17-04-2009, 09:02 AM
Magda
I've been an avid student of 'Peak oil' and its ramifications for maybe 5-6 years now - member of ASPO and 'The Energy Round Table' etc. Like Monbiot, I am mystified by the determination of governments the world over to avoid debate on the issue. Or rather, pace the central operating principle of all governments these days - deception - I think I have come to understand exactly why.
The concept of 'Peak Oil' really ought not to be controversial at all in that, if a resource is finite and it's consumption rate expands every year, there will come a time when it can no longer expand. The only questions should be timing it and the epoch-defining implications of it; but they are questions that, in spite of having access to the very best information available, governments steadfastly refuse to engage with. In fact they do their level best to obfuscate.
It is a classic illustration of Claud Cockburn's dictum 'Never believe anything until it has been officially denied'. And the reason? In a nutshell - because it changes everything. Which places it at the heart of The Great Geo-political Game, but as the elephant in the living room so-to-speak. It cannot be acknowledged lest the West's entire foreign policy and military adventures over the past 40 years or so be revealed for what they undoubtedly are: viz constant determined manoeuvring to gain and retain control over what is left of the worlds rapidly depleting oil and gas endowment. Not to mention the looming end of pretty much everything that has come to define our happy motoring, flying, suburban lifestyle.
I've been an avid student of 'Peak oil' and its ramifications for maybe 5-6 years now - member of ASPO and 'The Energy Round Table' etc. Like Monbiot, I am mystified by the determination of governments the world over to avoid debate on the issue. Or rather, pace the central operating principle of all governments these days - deception - I think I have come to understand exactly why.
The concept of 'Peak Oil' really ought not to be controversial at all in that, if a resource is finite and it's consumption rate expands every year, there will come a time when it can no longer expand. The only questions should be timing it and the epoch-defining implications of it; but they are questions that, in spite of having access to the very best information available, governments steadfastly refuse to engage with. In fact they do their level best to obfuscate.
It is a classic illustration of Claud Cockburn's dictum 'Never believe anything until it has been officially denied'. And the reason? In a nutshell - because it changes everything. Which places it at the heart of The Great Geo-political Game, but as the elephant in the living room so-to-speak. It cannot be acknowledged lest the West's entire foreign policy and military adventures over the past 40 years or so be revealed for what they undoubtedly are: viz constant determined manoeuvring to gain and retain control over what is left of the worlds rapidly depleting oil and gas endowment. Not to mention the looming end of pretty much everything that has come to define our happy motoring, flying, suburban lifestyle.
Peter Presland
".....there is something far worse than Nazism, and that is the hubris of the Anglo-American fraternities, whose routine is to incite indigenous monsters to war, and steer the pandemonium to further their imperial aims"
Guido Preparata. Preface to 'Conjuring Hitler'[size=12][size=12]
"Never believe anything until it has been officially denied"
Claud Cockburn
[/SIZE][/SIZE]
".....there is something far worse than Nazism, and that is the hubris of the Anglo-American fraternities, whose routine is to incite indigenous monsters to war, and steer the pandemonium to further their imperial aims"
Guido Preparata. Preface to 'Conjuring Hitler'[size=12][size=12]
"Never believe anything until it has been officially denied"
Claud Cockburn
[/SIZE][/SIZE]