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| Author |
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| 25 new of 107 responses total. |
johnnie
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response 75 of 107:
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Feb 3 20:11 UTC 2006 |
That's about right. Roughly speaking, it takes 150,000 new jobs per
month to keep up with population growth. Table 1 ["Civilian Working
Age Population"] in the report klg references demonstrates this
(actually, it seems to indicate the 150K figure is a bit low). 150K
times 12 months in a year equals 1.8million times Bush's 5 years in
office (Jan 01 - Jan 06) equals 9million. Note that Bush crowed about
creating 4.6million jobs over 2.5 years, a rate that just barely keeps
pace with population growth.
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klg
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response 76 of 107:
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Feb 3 20:22 UTC 2006 |
VH is correct. Which makes Curl's lie even worse. How do you increase
employment by 9.6M "just to keep pace" if the labor force grew only by
5.6M??
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tod
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response 77 of 107:
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Feb 3 20:34 UTC 2006 |
The labor force grew by less than 2.5 million. GW didn't take into account
all the job loss from his economy crash in 2001. 2.5 million burger flippers
can't be wrong!
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rcurl
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response 78 of 107:
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Feb 7 06:39 UTC 2006 |
Addiction
February 6, 2006
By now, President Bush's wildly irresponsible remarks on energy in
his state of the union speech may have already vanished down the memory
hole, but the damage will linger on. "America is addicted to oil," Mr.
Bush began, failing to mention that underlying this addiction was a
living arrangement that required people to drive their cars incessantly.
A clueless public will continue to believe that "the best way to break
this addiction is through technology . . ." and that "we must also
change how we power our automobiles."
Mr. Bush recommended ethanol. As one wag put it after the speech:
"America's heroin is oil, and ethanol will be our methadone." The
expectation will still be that everybody must drive incessantly.
It is hard to believe that Mr. Bush does not know the truth of the
situation, or that some of the clever people around him who run his
brain do not know it, namely that ethanol and all other bio-fuels are
net energy losers, that they require more energy to grow and process
them than they produce in the end, and that the energy "inputs" required
to do this are none other than oil and natural gas, the same fuels we
already run engines on.
The president also said that "breakthroughs on this and other new
technologies will help us reach another great goal, to replace more than
75 percent of our oil imports from the Middle East by 2025."
In point of fact, our oil imports from anywhere on the planet will
be reduced by more than 75 percent because by that time worldwide oil
depletion will be advanced to its terminal stage, and nobody will have
any oil left to export -- assuming that the industrial nations have not
ravaged each other by then in a war to control the diminishing supply of
oil.
The key to the stupidity evinced by Mr. Bush's speech is the
assumption that we ought to keep living the way we do in America, that
we can keep running the interstate highway system, WalMart, and Walt
Disney World on some other basis besides fossil fuels. The public
probably wishes that this were so, but it isn't a service to pander to
their wishes instead of addressing the mandates of reality. And reality
is telling us something very different. Reality is saying that the life
of incessant motoring is a suicidal fiasco, and if we don't learn to
inhabit the terrain of North America differently, a lot of us are going
die, either in war, or by starvation when oil-and-gas-based farming
craps out, or in civil violence proceeding from failed economic
expectations.
I hate to keep harping on this, but Mr. Bush could have announced
a major effort to restore the American railroad system. It would have
been a major political coup. It would have a huge impact on our oil use.
The public would benefit from it tremendously. And it would have put
thousands of people to work on something really meaningful. Unlike trips
to Mars and experiments in cold fusion, railroads are something we
already know how to do, and the tracks are lying out there waiting to be
fixed. But the reigning delusions of Hollywood and Las Vegas prevent us
from thinking realistically about these things. We're only into wishing
for grand slam home runs and five-hundred-million-dollar lottery
jackpots. Anything less than that makes us feel like losers.
Meanwhile, the official Democratic Party response to Mr. Bush's
fucking nonsense was the stupendous fatuousness of newly-elected
Virginia Governor Tim Kaine's rebuttal, a saccharine gruel of platitudes
and panderings that made me want to shoot members of my own party on
sight.
History will look back in wonder and nausea at the twitterings of
these idiots as the world they pretended to run lurched into darkness.
James Kunstler
Read a well-written intro to the problem of "peak oil" here
http://www.energybulletin.net/primer.php Yahoo! Groups Links
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gull
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response 79 of 107:
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Feb 7 07:15 UTC 2006 |
The National Review published another blistering review of Bush's
speech, where they accused him of going green and becoming another Al
Gore.
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happyboy
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response 80 of 107:
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Feb 7 09:23 UTC 2006 |
thank god ther aint a-gunna be no chickenmen hybrids
oh wait...HE IS ONE!
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klg
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response 81 of 107:
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Feb 7 11:42 UTC 2006 |
So, Curl. Have you picked out the cave you plan to move to?
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sholmes
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response 82 of 107:
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Feb 7 11:56 UTC 2006 |
What's the difference between the cost of public transport and hiring a cab
in US ? or does it vary wildly from state to state ?
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jep
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response 83 of 107:
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Feb 7 13:46 UTC 2006 |
re resp:78: The president should have reversed the basis of modern
Western civilization by giving a different speech? Wow, that guy is
not just a fan of the president, he thinks George W. Bush is a god or
something. We've used oil for a hundred years, more and more and more,
and people in America and other places seem to like it that way. I
don't think any president has the kind of leadership influence needed
to make people give all of that up. I don't think anyone who tried
would be able to stay in office. No one who is so inclined would be
able to get into office in the first place.
I tend to agree with the president that alternatives to oil need to be
developed or we *are* eventually going to decline into a non-
technological abyss. Most of the people in the world can't and won't
survive if we run out of oil and there's no alternative to keep the
technology going. It's not a matter of choosing to go back to the
technology of 1300 A.D., with almost everyone in Europe living by
farming their fiefdom with ox-drawn plows, and most of the few hundred
thousand people in America hunting in boundless forests. We use
technology now or almost all of us die, horribly, of disease and
starvation.
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bru
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response 84 of 107:
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Feb 7 16:13 UTC 2006 |
There are things I would like to see. Things like a requirement that all new
housing include energy conservation methods. Tax breaks for adding same to
old housing.
Railroads? Do you realize how much material already moves by rail? Yes, they
could add some lightrail passenger systems ver already abandoned tracks, but
would they use less oil than current methods?
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tod
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response 85 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:08 UTC 2006 |
re #84
Lightrail runs electric in most places.
What ticked me off was that GW mentioned dependence on oil and then spun it
into alternative home heating instead of coal. What he should have been
focusing on was initiatives for better mass transit in urban areas.
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klg
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response 86 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:10 UTC 2006 |
Why do you think that the government has to get involved (and, most
likely, screw things up) when the market will accomplish the same ends
in a much more rational and less disruptive way??
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tod
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response 87 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:17 UTC 2006 |
re #86
What makes you think there is any distance between the Administration and the
businesses that control the "market"?
You know what the White House's response is to investing in our energy
infrastructure? By expanding refining capacity
They've flat out rejected the most sane idea I've heard thus far which was
presented by Senator Grassley: Major oil corporations voluntarily hand over
10 percent of their vast windfall profits towards saner energy investments
for America.
It won't happen. Why? Major appointees of this Administration are former
major oil executives
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mcnally
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response 88 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:23 UTC 2006 |
When are we going to have a president who announces a "Manhattan Project"-
style initiative for fusion power?
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tod
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response 89 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:40 UTC 2006 |
When we elect one.
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kingjon
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response 90 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:46 UTC 2006 |
Wasn't the Manhattan Project's goal to develop *weapons* before the enemy got
them? For that to fly you'd have to have some extremely effective military
technology that required it, I'd think.
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keesan
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response 91 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:51 UTC 2006 |
I would like to see a requirement that all new housing be within 1/2 mile of
public transportation, rather than a requirement for parking. And that all
businesses be within a 5 minute walk of public transportation, and have
sidewalks (unlike many on Washtenaw Ave, which are linked by mud paths, which
also link the bus stops). I would also like to see people who own cars use
them less, including Rane. And stop using power mowers and power clothes
dryers, and stop cooking in air conditioned kitchens, and other obvious energy
wasters.
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rcurl
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response 92 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:52 UTC 2006 |
Fusion power does not, of course, address "Peak Oil". As Kunstler also put
it "We're only into wishing for grand slam home runs". There is a lot that
could be done now with what we know to forstall the consequences of the
end of the era of oil.
KLG doesn't know that caves serve poorly as habitats, except partly as
defensive sites against attacks with bows and arrows.
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tod
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response 93 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:52 UTC 2006 |
I think the threat of oil shortages being used as a weapon against the US
economy should be enough of a requirement for such a project.
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kingjon
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response 94 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:57 UTC 2006 |
Re #91: Hear, hear!
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mcnally
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response 95 of 107:
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Feb 7 17:58 UTC 2006 |
re #92: Fusion power (or any other sort of cheap alternative power) doesn't
create more oil, true, but it could substantially reduce the consumption of
remaining oil, giving us a longer transition time. And working now to find
an eventual oil alternative isn't in any way incompatible with also working
to reduce current oil consumption.
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klg
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response 96 of 107:
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Feb 7 18:02 UTC 2006 |
"And everyone must wear their underwear on the outside"
We have already had some big projects from the Government, for example,
(1) a war on poverty and (2) a war on cancer.
Did we win those yet??
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tod
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response 97 of 107:
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Feb 7 18:06 UTC 2006 |
The war on nouns is always a blank check. Just look at the war on terror.
Instead of a war on OPEC or war on Saudi Arabia, its a war on terror.
GW's solution is to expand refineries and drill more.
This country needs to kick the Big 3's ass to the curb and take their bus and
train technologies back which were dismantled by the Big 3 during Operation
Suburbia of the 50's and 60's.
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rcurl
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response 98 of 107:
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Feb 7 18:06 UTC 2006 |
Add (3) a war on terror.
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tod
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response 99 of 107:
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Feb 7 18:09 UTC 2006 |
A White House document shows that executives from big oil companies met with
Vice President Cheney's energy task force in 2001 -- something long suspected
by environmentalists but denied as recently as last week by industry officials
testifying before Congress.
The document, obtained this week by The Washington Post, shows that officials
from Exxon Mobil Corp., Conoco (before its merger with Phillips), Shell Oil
Co. and BP America Inc. met in the White House complex with the Cheney aides
who were developing a national energy policy, parts of which became law and
parts of which are still being debated.
In a joint hearing last week of the Senate Energy and Commerce committees,
the chief executives of Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and ConocoPhillips
said their firms did not participate in the 2001 task force. The president
of Shell Oil said his company did not participate "to my knowledge," and the
chief of BP America Inc. said he did not know.
Chevron was not named in the White House document, but the Government
Accountability Office has found that Chevron was one of several companies that
"gave detailed energy policy recommendations" to the task force. In addition,
Cheney had a separate meeting with John Browne, BP's chief executive,
according to a person familiar with the task force's work; that meeting is
not noted in the document.
The task force's activities attracted complaints from environmentalists, who
said they were shut out of the task force discussions while corporate
interests were present. The meetings were held in secret and the White House
refused to release a list of participants. The task force was made up
primarily of Cabinet-level officials. Judicial Watch and the Sierra Club
unsuccessfully sued to obtain the records.
Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), who posed the question about the task force,
said he will ask the Justice Department today to investigate. "The White House
went to great lengths to keep these meetings secret, and now oil executives
may be lying to Congress about their role in the Cheney task force,"
Lautenberg said.
Lea Anne McBride, a spokeswoman for Cheney, declined to comment on the
document. She said that the courts have upheld "the constitutional right of
the president and vice president to obtain information in confidentiality."
The executives were not under oath when they testified, so they are not
vulnerable to charges of perjury; committee Democrats had protested the
decision by Commerce Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) not to swear in the
executives. But a person can be fined or imprisoned for up to five years for
making "any materially false, fictitious or fraudulent statement or
representation" to Congress.
Alan Huffman, who was a Conoco manager until the 2002 merger with Phillips,
confirmed meeting with the task force staff. "We met in the Executive Office
Building, if I remember correctly," he said.
A spokesman for ConocoPhillips said the chief executive, James J. Mulva, had
been unaware that Conoco officials met with task force staff when he testified
at the hearing. The spokesman said that Mulva was chief executive of Phillips
in 2001 before the merger and that nobody from Phillips met with the task
force.
Exxon spokesman Russ Roberts said the company stood by chief executive Lee
R. Raymond's statement in the hearing. In a brief phone interview, former
Exxon vice president James Rouse, the official named in the White House
document, denied the meeting took place. "That must be inaccurate and I don't
have any comment beyond that," said Rouse, now retired.
Ronnie Chappell, a spokesman for BP, declined to comment on the task force
meetings. Darci Sinclair, a spokeswoman for Shell, said she did not know
whether Shell officials met with the task force, but they often meet members
of the administration. Chevron said its executives did not meet with the task
force but confirmed that it sent President Bush recommendations in a letter.
The person familiar with the task force's work, who requested anonymity out
of concern about retribution, said the document was based on records kept by
the Secret Service of people admitted to the White House complex. This person
said most meetings were with Andrew Lundquist, the task force's executive
director, and Cheney aide Karen Y. Knutson.
According to the White House document, Rouse met with task force staff members
on Feb. 14, 2001. On March 21, they met with Archie Dunham, who was chairman
of Conoco. On April 12, according to the document, task force staff members
met with Conoco official Huffman and two officials from the U.S. Oil and Gas
Association, Wayne Gibbens and Alby Modiano.
On April 17, task force staff members met with Royal Dutch/Shell Group's
chairman, Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, Shell Oil chairman Steven Miller and two
others. On March 22, staff members met with BP regional president Bob Malone,
chief economist Peter Davies and company employees Graham Barr and Deb
Beaubien.
Toward the end of the hearing, Lautenberg asked the five executives: "Did your
company or any representatives of your companies participate in Vice President
Cheney's energy task force in 2001?" When there was no response, Lautenberg
added: "The meeting . . . "
"No," said Raymond.
"No," said Chevron Chairman David J. O'Reilly.
"We did not, no," Mulva said.
"To be honest, I don't know," said BP America chief executive Ross Pillari,
who came to the job in August 2001. "I wasn't here then."
"But your company was here," Lautenberg replied.
"Yes," Pillari said.
Shell Oil president John Hofmeister, who has held his job since earlier this
year, answered last. "Not to my knowledge," he said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/15/AR200511150
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