Oil wars: the prequel

JIMMY CARTER:
"All the traditions of our past, all the lessons of our heritage, all the promises of our future point to another path, the path of common purpose and the restoration of American values. That path leads to true freedom for our nation and ourselves. We can take the first steps down that path as we begin to solve our energy problem.

...

To give us energy security, I am asking for the most massive peacetime commitment of funds and resources in our nation's history to develop America's own alternative sources of fuel: from coal, from oil shale, from plant products for gasohol, from unconventional gas, from the sun. " (1979)

There are a few problems with the sentiments expressed in this speech from 1979. First, he refers to a "path of common purpose". As everybody who owns a Congressman or Senator knows, only Communist agitators talk about “common” anything. It suggests a collective, a co-op or commune, all of which are, ipso facto, bad for the power consortiums, cartels and syndicates which guarantee freedom to the top 1% of the population.

If you or your ancestors had been any good at anything or worthy of an earthly reward, you would have it by now. The time for whining is past. Get over it. If you’re not raking in a minimum of $17,000,000. per year, it’s because you lack character.

If you can get a job as a secretary, manicurist, pool man or gardener to any of the top 1%, the commons is a threat to you too, because you might get trampled by the other 98.75% of the people when they finally run out of food and oil, and the bankers, who so graciously have underwritten their mortgages, throw them out of their houses. Additionally, you can be replaced on a whim. Half a whim, even.

Why is it that those special people in the top 1% must tolerate the descendants of icky pioneers and farmers and people of no vision and too many scruples? There are plenty of nouveau riche in the top 1%, proving once and for all that those who haven’t made it are just jealous.

I know cynicism offends Peggy Noonan, but I am bitter because I don’t have a perch at the Wall Street Journal where I castigate people like me for their bad attitudes. Attitude and positive thinking are everything. The movers have dropped a grand piano from the third floor right above my head, but I will think of the "Moonlight Sona…

Last night, George W. Bush advised us that we are addicted to oil. Addictions are something he can relate to. “I was drunk on Wild Turkey, but now I’m drunk on the Lord.” (applause) All the little people should think about car pooling. There is no money for infrastructure, and besides, public transportation is another manifestation of the commons. There are a lot of fat adults and children, so to work off Happy Meals and Domino’s Pizza, they should walk to work or school. If they have heart attacks because they are so out of shape and the ambulance company is out of gas, their sacrifice for America will not go unnoticed.

What’s everyone complaining about? Jimmy Carter would not have been fun to have a beer with, because he’s a sanctimonious Baptist, whereas George W. Bush is a Methodist. Jimmy Carter wanted to tax the bejesus out of the oil companies. George W. Bush wants us to be afraid of “the terrorists”.

Terrorists are bad.
Taxes are bad.
Therefore, the people who would tax the oil companies are like terrorists.

I remember the 1970s oil embargo and the hostage crisis and Omar Kadafi of Libya. The unwieldy baby boom was all for energy conservation, energy independence and freedom. Some of us anyway. Manufacturers began designing “energy saver” products. A company I worked for at the time removed every third fluorescent bulb throughout the corporate headquarters skyscraper, except presumably on the executive floor, and put the heating/cooling system on timers. I know they were functioning, because I found myself toiling away after hours rather often.

Now thirty years later, Carter’s energy initiatives are filed somewhere in the Potomac, and the consumption crazy “conservatives” are telling us to suck it in. They hadn’t quite hollowed out the center enough by 1974 – they were really just getting started – so they needed a few more decades of enabling the proletariat to consume its way to oblivion. It was astonishingly easy, too.

I do not trust the great unwashed any more than the “conservatives” do. Their votes are useful in mass movements, no matter whose team flag is atop the flagpole. Stupidity is on fire and raging. This is not a simple problem, by any means. However, know that the government is not your pal, that infrastructure is going to erode even more, that elections from here on in will be rigged ,, that survival means thinking independently of media, especially Fox and Fox lite (CNN), the markets and the great unwashed. Plenty of us left and right fit that category. That’s why I have hope.