 46.3 kph). So, as long as we have weather satellites, New York Island will be able to avoid hurricane winds. The other option is traveling beyond hurricane and typhoon zones in bad weather seasons. Additionally, a SeaArk could generate most of its power from wave energy, hydrothermal ducts, next-gen wind generators and solar energy.
Yet, any best-case solution requires the cooperation of scientists, engineers, designers, realists, teachers, activists, Democrats, Greenies, Blacks, Hispanics, Feminists, Marxists, Unionists, Lefty ‘progressives’ and a huge majority of voters wanting it and staying united, not staying distracted and diverted by sub-problems and divisive single-issue arguments.
It still seems fair to wonder how we could afford the best solution.
Beyond Kleptocracy
Does The Fed ever ask how it can afford to give the world’s bankers as much instant ‘money’ as they need to keep the game going? No, they do not. Why? They know that all their play money is really artificial and imaginary. For example, the unregulated global derivatives market—the world’s Shadow Economy—keeps the game going with pure cyber-bucks ‘worth’ 20 to 30 times the ‘value’ of the world’s financial score (GDP). Where does all that extra artificial ‘money’ come from?
All of it emerges instantaneously from weird math in cyber-space, and from The Fed’s rules.
It works like neoMonopoly, where only The Banker ever wins, always. So, what’s good for the gander can be just as good for the goose who lays the golden eggs, us. We could make our game work even better, even without The Fed cancelling our artificial debt or giving us all those inflated debt-bucks we thought we owed them.
I know that seems outrageous or mind-boggling, but recall this: You can give a man a gun, and he can rob a bank. On the other hand, you give 1% of us a central bank, and they rob the world.
Think of it the way Presidents Jefferson and Lincoln did. Thomas Edison did. More than 100 years ago he saw that if our government can print and issue bonds so the international banking cartel can make exponential profit (compound interest) on our money, then government can issue our money, without The Fed and debt, interest, inflation and manipulation by bankers, kleptocrats and currency speculators. What would that look like?
First, look at what happened to the US dollar’s original value, its buying-power, from 1793 to now: The Fed’s 2020 debt-dollars will buy about 3% of what the first US dollars could buy. The Fed’s game inflated our currency by about 3,300% (and the prices of everything except labor). With the help of related taxation, deficit-spending and national debt, the longer we keep playing that game, the worse off we get, automatically.
So, we also have a national financial crisis caused by and maintained only by the rules of neoMonopoly, the kleptocrats’ global pyramid game. As implied before, we can play a better game, one that Jefferson, Lincoln and Edison would enjoy. How?
Green Credit, Green Culture
Thinking of new Green money and credits being like coupons or gift cards makes transition easy.
First, we need an alliance and a new nonprofit association to sponsor an ecotopian cultural credit union (ECCU). It can then manage a nonprofit cultural credit system and “commodity index” crypto-coins via member communities, consortiums, NGOs, co-ops and business firms that help develop and operate our new Green infrastructure. Member organizations and local/regional governments could then pay employees either wholly in nonprofit currency & credits or with both Fed-bucks and ECCU currency/credit.
Reversing the loss of working-class and middle-class buying-power is another possible benefit of the ECCU and our own nonprofit Green credit system. How? Very simply, by choice.
Say 99% of us want the lively economy and buying-power most US citizens enjoyed in 1965. OK, you could be paid in Fed-bucks, plus 25 times that artificial debt-money ‘value’ with Green credit/crypto-coin. So, the 99% of us with less than upper-middle-class wealth would then be modestly affluent. How much more affluent?
If the lowest part-time wage is $10 per hour in Fed-bucks + a 25x Green bonus = $260 buying-power per hour. If a highly-skilled construction worker or factory supervisor makes $30 in Fed-bucks hourly, then their total equivalent buying-power equals $750 hourly. Oh, what about healthcare, inflation and cheaters?
Do you know any doctors, nurses, insurance agents or typists who would refuse a 25x increase of their buying-power? Green credit will only be issued in direct proportion to real goods produced or services provided. That keeps bankers and economists from gaming the system. Vladimir Lenin, the godfather of Russian totalitarianism, realized that inflation is currency devaluation caused bankers and kleptocrats (who subvert and pervert a nation’s money system). So, Green credit and the ECCU’s AI-auditor system eliminates the worst cheating systematically.
Small-time cheaters—criminals, mobs, counterfeiters and petty scammers—will be no match for the ECCU’s next-gen AI-enhanced security and whole-system auditing in real-time.
Ecotopia or Oblivion?
So, the only question anyone needs to answer is, “do I want ecotopia or dystopia and oblivion?”
If a large majority of 99% of us fail to choose and co-create an ecotopian future, civilization will keep sinking to the level of dystopian idiocracy. At this late stage of the neoMonopoly game, letting dystopian chaos and mass-idiocy would ensure worst-case catastrophe.
I choose to foster and support the positive, life-enhancing alternative. We may not survive the consequences of kleptocratic insanity, but surely, quality of life and culture is more important than the most quantity in a toxic, radioactive Hell on what’s left of post-petrocene Earth.
~ Copyright © 2020 by Michael Lucas Monterey. All rights reserved, but reproduction or use for nonprofit educational or critical uses is permitted, with accompanying credit & attribution of the author. For questions, comments or permissions, contact me:
michael@michaellucasmonterey.com or via Twitter @michaelmonterey