Comments on: Breaking our oil addiction

By: micky2

micky2 — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 23:02:09 +0000

Talk about fear mongering, jeeze.

By: micky2

micky2 — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 22:54:02 +0000

Decline of the American Empire.
Gerbal warming will be the end of us all.

Talk about changing thinking ?
You make it sound like the whole country is gonna take a dump in unison

Go have another drink man.

By: Brian

Brian — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 22:47:08 +0000

Jersey

A year ago I could agree with you on healthcare…but today I pay hardly anything at all for very good healthcare…including prescriptions etc…I am not alone in the enjoyment of such benefits…we must not throw the baby out with the bathwater in this case…

Iraq: A majority of Americans don’t wish to just leave…they may not be happy about being there…but they do not want a wholesale slaughter to occur once we’ve left…

By: Jersey McJones

Jersey McJones — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 13:03:35 +0000

Hey, I’m fine (though I am hungover…). I worry about our future. We are waaaaaay behind in upgrading all of our institutional and physical infrastructures. We may well be looking at the final decline of the American empire if we don’t change the way we think about things.

JMJ

By: micky2

micky2 — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 01:27:25 +0000

We’re not screwed jersey.
American ingenuity , resourcefulness and creativity have always gotten us through far worse scenarios.
But if you think like that, then you truly are screwed.
Now go out, paint a part of your body green with a caption that says ” kiss me I’m Irish” and gave a good night

By: Jersey McJones

Jersey McJones — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 23:58:37 +0000

Happy Patty’s Day!!!

It’s fitting on this day that we’re all apparently Irish! I guess if you drink enough green beer, anything is possible and anyone can get along!

(God, I miss NYC on St Pats Day…)

Deacon, it seems we’re all in agreement. I think most mainstream “lib, con, Dem, Rep, Liber, Green” voters and everyone else agree with these positions. Regardless of of the party in power, though, the status quo continues. We are in an evolutionary quagmire as a people and a nation. We’re living in the past. We’re spending too much time and energy fighting each other over silliness and not paying enough attention to what really matters. Today’s subject really, really, really matters.

Most people have about had it with the healthcare sector. It’s a failure. You can disagree with that, but most people will be against you to one extent or another. Most people think the war in Iraq is an acceptable collateral loss. They’d rather just end it. Again, you can disagree, but you’d be in the minority. It’s okay to be in the minority in and of itself. As long as you mean well and have a voice.

But when it comes to oil, to our energy dependence, to the oil trade, petro-dollars, the and economic impacts, to the now proven implicit wars, almost everyone agrees: We need infrastructural upgrades, period. We need to be more self-reliant. We always extol the virtues of accountability, why aren’t we upgrading our infrastructure? It’s like a father who never fixes a thing in the house. It’s irresponsible.

For example…

I was watching the news the other day showing the recent tornado damage in Atlanta. I saw a telephone pole broken in half, laying behind some reporter, wires snapped off all over the place… What century is this?

And now that sattellites have shown a huge vulnerability (re: recent space-race news), we need a secure wire infrastructure. Water, power, wires, roads, tracks, airports: That’s what we need now. We’re falling behind. It’s time to catch up and apply Keynes to more than just war. Keynes theory doesn’t always work, but when it does it does it well. When it comes to utility, there’s no denying that’s where Keynes works. We need to be more utilitous. I’m more than willing to pay for that. I think we all are - as long as it’s vetted and economic.

Hmmm…

Well, I guess we’re screwed.
JMJ

By: micky2

micky2 — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 23:33:01 +0000

Its a conspiracy.

By: Eagle 6

Eagle 6 — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 23:24:14 +0000

Wow! left, right, centrist, male and female agreeing to work toward a common good…just like real citizens of a great, free country.

By: deaconblue

deaconblue — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 22:30:26 +0000

Ack! I find myself agreeing with Jersey on this. Of course, we will need to do a massive infrastructure upgrade to achieve a true national grid (and not the rip-off company). Our current high tension lines and such are too inefficient to properly reach this goal. We lose too much in degredation over long distances. It would also help if we could get a unified policy of energy sales and sources. We in NY can’t buy nuclear power for example, even though we produce plenty (it gets sold cheaply to CT, ONT, OH, NJ, PA. QUE instead). It also means converting existing homes from fuel oil and electric heat, to natural gas or propane. We can also build wind farms, as lng as some nimrod doesn’t sue because it will disturb his view 8 days a year.

By: Jersey McJones

Jersey McJones — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 18:56:34 +0000

One thing we must develope is a national power grid. The grids we have now are outdated, cumbersome, insecure, and inefficient. With a national grid we could move energy from low-use regions to high-use regions seemlessly. Solar power from the Southwest could be imported to the Northeast in the summertime. Geothermal power in the Rockies could be exported to the Southeast in the winter, and so on. This would build efficiency and security just as Eisenhower’s highway programs did for us in the 50’s.

JMJ