Think you know the God Squad??

By William Fisher

OK, we liberals are spooked by ‘Jesus Freaks’. We don’t want them passing a Constitutional amendment telling us who we can marry. We don’t want them teaching our kids Creationism. We don’t want them mandating that we just have to have that baby.

In short, we don’t want to have anything to do with these fringy lunatics of the religious right.

Well, no so fast. Hang on a minute.

Would you be surprised to discover that you have a lot more samenesses than differences with Christian evangelicals?

Well, so was I. Until I covered a telephone news conference last week sponsored by an evangelist group called Faith in Public Life.

The purpose of the conference call was to challenge President Bush to use his State of the Union speech to salvage his legacy by “changing course on the most pressing moral issues of our time.”

They must be talking about abortion, stem cell research, school prayer, gay marriage – those so-called ‘values issues’, I thought.

Not so.

Here’s some of what we reporters heard:

First, the participants – some of the best-known names in the evangelical world – called George W. Bush “an explicitly evangelical president” with a “sadly truncated” moral vision.

Then these Protestant and Roman Catholic leaders challenged the president to use his speech to announce major changes in his administration’s policies on war, torture, climate change, and U.S. and international poverty.

They credited Bush for some of his efforts, including his programs to address the HIV-AIDS pandemic in Africa, increasing foreign aid, and his domestic Faith-based Initiative. But it was highly critical of many other Bush Administration policies, particularly the war in Iraq, providing insufficient resources to help millions of Iraqi refugees, seeming indifference to growing poverty in the U.S., the use of torture, and failure to take a leadership position on global climate change.

The group was particularly critical of the president and his team regarding the use of torture as a tool in the war on terrorism. Rev. David Gushee, president of Evangelicals for Human Rights – did you know there was one? -- said, “In his well-intentioned efforts to protect national security, President Bush and his team over-reached by authorizing and employing torture that certainly qualify and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.”

Noting that “these decisions were made in secret” following the September 11, 2001 attacks on the U.S., Gushee said that once abuses such as the Abu Ghraib prison scandal were revealed, the courts, the media and public opinion forced Bush into “a kind of tactical retreat.” But, he added, Bush

“still reserves the right to authorize the CIA to employ a

range of secret ‘enhanced interrogation’ techniques,

including waterboarding.”

He criticized the president for threatening to veto pending legislation that would make these practices illegal, and urged him to abandon his objections to using the Army Field Manual as the standard for all interrogations, including those carried out by the CIA.

“It is hard to overstate the devastating effect of this policy on the moral standing of the U.S.,” Gushee said. He added that

“euphemizing torture as something else does not make it any less torture.”

He urged the president to tell the American people Monday evening, “On behalf of the U.S., I personally apologize for the use of torture by this nation.”

Fat chance!

The came Sister Anne Curtis of the Institute of the Sisters of Mercy, who recently returned from Iraq. She focused on the plight of the estimated four million Iraqis who have either fled to neighboring countries or who have been internally displaced by the war. She told us U.S. efforts to assist these refugees – many of whom have become targets for insurgents because they worked for American authorities – are under-funded and under-resourced.

Talking with refugee families, she said,

“I felt a great sense of shame and deep sorrow as a citizen of the U.S.,”

she told us reporters.

“President Bush needs to understand the reality”

of the refugee situation. He has

“a responsibility, a moral obligation, to end the war in Iraq, aid the refugee applicants, and provide for the necessary funding of refugee assistance,”

she said.

But aren’t these the same folks who have been so tight with Dubya, Cheney, and Karl Rove? Sure didn’t sound that way. One of the speakers, Dr. Ron Sider, opined that

“The evangelical world has been hurt by its identification with President Bush’s immoral choices.”

Sider is president of Evangelicals for Social Action – another outfit most of us have never heard of.

But how about former Gov. Mike Huckabee’s proposal to amend the U.S. Constitution to bring it more in line with scripture? Sider said,

“I would not state it that way. This is not a Christian nation. We should not talk about making the Constitution in line with any religious text.”

In fact, the group had some harsh words for the religious right. “It’s just not enough to articulate opposition to abortion, gay marriage and judicial decisions we may not like,” said Rev. Gushee.

“I think we have yet to sort out the legacy of an explicitly evangelical president who sadly has had such a truncated vision of what moral leadership looks like. The limits of that vision have been painfully apparent over the last seven years,”

he declared.

While the group appeared to favor President Bush’s Faith-based Initiative, they criticized him for failing to adequately fund the program. One member noted that Bush mentioned it in his first year and last year, but between these two points has been silent on the subject.

Poverty in the U.S. was also high on the group’s agenda. Father Larry Snyder, president of Catholic Charities USA, noted that in 2002 his organization provided 43 per cent of its services to the working poor; by 2006, the number had risen to 52 per cent.

“More than 36 million people living in poverty in the U.S. is simply unacceptable.

It is a moral and social crisis, because as a country we have the knowledge and the resources to significantly reduce this number,” he said. He criticized congress as well as the president for failing to pass legislation to address the long-term health care needs of poor children.

Global Warming was another major concern for the group. Rev. Paul deVries, a board member of the National Evangelical Association (NEA) and an original signer of an “Evangelical Climate Initiative” statement, urged Bush to use his Monday night speech to lay out his commitment to “take care of God’s creation.” He should

“praise the scientists, praise the congress, and lay out a program to set an example for the rest of the world.”

That puts Rev. deVries on a collision course with the likes of right-wingers like James Dobson, Chuck Colson, and Richard Land, head of the Southern Baptist Convention.

But he’s been there before. These were the folks who led the NEA’s successful fight against any kind of statement supporting action to address climate change. They said it was not a “consensus” position.

The group also expressed concern about the current economic downturn triggered by the sub-prime mortgage market meltdown. Rev. deVries called attention to “the extraordinary levels of deceit” by banks and mortgage companies, and charged that “no one seems to have the guts to say so and conduct a thorough investigation.”

He added,

“The bank robbers have taken over the banks.”

On achieving a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians, Rev. Sider said President Bush could have a “huge impact” on current negotiations. But he added, “This is not going to happen unless he invests himself and his credibility” in the effort.

The moral of this story is:

All evangelicals aren’t loyal Bushies.

They aren’t even all Republicans. And they’re certainly not homogenous. On many, many issues, they’re pretty much like most of those who are reading this column.

Those readers won’t agree with a lot of their beliefs and positions. But there’s a lot more common ground than most of us would have guessed.

See also:

The World According to Bill Fisher
Frequent columns and reports on issues in public diplomacy.

THE PENTAGON'S REVOLVING DOOR
THE 2008 CAMPAIGN: CANDIDATES COMPETE TO BE "MORE CHRISTIAN"

George Ure prepares us for the next few months

Report from peoplenomics.com and halfpasthuman.com

The links are requested, but I like to remind people about them from time to time, anyhooo.


This is kinda like a Big Day WOW! thing for me. This report is always eagerly anticipated, like my own private HUGE box of Godiva (Prefer Leonida's) to eat and NOT get sick.

THIS, THIS is the latest report, but no great surprises here. Not REALLY. It's about time for Dick Cheney to "get his" .... that's just one thing. The anger toward the Bushistas? Totally deserved and my take on Scott McClellan is right on target. This is awful stuff he is saying and perhaps we can use it to push these WAR MONGERS behind bars where they BELONG, so richly.

Oh, and remember what I say about the idiocy of the financial house managers - THEY CANNOT REORGANIZE THEMSELVES. They cannot see that IF they would stop and think about the sustainable future that we want to build, there would be plenty of work!! PLENTY!! But they cannot think outside the "box" they've built for themselves with THEIR media (consumerist, warmongering), their value set (get more! Kill anyone in our way!), and their inability to use hearts, hands, hopes and health together at one time. Sad comment, but TRUE. Remember this .. I worked at the Wall Street law firms, at many many major banks, in the City of London, at the United Nations .. I KNOW how warped the values reallly are.

If you are new, and don't know about the linguistic runs, head over to halfpasthuman. FIND OUT. You will be glad you did - and tell George I sent you. You'll WANT to fork over that 40 bucks, you really will. It's about the best deal I know of.

Tickers & Time Tinkers

Things are at a serious enough point where the time monks at www.halfpasthuman.com have given me the green light to roll out a little more of the predictive linguistics so you can brace for what's ahead for the population of the USA in the next couple of months. If you repost any of this, a link to both this page and www.halfpasthuman.com is required. So fasten your seat belt, here's a kind of sneak peek under the covers as to where we are, where we're going, and 'what comes next.'

Let's start with the report Monday that vice president Cheney has been been undergoing heart treatments for an irregular rhythm.

This is something we've been expecting since it popped up in the predictive linguistics almost 6-months ago. From ALTA 0108 (Part Zero, May 2007), we seemed to get a sense that the health issues would begin around the time of some new disclosures about what it's like inside the Bush White House. Best we can figure, the coming 'tell all' book by Scott McClellan which was unveiled a couple of days back is just about a perfect temporal marker. Here's how it looked when reported as a linguistic probability mid May of this year:

"As the modelspace is progressed into December and the [results linger/limp_along] from the [power outage], the TPTB entity is showing that the [exposure (of the) hungry mouth/teeth] will [precipitate] a [wave/residual flow] of [bad luck/happenstance]. The data sets are under the influence of the [conflict] meta data layer, and are supported with [beasts] and [blood], as well as [crippled/lame] and [damaged tendons pulling]. This sub set has the supporting aspect/attributes with close links to the Press entity which point toward a [visibility] of the [warfare/strike] with TPTB causing an image of [rapacious/lust], and [hunger (for) all (things?/resources)] to emergence within the global mediastream. This is *not* good for TPTB entity and there will be a swift [reaction] and an [attempted purge] of some [offending voices/faces].

"There are several detail layers within the aspect/attributes which help to describe the situation immediately following the [exposure] of the [conflict]. These are pointing to a [bed-ridden/sick/ill] [government] with specific references to vice Dick Cheney. There are other sets going to [loss (of ability) to reunite], with special emphasis on the [fractured/split] being [permanent], and [without (possibility) of repair]. This area shows that the [broken alliances] will [leave stranded] (many) in [desolated plains/places]."
Plain as mud? At the archetype level, t the visibility of warfare/strife within the TPTB entity is well met by the McClellan book, and along about now, we have the vice president's health issues, and with the opening of the Middle East peace conference in Annapolis today, linguistically at least, one way to read the view from May of this year would be not to expect any reuniting as the fracture in that part of the world will be permanent and is past repair.
Time and Markets

Before returning to some of the linguistics for the markets in the coming weeks, let me first drag out a chart for you to ponder. I know the market futures are pointing to an up day in the market as we head into the opening, but the market popped to the up side yesterday too, and that didn't keep us from seeing nearly 240 points whacked off the Dow.

I've been closely watching how this market seems to be running parallel to the declines which followed the market peaks in 1929 and 1987, and as you'll see, the markets right now (today) are at an important 'fork in the road' because if we don't stop this decline in its tracks, the Fed and other PTB forces may not be able to prevent a wholesale rout over the next couple of weeks are events in the past (we think of these as 'self-seeding time cycles' but there's nothing in the literature, so just use the words to conjure up what that means) and events rhyme/echo to cause a next bigger down move.


Now, to return to the linguistics, from the ALTA 0508 report, there was a sense that although there would be a break in the 'panic' language that accrued around the end of August/early days of September, for a 72-day respite, the problems of the market would continue to build under the surface:
"As the modelspace is moved through the 'turn around' point of September 19th and beyond, the [blood letting] meme begins to accrue almost instantly. It gains strength through the Fall, and goes into its maximum emotional summation levels just as Fall transitions into Winter. Thereafter it fades rapidly as though 'once the beast is drained, nothing more to be said'. There are a number of temporal markers which appear in conjunction with the [blood letting] meme, and these include a [wave/tidal_wave] of [job loss] within [banks]. This area is also curiously involved with [visible] examples of people who [abandon] their [positions] as the [banks fail], and those who [stubbornly maintain attendance] even though their [former employer] (the bank) has failed. This [visibility] of the [bank employees wandering aimlessly] and [locked doors] represents the second level of the [employment crash] and the beginning of the [visibility] for some of the [new populations/self_organizing- collectives] to begin to appear in global mediastream.

The [progression of loss of money/currency] which is supported by bespoke [confidence] such that a better interpretation of the whole of the aspect/attribute set might be a [progression of the loss of confidence in currency/paper_debt]. As part of the other temporal markers for this period include [officials] who [make rash promises], and [other officials] who [act as though blind, rashly running (into) obstacles and crying out]. These last are apparently within the [currencies industry] which is another name for the Federal Reserve Bank/Central Bank...which we note is *not* a bank, and therefore is very likely the 'beast' being let of its blood over the course of this Fall. There are repeated references to much [stink] in the way of [talk/verbiage (from/of) officials] which is shown as [doing/accomplishing no things/results], and indeed actually [causing/initiating inter national arguments]. In the end, at the deepest level of support for this area, the [officials] are described as being [exhausted/deflated] and [weeping] and [broken] and [energy depleted]. At this level the cross links go more heavily to the Bushista entity where they are terminating in the main in areas which are controlled by, or participate in [revolution] as a meta data layer, *and* as the actively rising {ed note: near the end of Fall}, dominant aspect/attribute set within Bushista. Apparently lots of people will be very very very p*ssed off about losing all their 'power' and 'money' and will assign blame to the Bush White House."

Again, as you read the linguistics, it's important to read the words trying to sense the 'feel' or 'texture' of what the words paint. With this continuous 'turning' of the markets, we have to confess to being less than surprised when it was reported yesterday at Citibank may be cutting as many as an additional 45,000 people from its payroll, a headline number that's sort of buried by LameStreamMedia in the USA, but which has not escaped the notice of the Chinese media group at Xinhua...

As the September 15th 0508 Part Three continues, we also get a vision of what late winter and heading into spring will 'feel' like - revolutionary change in the wake of economic failure in general and the foreclosure crisis in particular:

"This area is also described within the Markets entity as the [point/time] in which [decisions] are [taken/made] which will begin to manifest as the [new populace] entity that we have been observing forming up in modelspace. Apparently the [fuzzy revolution] will begin to emerge into [visibility] this Fall as [squatting] in [blanks/empty houses] will take on a whole new meaning, and which in turn will begin to build [new collectives/communities] within the populace. This is mostly affecting of the Populace/USofA, but some of the themes will emerge from patterns in other parts of the planet. There are images of [people/crowds (who/which) squat/seize/appropriate] [golf courses], and [canals/other water-ways/sites] where they will [construct places of food production]. In several of the more visible [squatting incidents] there will be actual [battles] with [officialdom] which are shown as [proceeding/lasting] for several months."
When reading these linguistics, it's important to realize that 1) the language always seems to err on the side of the extreme and 2) it is often not an event, per se, that is referenced, but rather the emotional reactions of the planet/population as expressed in MainStreamMedia.

An example of this was the case a while back where linguistically we saw references to a 9.5 earthquake associated with Hawaii, which has very high emotional values, but it turned out to be a rumor reported in Hawaiian media that was passed along the beach and that rumor was what was picked up because of its emotional intensity.

So, just because the language goes to falling markets, collapse of paper assets, or even a bed-ridden vice president and failed Middle East talks, and problems for the upcoming shuttle mission, none of this means these events will happen, it's just that down at the archetype level of mass consciousness measured by scanning millions of web discussion groups, this is what the language shifts imply.

The time monks continue to work on tuning of the technology. The actual beginning of the release period came a couple of days ahead of schedule (McClellan's book references on the 20th) and so with each 'hit' linguistically, a few words/phrases can be tweaked this way or that to improve the temporal accuracy of forecasts.

If you're looking for something really, really big as a 'forecast', you might want to watch the upcoming Atlantis space shuttle mission. Here, we've got loads of linguistics that seem to foretell an Apollo 13-like "Oh my God, will they make it?" kind of event, but sadly, nothing specifically actionable in the way of preventative measures. Even if we had, who would believe such a garage based effort? We won't post that whole section publicly, until the events that seem to be foreshadowed to occur over the Atlantic occur (or don't), although this gives you some sense of it:
"This last has the descriptor set of [unknown object] as a place holder or 'variable' in the programming sense of the word. The data sets are indicating, and we are predicting from them, that an 'unknown at this time' object will be [dislodged] and it will be the proximate cause of a [disastrous unfolding/process]."
Hopefully, that's just an artifact of the processing, which with more than 200 operations on millions of half page snips is to be expected. But, in a sense, the lack of minute details about the future may be a blessing. If we could say "stay off that street corner tomorrow at 2:53 PM because a bus will go out of control" the accuracy be such that mere possession of it would make some of us outright expendable, as people hungry for power will usually stop at nothing. On the other hand, seeing only the broad brush of events before they happen is useful in terms of 'bracing' for whatever comes next. The disclosures to come about some of the presidential wannabe's is another area to be watching. January-ish.

To return to our economic focus, the problems of the dollar (from ALTA 0708 Part 0, 10/21/2007) continue to center on the troubled Buck:
"The longer term value sets remaining from ALTA series 0508 continued to accrue supporting sets under the [millions of small particles]. It now appears that while there are certainly [housing] related inferences within the data set, the *more* likely interpretation is now for either [dollars] or [credit cards]. There are several large sub sets supporting both aspects within the [millions of small particles] new accretions. These data sets of [credit cards] and [dollars] are perhaps *both* legitimately represented. The interpretation of both would forecast a [fall default] wave on credit cards, and this would come in conjunction with a huge [repatriation] wave of [dollars] back to the [usofa]. How this [repatriation] might occur is less clearly described. There are hints that a [complete/total] [abandonment] of [us treasury] and other paper debt instruments would in effect be [repatriation] of [dollars], and would certainly be in the [millions] levels. Further there are
also pointers toward a [forced purchase] which involves [metals/commodities] and another which involves [property] of an unknown type. In both cases these are seen as [repatriating] [millions] of [dollars] back into the system.

There are recent accretions from the immediacy values of 0708 which also are going to the idea of [millions of dollars] [returning home]. This is cross linked internally with 2/two aspect sets of interest. The first these is terminating in [housing] and seems to be pointing to yet another wave of [foreclosures] and other [abandonment] issues which will begin to surface in late October/early November. Then in conjunction with aspect/attributes from 0508, longer term values sets, the other cross link is pointing toward a [mutiny/insurrection] which is directly held within the Markets entity. This area has very extensive cross links over to the Bushista entity, but is still holding its mass entirely within the Markets entity linguistic structure. The [mutiny/insurrection] values have a very high [visibility] sums, and therefore are expected to be covered by the global mediastream. Further, the [mutiny/insurrection] is apparently to surface as we move into the release period
after November 22. In this case we note that the Markets entity is forecasting that the [mutiny] will [topple/fall] the [markets] in December of this year. An additional and possible interpretation for the [mutiny] area also includes [retreat]. The support for this area includes [under/pressured by] and [disparate/separated forces]. There are also [iraq] values directly held as well as extensive cross links over to the [failure] sub set within Bushista. In either interpretation, the impact will hasten the [degradation/death] of the [usofa dollar], and have very serious [dampening] impact on the [markets] for [paper] originating in the [usofa].

Not that there won't be plenty of [drama], [heartache], and vast amounts of [increasing tensions] in the [markets] prior to December's 'release language episode'."
So on that note, I can only tell you that while we have hope that a major 'crash' kind of event won't happen in December, down in that preconscious place where people don't spend much time (it is very scary!) there are shifts in the archetypes that seem to be sending us warnings that would fit with precipitous economic decline. Is it just a Big Fear or Real Deal? We're about to find out...

Having posted this larger context of future events, it's a little repetitious for me to go through a bunch of links about what's going on today - or more accurately, what happened yesterday that's coming out the news pipes today.

Most of the broad brush of things is fairly clear, and except for filling in a specific event detail (like the precise Consumer Confidence number at 10 AM Eastern today, or existing home sales about the same time) we can just go ahead and skip ahead to our "Coping" section so we can get to the actionable work: collecting ideas for how to be ready for what may...

Some headlines this morning go to the idea that now that the market has done a 10% correction everything is set for a rally. Here's a "Duh!" for you: Although a 200 point rally would be widely reported and hyped, if it comes on the heels of a 237 point drop the previous day, it's only a dead-cat bounce on steroids, but then again, I guess you have probably already figured that...

----snip and save section ----

Coping: Great ideas
Lots of emails coming in, so here are some snips to save. Let's start with how to pass the time...
"For your upcoming coping page, something most folks won't think of, is having on hand a few decks of cards, cribbage and backgammon boards, dominoes, and non-electronic board games (you know, old-fashioned Parcheesi, Monopoly, Scrabble, etc). The stress relief and competition of playing games (or sports) can make hard times seem a little easier. Also birth control - can't think of anything more inconvenient than becoming parents in the middle of an apocalypse."
And no, playing cards for profit at someone else's expense is not a proper use of cards. Depression, or not.

Next, let's talk about fireless cooking.
"George,
I have done two published articles on “Fireless Cooking” (cooking with retained heat ), modern-day haybox cooking, bearing similarity to today’s posting about cooking rice in a pot that has had the fire turned off except that an insulated container is used to hold in the heat the pot has received. I have done fireless cooking many hundreds of times over 30 years in a variety of vessels and it works great. It is a way to potentially save a considerable amount of fuel in a crisis because most foods cook with no additional heat input beyond the point where boiling is achieved. I

www.solarcooking.org covers “fireless cooking” and every conceivable aspect of solar cooking, too, for those who might want to build their own solar cooker from scratch for a couple dollars. This is a huge website.

www.thermos.com carries Nissan vacuum products and they make the “Cook and Carry System” Fireless Cooker which I’ve personally used for 15 years. It is tremendously efficient and compact; has a 5 quart capacity. They had 4 sizes at one time but now just sell the one at $125. Their vacuum technology is head-and-shoulders the best in my testing. Their wide-mouthed thermos bottles make the best fireless cookers of this sort esp. where a portable unit is desired. Just pour in the boiling hot ingredients, seal it up and give it 2 to 2-1/2 hours for most foods (beans take longer and may benefit from a reheat.)

Another thing Aprovecho (www.aprovecho.org) has done work on is the “Rocket Stove”, a small cook stove that uses ridiculously small amounts of wood to cook a family’s food. See 40 pp. tech paper off their home page that also has a section on “Fireless Cooking”.

A lot of the best technology in the above areas is directed to Third World countries but it would behoove us to pay attention while the internet is readily available.
The commercially-produced “Zipp Stove” ( a wood-burning camping stove in two sizes from www.zzstove.com ) accomplishes a similar feat for a few bucks but the smaller unit requires a battery to power its draft fan. But I would still recommend knowing how to make and use a Rocket Stove if I lived where fuel might be an issue, which may be everywhere with the eco-nazis on the loose.
Another reader has thoughts about this, too:
The item about cooking rice in a pot (heat off) reminded me of "Thermos cooking". In short, you put whatever you're cooking in a pot, add water, and bring to a boil. Then pour it all into a vacuum insulated bottle. In a few hours your meal is ready. I tried it several years ago and it works great. For more info see: http://www.homestead.com/peaceandcarrots/Thermoscookinglinks.html
Home Stocking:
"Have your readers look at Sprouts... I've been buying the following in bulk.
http://www.wheatgrasskits.com/sprouting/5_part_salad_mix.htm 5 part salad mix Crunchy lentil fest and many others for variety
Then Spirulina, Grits, multi-grain cereal, Rice and seeds.
I have Chickens and Rabbits and then guns for protection..
Its funny how just about everyone at my work say that I can't stock pile enough for all of them and I just kindly remind them that I stock for my family and a select few and then bullets for the rest... They think I'm joking..."
And a question:
"I looked at the site about the 100 things that go missing first from a Sarajavo survivor.... Excellent reference list but #14 and #15 are missing.
Wonder what they were? They were near the top of the listings too."
Hmmm...haven't had time to look yet.... more tomorrow...

--- end of snip and save section ----

An email of note

Consider the following strained systems:

Electrical Grid

Those of us who live in the NE or southern Canada remember the
blackouts of 2003. All caused by a couple of trees in my lovely home
state. There are multiple articles available on how we barely have
enough generation capabilities now and things are going to grow a lot
worse by 2020.

http://www.eei. org/industry_ issues/industry_ overview_ and_statistics/ in
dustry_statistics/ index.htm

http://www.utilitie sproject. com/documents. asp?grID= 111&d_ID=3237

And from the CFR (nobody freak out)

http://www.cfr. org/publication/ 12866/united_ states_future_ need_for_ pow
er_and_energy. html

Housing Bubble

Many experts suspect that the building boom and home refinancing
represent the only real growth in the US since 2000. So the
implications of this are bigger than normal. If it's over what's
next? Inflation and recession.

http://thehousingbubbleblog. com/

http://moneycentral .msn.com/ content/P149596. asp

Personal and National Debt (includes currency)

Basically, many Americans and our Nation are bankrupt by GAAP
(generally accepted accounting principles) standards. The dollar is
doomed.

http://www.brillig.com/debt_ clock/

http://www.whatreal lyhappened.com/ARTICLE2/ doodoo.html

http://mwhodges. home.att. net/nat-debt/ debt-nat- a.htm

http://www.wsws. org/articles/ 2004/jan2004/ debt-j15. shtml

http://www.msnbc. msn.com/id/ 11098797/

http://www.wnd. com/news/ article.asp? ARTICLE_ID= 53311

Oil/ Natural Gas

The favorite of this board. Not only includes finding and producing
oil but refining it.


************ *


Anyone can google anything and post a bunch of links. I mean cell
phones, teflon cookware, etc. (and I apologize if I have touched on
anyone's favorte tin foil hat subject) will all kill us all soon.
What is interesting to me about this doomsday list is that with the
exception of peak oil all the statements and issues are facts. When
(very seldom) these issues are raised no one disputes the reality of
the situation. The only "solutions" that are offered are the tired
old lines of we'll grow our way out of it, technology will save us,
etc. Sometimes all that is offer are platitudes like:

"Oh it isn't really all that bad"

or

"Things have always worked out"

My point in this list is to support the need to prepare. I must admit
that at heart I am an old fashioned guy who likes old ways and splits
his wood by hand just to do it. That being said I am an engineer ho
loves technology (insert fast cars here) who while he likes the old
ways would prefer to keep it as a hobby and not return to the 1800's
or stone age. But unfortunately, facing the multitude of issues we
have, I find it likely that things are going to get very ugly sooner
rather than later.

Population

Most industrialized societies, excluding immigration are near zero
population growth. Some are in slight decline. A German colleague of
mine told me that he gets a check from the government because he has
kids and more kids means more Euros.

Global warming

I am very ambiguous on this one. When I was a child the same
climatologists were telling us the ice age was coming and we were all
going to freeze to death. I am very leery of the $ aspects of the
debate and am appalled that one side wants to cut off all debate and
professionally destroy anyone who questions their religion...errrr I
mean science. That being said there is no doubt that pollution, in
general, needs to be addressed. Al Gore has made himself the poster
boy for this and frankly if I owned a McDonald's I do not think I'd
let him run it. He is cut from the same cloth as the rest of the
current band of politicians and therefore I take everything he says
with the same credence I'd give an internet rumor. I see hope in this
area too. Lake Erie, while not perfect, in unquestionably better than
it was when I was a child and the Cuyahoga River hasn't caught fire
lately.

Habitat Destruction

Another item that would be addressed by ending population growth. We
must save wild areas and there are many of us who do want to live
where we can touch our neighbors house. I cannot imagine living in a
world without wild areas but I think enough people feel that way and
that makes a little room for hope.

All of that being said I do not see much room for hope right now. I
outlined in another post all the things I see as currently screwed
up. I wish peak oil was the only problem we faced. We all need to
prepare as much as possible.