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Moving industrialization offshore can look like a good idea at first. But as fossil fuel energy supplies deplete, this strategy works less well. Countries doing the mining and manufacturing may be less interested in trading. Also, the broken supply lines of 2020 and 2021 showed that transferring major industries offshore could lead to empty shelves in stores, plus unhappy customers.
The United States started moving industry offshore in 1974 (Figure 1) in response to spiking oil prices in 1973-1974 (Figure 2).
Industry is based on the use of fossil fuels. Electricity also plays a role, but it is more like the icing on the cake than the basis of industrial production. Industry is polluting in many ways, so it was an “easy sell” to move industry offshore. But now the United States is realizing that it needs to re-industrialize. At the same time, we are being told about the need to transition the entire economy to electricity to prevent climate change.
In this post, I will try to explain the situation–how fossil fuel prices have spiked many times, including 1973-1974 (oil) and more recently (coal in 2022). I will also discuss the key role fossil fuels play. Because of the key role of fossil fuels, a reduction in per-capita fossil fuel consumption likely leads to a transition to fewer goods and services, on average, per person. A transition to all electricity does not seem to be feasible. Instead, we seem to be headed for increased geopolitical conflict and the possibility of a financial crash seems greater.
[1] When fossil fuel supplies become constrained, prices tend to spike to high levels, and then fall back again.
Economists and energy analysts have tended to assume that fossil fuel prices would rise to very high levels, allowing extraction of huge amounts of difficult-to-extract fossil fuels. For example, the International Energy Agency (IEA) in the past has shown forecasts of future oil production assuming that inflation-adjusted oil prices will rise to $300 per barrel.
Instead of rising to a very high level, fossil fuel prices tend to spike because there is a two-way contest between the price the consumers can afford and the price the sellers need to keep reinvesting in new fields to keep fossil fuel supplies increasing. Prices oscillate back and forth, with neither buyers nor sellers finding themselves very happy with the situation. The current price of the benchmark, Brent oil, is $81.
[2] Historical data shows spiking oil and coal prices.
When world oil prices started to spike in the 1973-1974 period, the US started to move its industrial production offshore (Figure 1). The very low inflation-adjusted prices that prevailed up until 1972 no longer held. Manufacturing costs climbed higher. Consumers wanted smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicles, and such cars were already being manufactured both in Europe and in Japan. Importing these cars made sense.
More recently, coal prices have begun to spike. Coal prices vary by location, but the general patterns are similar for the types of coal shown.
Before China joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, coal prices tended to be below $50 per ton (figure 3). At that price, coal was a very inexpensive fuel for making steel and concrete, and for many other industrial uses.
After China joined the WTO, China’s coal consumption soared (Figure 4), allowing it to industrialize. Figure 3 shows that the extra demand initially pushed coal prices up a little. By 2022, coal prices had soared. At present, coal prices are part-way back down, perhaps partly because higher interest rates are dampening world demand for coal.
Natural gas prices also soared in 2022, at the same time as coal prices. Both coal and natural gas are fuels that are burned to produce electricity. When the coal supply is constrained, utilities will try to purchase more electricity produced by burning natural gas. However, it is difficult to store much natural gas for future use. Thus, a shortage of internationally traded coal can simultaneously lead to a shortage of internationally traded natural gas.
Having oil, coal, and natural gas prices spiking at the same time leads to inflation and to many unhappy citizens.
[3] The 1997 Kyoto Protocol encouraged the trend toward moving industry to lower-cost countries.
In Figure 1, I show a dotted line at 1997. At that time, an international treaty stating that the participating countries would limit their own CO2 emissions attracted a lot of attention. An easy way to limit CO2 emissions was by moving industry overseas. Even though the US did not sign the treaty until later, the treaty gave the US a reason to move industry overseas. We can see from Figure 1 that US industrialization, as measured by the energy per capita required to industrialize, began to fall even more rapidly after 1997.
[4] There were many reasons besides the Kyoto Protocol why Advanced Economies would want to move industry overseas.
There were many reasons to move industry overseas besides spiking oil prices and concern over CO2 levels. With such a change, customers in the US (and European countries making a similar change) gained access to lower-cost goods and services. With the money the customers could save, they were able to buy more discretionary goods and services, which helped to ramp up local economies.
Also, industry tends to be polluting. Smog tends to be problem if coal is burned, or if diesel with high sulfur content is burned. Mining tends to produce a lot of toxic waste. Moving this pollution offshore to poorer countries would solve the pollution problem without the high cost of attempting to capture this pollution and properly store it.
Furthermore, business-owners in the United States could sense the opportunity to grow to be truly international in size if they moved much of their industry overseas.
[5] All the globalization and moving of industry overseas had a downside: more wage and wealth disparity.
In a matter of a few years, the economy changed to provide fewer high-paying factory jobs in the United States. Increasingly, those without advanced education found it difficult to provide an adequate living for their families. The high incomes were disproportionately going to highly educated workers and the owners of capital goods (Figure 5).
[6] Part of what caused the growing wage and wealth disparities in Figure 5 was the growing industrialization of China (Figure 6).
China, with its growing industrialization, could outcompete whole industries, such as furniture-making and garment-making, leaving US workers to find lower-paid jobs in the service sector. Similar outcomes unfolded in the EU and Japan, as industrialization started moving to different parts of the world.
[7] The indirect impact of the Kyoto Protocol was to move CO2 emissions slightly away from the Advanced Nations. Overall, CO2 emissions rose.
Anyone who expected that the 1997 Kyoto Protocol would reduce world CO2 emissions would have been disappointed.
[8] The direct use of fossil fuels plays a far more important role in the economy than we have ever been taught.
Thanks to the direct use of fossil fuels, the world can have paved roads, bridges made of steel, and electricity transmission lines. It can have concrete. It can have pharmaceutical products, herbicides, and insecticides. Many of these benefits come from the chemical properties of fossil fuels. Electricity, by itself, could never provide these products since it has been stripped of the chemical benefits of fossil fuels. Electricity is also difficult to store.
With the benefit of fossil fuels, the world can also have high-quality steel, with precisely the composition desired by those making it. With only electricity, it is possible to use electric arc furnaces to recycle used steel, but such steel is limited both in quantity and quality. US production of steel amounts to 5% of world supply (primarily using electric arc furnaces), while China’s production (mostly using coal) amounts to 50% of world supply.
I highly recommend reading the article, Trapped in the Iron Age, by Kris De Decker. He explains that the world uses an enormous amount of steel, but most of it is hidden in places we can’t see. Today, with the US’s limited steel-making capability, the US needs to import most of its steel, including steel pipes from China to drill its oil wells. We cannot see how dependent we have become on other countries for our basic steel needs.
China and India have both based their recent growth primarily on rising coal consumption. This is what has kept world CO2 emissions high. The US is now exporting coal to these countries.
[9] Citizens of Advanced Economies are easily confused about the importance of fossil fuel use because they have never been taught about the subject and because their worldview is distorted by the narrow view they see from within their homes and offices.
Figure 8 shows that the sector with the highest share of electricity use is the commercial sector. This includes uses such as stores, offices, and hospitals. The most visible energy use is lighting and operating computers, which gives the perception that electricity is the greatest energy use. But these businesses also need to be heated, and heat is often produced by burning natural gas directly. Businesses also need back-up for their electrical systems. Such back-up is typically provided by diesel-powered generators.
Residential usage is similar. It is easy to see the use of electricity, but heat is generally needed during winter. This is often provided by natural gas or propane. Natural gas is also often used in hot water heaters, stoves, and clothes dryers. Occasionally, wood is used to heat homes; this would go into the non-electricity portion, as well.
The thing that most people do not realize is that industrial use and transportation use are extremely large sectors of the economy (Figure 9), and these sectors are very low consumers of electricity (Figure 8). Also, if the US and Europe were to re-industrialize to produce more of our manufactured goods, our industrial sectors would need to be much larger than they are today.
In recent years, electrical consumption as a percentage of total energy consumption for the industrial sector has averaged about 13% of the total (Figure 9). Industries typically need high heat levels; such heat can usually be achieved at lowest cost by burning fossil fuels directly. Wikipedia claims, “Electric arc steelmaking is only economical where there is plentiful, reliable electricity, with a well-developed electrical grid.” An electric grid, powered only by intermittent electricity from wind turbines and solar panels, would not qualify.
In Figure 8, electricity consumption as a percentage of total energy consumption for the US transportation sector rounds to 0%, for every year. Even the amount of biomass (ethanol and biodiesel) used by the transportation sector doesn’t have much of an impact, as shown in Figure 10.
A major issue is that transportation is a broad sector, including trucks, trains, planes, and boats, in addition to private passenger autos. Also, I expect that the only electricity that would be considered in the transportation energy calculation would be electricity purchased from an away-from-home charging facility. Electricity used when charging at home would likely be part of residential electricity consumption.
[9] The narrative saying that we can transition to an electricity-only economy, powered by intermittent wind and solar electricity, has major holes in it.
One major issue is that the pricing of wind and solar tends to drive out other electricity providers, particularly nuclear. Intermittent wind and solar are given “priority” when they are available. This leads to very low or negative prices for other electricity providers. Nuclear is particularly affected because it cannot ramp up and down, in response to prices that are far below its cost of production.
Nuclear is a far more stable source of electricity than either wind or solar, and it is also a low-carbon source. As a result, economies end up worse off, in terms of electricity supply per capita, and in stability of available supply, when wind and solar are added.
Another issue is that wind turbines and solar panels are made with fossil fuels and repaired using fossil fuels. Without fossil fuels, we cannot maintain electricity transmission lines and roads. Thus, wind turbines and solar panels are as much a part of the fossil fuel system as hydroelectric electricity and electricity made from coal or natural gas.
Also, as discussed above, only a small share of the economy is today operated using electricity. The IEA says that 20% of 2023 world energy supply comes from electricity. The amounts I calculated as “Overall” in Figure 8 indicate an electricity share of 18%, which is a bit less than the IEA is indicating for the world. Figure 8 shows an early upward trend in this ratio, but no upward trend since 2012. Fossil fuels are being used today because they have chemical characteristics that are needed or because they provide the energy services required in a less expensive manner than electricity.
Even in the early days of the Industrial Revolution, wind and waterpower provided only a small portion of the total energy supply. Coal provided the heat energy that both industry and residences needed, inexpensively. Wind and waterpower were not well adapted to providing heat energy when needed.
If we are short of inexpensive-to-extract fossil fuels, relative to today’s large population, we certainly could use some new inexpensive source of stable electricity supply. But this would not solve all our energy problems–we would still need a substantial amount of fossil fuel supplies to grow our food and keep our roads repaired. But if a new type of electricity production could reduce the demand for fossil fuels, it would make a larger quantity of fossil fuels available for other purposes.
[10] Practically everyone would like a happily-ever-after ending, so it is easy for politicians, educators, and the news media to put together overly optimistic versions of the future.
The narrative that CO2 is the world’s biggest enemy, so we need to move quickly away from fossil fuels, has received a great deal of publicity recently, but it is problematic from two different points of view:
(a) The feasibility of moving away from fossil fuels without killing off a very major portion of the world’s population seems to be virtually zero. The world economy is a dissipative structure in physics terms. It needs energy of the right kinds to “dissipate,” just as humans are dissipative structures and need food to dissipate (digest). Humans cannot live on lettuce alone, or practically any other foodstuff by itself. We need a “portfolio” of foods, adapted to our bodies’ needs. The economy is similar. It cannot operate only on electricity, any more than humans can live only on high-priced icing for cakes.
(b) The narrative about the importance of CO2 emissions with respect to climate change is quite possibly exaggerated. There are many other things that would seem to be at least as likely to cause short-term shifts in temperatures:
- Lack of global dimming caused by less coal dust and reduced sulfur compounds in the atmosphere; in other words, reducing smog tends to raise temperatures.
- Small changes in the Earth’s orbit
- Changes in solar activity
- Changes related to volcanic eruptions
- Changes related to shifts in the magnetic north and south poles
Politicians, educators, and the news media would all like a narrative that can explain the need for moving away from fossil fuels, rather than admit that “our easy to extract fossil fuel supply is running out.” The climate change narrative has been an easy approach to highlight, since clearly the climate is changing. It also provides the view that somehow we will be able to fix the problem if we take it seriously enough.
[11] Today, we are in a period of conflict among nations, indirectly related to not having access to enough fossil fuels for a world population of 8 billion. There is also a significant chance of financial collapse.
In my opinion, today’s world is a little like the “Roaring 20s” that came shortly before a major stock market crash in 1929 and the Great Depression of the 1930s. After the Great Depression, the world entered World War II. There is huge wage and wealth disparity; energy supplies per capita are stretched.
Today, NATO and Russia are fighting a proxy war in Ukraine. Russia is a major fossil fuel producer; it would like to be paid more for the energy products it sells. Russia could perhaps get better prices by selling oil and other energy products to Asian customers instead of its current customer mix. At the same time, the US claims primary leadership (hegemony) in the world but, in fact, it needs to import many goods from overseas. It even needs supply lines from around the world for weapons being sent to Ukraine. The Ukraine conflict is not going well for the US.
I do not know how this will work out. I am hoping that there will not be a World War III, in the same way that there was a World War II. All countries are terribly dependent on each other, even though there are not enough fossil fuels to go around. Perhaps countries will try to sabotage one another, using modern techniques, such as cyber warfare.
I think that there is a substantial chance of a major financial collapse in the next few years. The level of debt is very high now. A major recession, with lots of collapsing debt, seems to be a strong possibility.
[12] A presentation I recently gave to a group of actuaries that touches on several of these issues, plus others.
My presentation can be found at this link: Beware: The Economy Is Beginning to Shrink
Ralph Townsend, an American diplomat stationed in China, wrote Ways that are Dark, to try to talk Franklin D Roosevelt’s govt out of allying with China.
Not surprisingly that book was buried, although it is in public domain now for those who want to read about it.
In one of the passages he wrote about the streets of Shanghai, where every winter night (it sometimes snow there in winter) there would be a dozen deaths near any given rich man’s house, and nobody , including the servants, not giving a shit about these wretches.
It was like that in Europe just 100 years ago before that point – the Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Andersen was published on 1846.
The police have seen everything. They have no sympathy or emotions; in some sense they have evolved into a different species.
When Civilization returns to its true form, it will be bleak, merciless, and not that free. However, the survivors will be too busy to stay alive to really care too much about freedom, love or emotions.
There are really no pieces of literature from around St Augustine till around 1000s. Very few contemporary account of Charlemagne exist. In fact what we know about him mostly comes from the Song of Roland, written around the 12th century, and its associate legends, and the only contemporary account seems to be a report of a student having a field trip to Aachen during what was supposed to be Charlemagne’s time.
The world will revert to that age.
You may be on the mark with this comment Klum. History may go backward and that will be terrible for most people. Hopefully civilization does carry on like it did in the past difficult times for common people. I suppose if your wish comes true, most people will be destitute. You and yours too perhaps? We can only hope.
About 97% of the people will live like that
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbgAscHeRcE
And that is the time when civilization grew fastest.
I have the intelligence and street smarts to do better than others so I am not really worried about myself.
if you don’t do well, you will be dead within a few decades anyway.
yes, no need to worry.
The world never left that ability to not see the dying match girl. The class hierarchy of society never goes away. The change is it will get much closer and in our face.
The police in USA have ceased to be humans. They will gladly kill any number of people at will, without thinking for a nanosecond.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/may/19/colombia-paramilitary-salvatore-mancuso-auc-death-squads
Of course CIA trained these paramilitary of Columbia.
Right wing forces, hired by those who have a stake in civilization, will cleanse huge portions of places where the poor and the immigrants reside, with glee since they will share a bit of the spoils.
Wrong. Plenty of good cops who are good humans. Some aholes.
Right now the trouble is there is not enough cops. Police departments are dangerously understaffed.
This has a couple results. Police can move to jobs where they like. They can move to a wealthy suburban city and make $150k if they like. What they usually like to do is move somewhere rural that’s not all that dangerous but it’s a dangerous job period. The second thing is they make good money once they have some time in.
The job makes them aggressive and suspicious. If they let their guard down they get hurt sooner or later. So they learn to never let their guard down except when they are sure it is safe.
They are humans
Humans have flaws.
Utter twattle.
Policing is not a dangerous job.
Timber felling is a dangerous job, heavy construction is a dangerous job, pulling crab pots in northern waters is a dangerous job.
Policing is a job that utter pussies take because of low IQ and their for need the backing of the state to bolster their damn schoolyard cowardice.
I have yet to meet a single cop (and I have run in to countless of the scumbags) who could carry the water of a single actual man in the old mold.
When ever western po po run into a really angry man armed appropriately they run like women and call in heavy armor….because, you know,….courage lmao.
May they line the streets of the future sat atop their hardened poles like grasshoppers strung on green twigs for roasting.
I have worked in Alaska. I have suffered injury in construction. In my youth worked in the woods. Those are tough jobs. Dangerous yes. Never set crab pots.
There was a young woman police officer who got shot in my town last year. It was a juvenile and she hesitated. It cost her. He had already shot someone else. She survived. Her thigh bone was shattered into 30 pieces.
I had met her some years before in an association I had with the criminal justice system. She was bright and clear. Local girl. I honor her and the people who serve with her. They are decent folk.
I have known many an outlaw. Most are obsessed with is how tough they are. They try to behave but they can’t. They are humans and have human good qualities and flaws. They seem to keep on returning to this standard they set for how tough they are. Yes they are plenty tough. And just as you mention, if it is appropriate to take them down no chances are taken. They confirm how tough they are by that happening.
By the standards of the outlaw that young women police officer is to be ridiculed. Certainly not very tough. Hesitated taking the life of a 16 year old and took three bullets. Most outlaws do not value order.They don’t understand that there is more to life than toughness. There is a restless spirit in them. No one is ever surprised at their fate even as who and what they were is remembered and honored. Most wouldn’t have it any other way. They pass like all humans. Dust in the wind.
A single rabbit getting in can be a disaster. Pack rats are worse. They can climb anything. They move over a hardware clothe fence at will.
Large language models and a cubic mile of Pt will save us.
Even if we had that, which we don’t, all the gains will be monopolized by those who own such devices.
I have said that despite of all the riches of the New World the Spanish crown possessed, the people’s lives remained kinda medieval well into the 20th century, and land reform in Andalusia did not end until, I am not kidding, 2001. That is the 21st century.
With energetic and financial troubles to come, we should expect sudden ruptures, crashes to a lower level of complexity. People are used to stable supply lines and the state to manage all risks. When internet and TV malefunction they fall into depression.
People don’t even have the equipment to support themselves, neither books how to do things, nor emergency stock or non-electric tools not to mention shovel and seeds.
I am afraid, it will be much worse, especially in the large cities. I suppose, in major crashes, blackout and fails, people will hide in bed, especially when it is cold, and wait.
If you have been in a management position at some point of your life, you might have realized, that people cannot solve problems you have not solved before,
even with pressure.
I read in some eugenic texts, not my conviction, I read a lot, that some assume an “ice-age gene”, which leads to a social behaviour, that is quite aggressive against people outside the group, and can keep the family together – next to the ability to meet challenges. If that is true, I guess these people will start a different organisation of society.
Looking at the resources we have, livestock is the most important, because it can convert grasses into fat. Grasses grow even in lowlight and cold. Gardening is great for healthy supplies, be it herbs and berries, but it is hard to grow calories. That might be the reason for our historically unique complex system.
“Undeveloped” countries with a high grade of self-sufficiency, will have an advantage.
Good insights. Potatoes grow easy. Potato is the lowest mark of civilization but it’s a mark of civilization.
Where I live, we have had problems with something (rabbits, deer , something else) eating the tops of sweet potato plants. We needed to put mesh over them to grow them.
“In one of the passages he wrote about the streets of Shanghai, where every winter night (it sometimes snow there in winter) there would be a dozen deaths near any given rich man’s house, and nobody , including the servants, not giving a shit about these wretches.”
Rich people being indifferent to human suffering is not as a rare as you think. One of the major reasons for why African countries are undeveloped is because the groups in power only do things for their kin-group. Large portions of sub-Saharan Africa have not changed much since the fifteenth century. Pictures of building built by the Chinese and humanitarian work done by NGOs give the false impression that African attitudes towards the poor are modernized along with their buildings. I don’t think this is true.
For those who complain LLMs are not enough Jenson Huang’s tech talk in Taiwan.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKXDVsWZmUU
a much larger audience than he get in silicon valley
He is being floated to put Chinese money into the market.
A two hour talk, that was streamed earlier today.
Seems to include AI generated materials, besides NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang’s talk. Maybe someone else can summarize what he has to say, other than “AI will save the world.”
The great Jay Hanson once said it is NOT a shortage of resources.
He said it was a Longage of people.
Trump has said that he will make the police immune from prosecution, while the Dems are increasing the police forces by 100,000.
When there is a longage of people, the ones holding stake on civilization will decide how to alleviate the longage of two legged animals.
I have talked to some people, and I know how they are fed up with the ‘consumers’. With the advance of AI making most easier office jobs redundant, there will be even a greater longage of people.
Those who hold stakes in society are fed up about those who need help, and would rather not be bothering with that. They have no sympathy, no compassion and no concern over the poor, the unnecessary and so forth, whatsoever.
With an immunity granted by Trump or someone in his vein, militarized police will shoot up any protestors, just like the Egyptian military who cleaned up al-Tahrir square which was full of protestors in any given time.
Those who hold a stake in civilization would rather NOT share it with anyone else, and there are not enough to share, so sufficient measures will be taken to make sure their share is not threatened.
No need to kill just sterilize.
Children of Men is a work exploring that topic.
Sterilization won’t work, since the survivors, now having nothing more to look for, will thoroughly thrash whatever they can touch.
A real life zombie apocalypse.
They will need to be put in a camp like Gaza or they will need to be killed.
I remember a professor of mine mentioning that disappointed rising expectations make people very unhappy and galvanized for retribution. She was Jewish and I thought that was part of what she was referring too. Weimar, depression, then off to war we go and murder our enemies! You can see why such effort is made to make the future seem bright and unlimited like in Star Trek. Peoples mood can get rather dark if there is little hope for the future. Modern people will not accept destitution easily. They may have to.
Financial troubles will also affect rich people. Limitless brutality has always to be expected, it can break out any time. But brutality alone does not create functional systems. Military groups have to be fed. The main problem of peakoil is petrochemical agriculture and logistics. Any new structure need huge investment, knowledge and can feed drastically less people – unless we manage a “soft” transition. The Great Reset invests our surplus into more complexity, that is prone to fail.
Any crash to lower complexity means there is no surplus. Even if you expect a military force to enslave people to take over the work of tractors, you have to invest into transport, accomodation and shovels. And it won’t be possible to feed half of the population.
It is much more efficient to establish a self-organizing system, make a land reform, let people grow their own food, and tax them. The problem is overpopulation and the unavailable knowledge.
Any zombie terror is not sustainable. I agree, it might occur, but only for a short time. With less resources, the value of humans become negative.
The challenge is not morally, it is physical. The only way out is to create new systems, that lead to food and accomodation. All other systems will discontinue, because people will die and not be able to keep them up.
A mostly peaceful stabbing
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/watch-shocking-video-shows-german-politician-stabbed-during-campaign-event-mannheim
Integration, FTW.
When things are getting worse, not better, violence seems to happen.
A USA pivot away from Europe and toward the Asia-Pacific theatre has been touted by some for some time including in the FT last week – which Europe NATO is not happy about. Europe NATO is bigging up the ‘threat’ that Russia will invade Europe and that UKR is the ‘last chance’ to stop that.
USA could not fight two major wars at the same time or in close proximity and so, if USA got into one with Russia in Europe and China then moved against USA then it would be ‘game over’ for USA and Europe would then be on its own against all-comers in a more permanent way.
China is way ahead in various military technologies now anyway and an off would likely work out badly for USA. This looks like it would be a final ‘roll of the dice’ for USA to maintain its hegemony – a Thucydides Trap. The latter postulates that a hegemon will tend to fight it out against an emergent peer.
WSJ: US actively preparing for war with China
It will start with US submarines. They will need to sink both Chinese aircraft carriers. With that done the US carrier groups can start to sink the rest of the Chinese navy while keeping the carrier groups out of range. No easy task. A Russian sub or three would definitely not be helpful. If it doesnt work and a carrier gets sunk they can unload a couple three Ohio class subs tomahawk load outs on Chinas high tech industry. Bug out and call it a day. Let the subs hunt. Taiwan will fall sooner or later. No nukes I dont think with chinas 600 ICBMs but you never know. Trade ends from that side of the world. Hopefully Venezuelan oil keeps coming. US subs stop anything coming into China by sea.China rebuilds gets hit again. Rinse repeat. Or China and Russia let’s the nukes fly. Everything will be rationed in USA. USA falls apart. China falls apart. Attrition.
Russia is a peer. They have subs. Without subs China is not a peer. We can touch them they cant touch us. Subs can strike land targets regardless of airforce navy surface. Subs can stop shipping. It could go on a long time. If Russia steps in with their subs whole different story. I think that’s likely. Nothing will happen till after the election.
China should have been building subs not aircraft carriers. Just like us.
Subs will resupply out of Japan. Basically next door. That means ordnance can flow uninterrupted. This base will be heavily defended. It will be expected they will try to move on it. They lose home court advantage. If their aircraft carriers are gone it’s not even possible without nukes. If Russia gave them Zircon different story. Not a chance of that.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Fleet_Activities_Yokosuka
Korea and Japan will not (can not) participate in a war against China . Little Kim in NK will tie them down .
You could be right. NK might be there just for that. Tokyo is awful close. Theres really no alternative if the subs are to keep marching tomahawks in in a steady stream and to continue to sink the surface ships. If it really is to be war with China NK will have to be dealt with. There is of course a big chance Kim will escalate to nukes resulting in a strategic nuclear exchange by all parties. No one has agreed to be a good loser. Au contrair everyone has agreed to be a sore loser.
Unless policy has changed?
“By the time you got to the first Bush administration, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, they came out with a national defense policy and strategic policy. What they basically said is that we’re going to have wars against what they called much weaker enemies and these have to be carried out quickly and decisively or else there will be embarrassment—a way of saying that popular reaction is going to set in. And that’s the way it’s been. It’s not pretty, but it’s some kind of constraint. “?
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2018/03/noam-chomsky-populist-groundswell-u-s-elections-future-humanity.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+NakedCapitalism+%28naked+capitalism%29
Alex and Alexander are talking about the potential Taiwan conflict, in this video.
This seems to be the WSJ article published May 27 about, talking about preparing for conflict in Taiwan, that the Daily Mail is writing about:
https://www.wsj.com/world/asia/americas-new-island-fighters-are-preparing-for-conflicta-stones-throw-from-taiwan-dd5d0fd3
The US seems to have positioned itself that it will defend Taiwan. Alexander thinks there must be secret document committing the US to defending Taiwan. The US geographically is not in a good position, because it is far away; China is close to Taiwan.
Europe is afraid that the US will have to pull back from Ukraine to do this. This would involve the US taking on China. But doing so would be crazy.
Debate in Washington is between the Anti-Russian Neocons and the Anti-China Neocons. Some are concerned that China is getting stronger. Time to attack now.
Alexander is afraid that the US will go forward both in Ukraine and Taiwan, even though the US clearly cannot pull this off. There is no way to have an open discussion about these issues. Have to become a Neocon, to be part of the “club.” Spain years ago, when it was strong, tried to take on wars in too many part of the world. It didn’t work then; can’t work now.
A neocon (insert red or blue flavor of your choice) walks into a bar. He orders a beer and asks the bartender ” should I have a war with Russia or China?”: The bartender thinks for a moment then replies “buy both”.
China just saved Russias ass by defying sanctions. I dont think Russia is going to let China go it alone in the pacific. If a significant portion of Russian pacific naval assets say half untying the Chinese naval knot already risky really becomes IMO untenable. They drill together there will be a degree of coordination.
And what if a couple Russian missile cruisers just happen to be around? ( which means there is subs down below) Filing their fingernails. We just make them priority targets too? Fire on both Russia and China? Not fire on all that lethality just let it sit?
And that cuts two ways. If Russia is really all in why are Russia and China going to let a carrier group or groups sail on up. Why wouldn’t they engage it out in the Pacific? If you let say a couple Russian missile cruisers with zircons and khinzhal and even the old p800 and say half dozen Chinese missile frigates with YJ get the first shot in. There in range and you let them launch their loadouts? Everything will get sunk.
I could see untying the knot with only US having subs. If both sides have subs that means the US subs get hunted straight out of Tokyo when they get fresh load outs.
ANaval battle with that big of stakes you think no one will pull nukes if they lose?. Just says oh well. Get real.
Is the new anti China Taiwan president taking USA orders? If he is it means they can start a Taiwan invasion at will by having him declare independence.
It’s already done. Whether it’s long range missile strikes deep into Russia or Taiwan. They are going to do it .WW3.
No one is backing down from this. No one.everyone is all in. Everyone is resigned to it now. It started as awhat they thought was a faint possibility and gradually everyone realized it’s going to happen.and now they want it. They want ww3.
And were worried whether Trump paid off a porn star?
Copy/paste . Food for thought .
https://www.swentr.site/news/598654-prospects-of-peaceful-reunification-eroded/
China playing the USA’s PR game. China has no urgency to take over Taiwan, once the USA has collapsed and the Chinese have superior semiconductor technology, the Taiwanese will be begging to be friends with China, there won’t be any other game in town. Unfortunately for Taiwan, China will already have everything that Taiwan can offer, so Taiwan will end up being a second class province of China. The higher your climb, the further you fall.
China is using the USA’s Taiwan PR to project themselves as reasonable and restrained, which they are and they are also willing to wait until Taiwan crumbles. While the west concentrates on Taiwan, portraying China as the bogey man, and while China plays up to that PR, China’s internal issues and policies are ignored, so they can do what they like without criticism or pushback.
The only reason this Beijing guy is saying all this stuff is to play along with the USA and to try to neutralise the USA PR. Taiwan is important to China, but there is no urgency to bring them on board, China is much more concerned about making their economy independent of the USA and lifting their poor to a higher standard of living. Their only Taiwan goal is to prevent Taiwan going for independence from China, something the USA is trying to persuade them to do, the USA being the forever shit stirrers.
” The US seems to have positioned itself that it will defend Taiwan. ”
With what ?
” Seriously, definitively. Not at all. Not a little. Not a lot. We might, hmmm, I dunno, MAKE SHELLS. We might – spitballing here – MAKE A SHIP. We might, I dunno, HAVE A NAVY. You know, one with at least as many ships as Admirals? There are about 10,000 things you would need to do to “Actively Prepare for War” and we have done ZERO of them. Build barracks. Recruit soldiers. Fix PR. Fund the VA not to be an epic abusive embarrassment. ”
ROFL .
Newspapers can’t tell the real sad story.
is this tonight’s WW3 thread?
because the days and weeks and months keep zipping by with no strikes and retaliations.
it would be boring if it wasn’t potentially so exciting.
The destructive element of AI .
My daughter is a visual artist. Like many of her friends, she has an instagram account. Apparently, Meta decided to use its users posts — including their original artwork — to train their AI models. https://mashable.com/article/meta-using-posts-train-ai-opt-out My daughter was telling me yesterday that, apparently, if an artist posts original work on Meta (FB, instagram, etc.,) all of their hard work put into developing their craft and style can be copied by AI, and used for AI to generate comparable .
Individuals who take the time to learn a craft or art or skill: visual artists, musicians, net throwers, actors, surgeons, teachers, etc., and through their diligence and dedication a beautiful synergy arises. The results are art and music and buildings, children taught and lives saved. We honor these people for their efforts and work, even when they have failings in their personal lives, because their social contributions are greater than their immediate social circle of family, close friends, neighbors, and coworkers.
What happens when an AI produces visual “art” in seconds, commercial jingles and pop music, architectural plans, learning modules, and performs surgery? What is the point and purpose to learning to draw or paint or play piano if an AI can “do it better” or “do it for me?” Humanity will be tempted to take the route of the child of wealthy parents…who cannot give limits to the child because all limits are surmountable with money, and imposing a limit might be interpreted as withholding love. Hunter Biden who spends his life on hookers and blow and creating bad art because he never learned the value of persevering through adversity. It is in persevering through adversity and challenge that humanity becomes more than the sum of its parts .
Copy/paste from TAE .
The arts will be for humans to enjoy. Enjoy making and sharing. It will not be a means of money making as we all have UAI, universal abundant income.
That really sucks. I wonder if bad art inputs would mess the AI enity up?
Bad art on the ai hunting grounds. Good art walled off from AI. AI thinks bad art is good art.
I object to your speciesist hate for our AI friends.
If it feeds off human expression I feed it s***. Dont feed off human expression and you wont eat s***.
>> I wonder if bad art inputs would mess the AI enity up?
Once AI is trained on itself as a majority of accessible training data, it will turn into gibberish. The way that doesn’t happen is if humans are in place to serve as the optimization function to select desirable outputs. So, as long as humans are in the loop, I guess it works.
This is my understanding. Please correct me if I am wrong.
The vast majority of banks hold bonds and loans; they hold no currency.
These banks do not participate in trade.
To allow trade, specific banks are created and this is called “currency reserve.”
These banks hold a collection of currencies to settle trade.
Regardless of how these currencies were created, they are held in the form of digital ones and zeros. Which is not to say that a pedigree does not exist for those ones and zeros.
This system has pretty much been the sole means of trade settlement and the western financial system owns it.
When Russia invaded Ukraine, its 3/4 trillion of digital ones and zeros with various pedigrees was frozen.
This was supposed to end the Russian government, as it was supposed there was no alternative but it turns out there was.
Now many countries are using this system which has one foot in and one foot out.
The new system still uses the same digital ones and zeros with pedigree, but the database that holds them is outside the western financial systems control.
If China crosses certain lines the proposed response is to freeze their currency reserves. They have well over 3 trillion dollars worth as they are both large exporters and large importers.
The issue is that only a certain amount of currency exists in the world in currency reserves, and trade cannot occur without it using the western financial system. If China’s currency reserves were negated it would end a substantial portion of the world’s trade.
There are ways to replace those currency reserves but not with pedigree.
The pedigree is why those digital ones and zeros are considered to have value.
If China’s currency reserves were frozen, all trade using the western financial system would end, leaving only China’s rapidly growing participation in the one foot in one foot out system with Russia.
Countries don’t want to give up their equity in the digital ones and zeros with pedigree of the currency reserve trade system.
Russia did not want to give up its equity in the currency reserve system.
When its currency reserves were frozen, those digital ones and zeros expressly designated for trade were no longer available.
This harms the ability of international trade other considerations aside.
If those ones and zeros were given to Ukraine to spend on weapons they would reenter the world currency reserves.
At this point, nations holding currency reserves are worried, not panicked about losing their equity.
If Russia’s currency reserves were to be unfrozen and placed in Ukraines ledger many countries would seek to find a safer place to store them.
If they are spent in their entirety or locked up in bonds, that nation can no longer trade.
Since the new one-foot-in, one-foot-out Russian China system accepts those currency reserves with pedigree that would be the logical place to store them considered at least somewhat more safe.
If they can get it there.
But if it’s frozen for trying to get it to the outlaw database, that’s just less currency reserves for trade.
Giving Russian currency reserves to Ukraine equals an end to a substantial percentage of trade using the western financial system.
Freezing Chinas currency reserves is the end of the western financial currency reserve system, and the end of trade using that system.
Those digital ones and zeros will have no value in the frozen locked up western financial system, but are quite valuable in the outlaw database.
So why do they persist in considering actions that will destroy the western financial currency reserve system?
1. That’s a desirable outcome.
2. They are desperate and panicked and not thinking straight.
And my personal favorite
3 They are not capable of behavior that accepts anything other than dominance and growth.
Creating new digital ones and zeros for BRICS use has the problems of pedigree and interchangability. It appears they are content to just move those tokens into the outlaw database. That way, smaller countries fears of losing the equity in their currency reserves (which is huge to them) are assuaged. This is a very practical decision as negating the existing tokens and replacing them with new ones would raise issues of token pedigree.
An awfully lot of what I know about the banking system is things I have “picked up” over the years. I have never had a course in how the banking system works. I read various articles about banking, and I know how insurance works, but there are differences.
You write “To allow trade, specific banks are created and this is called “currency reserve.”” I can believe this, but I have never learned about it. The US is making its own currency all of the time. We don’t hear about a US currency reserve. But we do hear about currency reserves of small countries, quite often, and the need to shore them up.
Where did these currency reserves come from in the first place? Where are aggregate amounts published?
Where the currency reserves come from are a good question but I chose to ignore that to try to understand. I made two assumptions.
The aggregate amount and composition of Chinas currency reserves is considered a “state secret” which would imply there is already a degree of autonomy
Currency reserves exist solely or mostly in currency to settle trade.
They have sufficient pedigree ie came into existence in a manner that all parties agree they have value. This value is well established as the funds have gone back and forth many times. Pedigree.
I note that currency reserves are small amounts compared to the overall amounts of financial instruments. My perception of them is being different sort of financial instrument the one that provides liquidity. As such they can be considered vital and not easily replacable.
Because of their small amounts I am guessing they serve as consumption limits.
We know that Russia still accepts all currencies for its petroleum products. They are converted to rubles and leave the wests control.
And here I’m just guessing but it seems to me that currency reserves have a special status much like gold used to be. A digital token that originated from organic economies and has history of use. Much like any other device proves its value through a history of use.
I
As I mentioned I disregarded the origin of the tokens. They exist and in quite limited amounts compared to the overall amount of financial instruments.
Currencies can be regarded as a collection that is used to facilitate trading. I note that only half a trillion of chinas currency reserves are held in dollars. Very surprising considering the amount of dollars China takes in.
For a small country this special financial instrument could be considered quite vital. If participation in the western financial system is contingent on tieing money up in treasuries i
Due to there prime collateral” status it might leave much less free to have in currency reserves.
All that aside we can assume some things.
A new database has been created that holds reserve currency outside the western system.
Deposits in the new system are totally separate than the old system.
China already has significant deposits in the new system.
China maintains deposits in the western system to do business with countries with deposits in the western system and this is most.
While the nation name that is on the currency is important more important is that it has a history of working.
What is most important is which data base the currency is deposited in because the two are seperate. The asset deposited in one has no value in the other.
A trend of moving currencies into the outlaw data base would be deleterious to the dollar.
At this point we can assume the two currencies held in the outlaw data base are rubles and rembini. Russia will change any currency into rubles but only through organic economy petroleum purchases.
The main value of a currency reserve is trade. The tokens in it have value that is universally accepted. While the means of establishing value of the tokens of the western database are currently accepted as a function of organic economy purchases I see this gradually changing leading to different values in Tokens.
New currencies are not neccesarily needed to create new financial systems. That is created by the physical control of the database and participation.
Russia and China have already created a new system of trade that is accessible through trade with them in real physical products. Deposits held in one system with differing standards in tokens will invariably develop different values in tokens. As that occurs different tokens emerge that reflect the difference in value.
History of use will have value in the outlaw database tokens just as it does in the western financial system.
The world will not stop trading with China. Many products are single sourced through China. If China’s foreign reserves are frozen, it will be difficult but trade will resume in the outlaw database probably with difficulties and problems.
It is desirable for China to move its currency reserves into the new database as a function of risk. Just as the overwhelming conversation in China now is Treasuries have risk and the buzzword is “derisk”.
Countries can sell Treasuries. As long as Belgium is buying. They must maintain currency reserves for trade. In the big picture which database holds the currency reserves is much more important than treasuries.
We can expect slow change in the absence of war or stupid decisions as historically proven tokens and trade remain in place.
The probability of war and or stupid decisions is high.
I say 3. Like Cousin Bette, they just want to destroy what they can’t have.
“A lost century in economics: Three theories of banking and the conclusive evidence”
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1057521915001477
Please see this video of Jim Rickards from 19:15 minutes . It discusses what Blast has posted above , Brics , currency wars , China’s gold pile etc . Simple language .
Dozens of United Airlines passengers headed to Houston fall ill after international cruise
““Thirty minutes before we land, we get told that they’ve been exposed to an unknown virus.”
Passengers aboard the airplane say that the pilot and flight attendants alerted them that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is investigating the illness.
“This is where it got weird,” Snell said. “He [the pilot] got over the speaker, but he came out to us and he said, ‘Hey, in my 25 years of flying, I’ve never seen anything like this. We have been quarantined by the CDC. Nobody can exit the plane until the CDC lets us off.’”
https://www.click2houston.com/news/local/2024/06/01/dozens-of-united-airlines-passengers-headed-to-houston-reported-feeling-sick-nauseous/
Like it or not. They’re bringing it back!
When something real gets released, it will be days or weeks before symptoms are shown after exposure, and there will be no stopping it. If assets are committed to this technology advances will occur. When weaponized, the technology represents the end of all we know. As such, it is a very good Mutually Assured Destruction tool–a predominant doctrine and operating principle.
Other political or religious groups might find release of a biological weapon desirable. Jim Jones or salafacist fanatics.
We observe other destructive technologies become more available and weaponized at low cost. This technology is low cost requiring only minimal facilitation. The accounts of the research at the Sierra Leone ebola research facility were that it operated using masks; no controlled air and scrubbers. Shake and bake. When NIH cut funding, it was refunded by the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation. $800 million. Peanuts.
As mentioned in the earlier post, I find the argument that the 2014 ebola outbreak was the original lab leak to be very very very compelling. Pretty close to undeniable. The way the staff with some of the most published papers in the world on ebola suddenly claimed they didn’t know nuttin about ebola. The facility changing its name to not include ebola. Boom: they dint know nuttin about nuttin. Cm9n.
The trouble is how do you stop it? We cant even stop North Korea from creating nuclear weapons. That commits us to the world’s stupidest game. MEASURE COUNTERMEASURE.
No countermeasure for me thanks. I will not participate in this.
And that’s the rub. They have to start with naturally occurring organisms and gain of function them into chimeras. Just hang anyone who collects dangerous organisms in the wild. But if you believe in measure countermeasure, you make the absolute most vicious organism you can to develop a countermeasure because someone else might do the same.
The standard as it stands now: the bigger the genome map library of dangerous organisms the better. Those genome maps exist for the natural organism only as a base material for gain of function. To get more genome maps, You have to create the organism to genome map ir. And what’s the mother of all genome map acquisition. An outbreak. . The theory being if something shows up with a similar genome map, it will fast track countermeasure development. You need a very flexible genetic technology to be able to try to countermeasure all those chimera genome maps.. cutting edge.
I will not participate.
” We cant even stop North Korea from creating nuclear weapons. That commits us to the world’s stupidest game. MEASURE COUNTERMEASURE.”
They DON’T have nuclear weapons. They just have the support of China so that if they could..
No one knows who has working nukes.
Nuclear power could have helped us reduce fossil fuel consumption significantly if humans did not weaponize nuclear energy as a means of dominating others so early on in the history of nuclear energy.
I remember hearing shortly after the lockdowns ended, how biotech companies were buying up a a lot of the vacant commercial real estate units available for rent and that there was a significant amount of money from the private and the U.S. federal government going into biotech. We are given the impression that this is happening for the well-being of all human beings.
Biotech has become weaponized one way or the other, and now there is a lot of NIMBY sentiment, just like with nuclear energy.
This sounds like an international cruise that left from Vancouver, British Columbia that they were on. I think of cruises from Vancouver going to Alaska or Hawaii, but those are not international cruises from the perspective of the US. Where were these folks visiting? If these folks were in the US all along, and picked up a flu or stomach virus while traveling, that is different. Or food poisoning.
It is good the CDC is checking it out. The publicity will not help the tour boat industry.
It is time to admit that the so-called American Experiment has failed.
Trump does not matter anymore. The lift is now unhealable.
Dumping everyone, with different races, different religions and different objectives, did not work and it took 160 years to realize that but now the end is near.
Lincoln’s attempt to keep the Union as one created a monster.
USA was kind of a conduit for everyone to run away until around 1990, but after that it has become a cesspool, from which it is unlikely to recover, but since other countries have become crappy too, the fall of USA will mean the end of Civilization.
China, Russia, Korea, Japan maintain cohesive societies. Yes, the collective west is destructing. Patience.
These countries are authoritarian countries with central control, and until the West began to get interested on them, their civ was like that of medieval times
They won’t advance anything.
Taiwan is racing forward. Let’s just wait 20 years and see.
I doubt we will have 20 years. The world would have gone haywire long before that.
Civilization like this is eternal.
We will be ok just need to downsize a bit.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=e4Ao-iNPPUc&pp=ygUUdGh1bmRlcnN0cnVjayBzZWFndWw%3D
The Collapse Is Coming. Will Humanity Adapt?
“An evolutionary biologist and a science fiction writer walk into a bar… and mull over survival.”
Daniel Brooks: Well, the primary thing that we have to understand or internalize is that what we’re dealing with is what is called a no-technological-solution problem. In other words, technology is not going to save us, real or imaginary. We have to change our behavior. If we change our behavior, we have sufficient technology to save ourselves. If we don’t change our behavior, we are unlikely to come up with a magical technological fix to compensate for our bad behavior. This is why Sal and I have adopted a position that we should not be talking about sustainability, but about survival, in terms of humanity’s future. Sustainability has come to mean, what kind of technological fixes can we come up with that will allow us to continue to do business as usual without paying a penalty for it? As evolutionary biologists, we understand that all actions carry biological consequences. We know that relying on indefinite growth or uncontrolled growth is unsustainable in the long term, but that’s the behavior we’re seeing now.
“Darwin told us in 1859 that what we had been doing for the last 10,000 or so years was not going to work.”
Stepping back a bit. Darwin told us in 1859 that what we had been doing for the last 10,000 or so years was not going to work. But people didn’t want to hear that message. So along came a sociologist who said, “It’s OK; I can fix Darwinism.” This guy’s name was Herbert Spencer, and he said, “I can fix Darwinism. We’ll just call it natural selection, but instead of survival of what’s-good-enough-to-survive-in-the-future, we’re going to call it survival of the fittest, and it’s whatever is best now.” Herbert Spencer was instrumental in convincing most biologists to change their perspective from “evolution is long-term survival” to “evolution is short-term adaptation.” And that was consistent with the notion of maximizing short term profits economically, maximizing your chances of being reelected, maximizing the collection plate every Sunday in the churches, and people were quite happy with this.
Well, fast-forward and how’s that working out? Not very well. And it turns out that Spencer’s ideas were not, in fact, consistent with Darwin’s ideas. They represented a major change in perspective. What Sal and I suggest is that if we go back to Darwin’s original message, we not only find an explanation for why we’re in this problem, but, interestingly enough, it also gives us some insights into the kinds of behavioral changes we might want to undertake if we want to survive.
To clarify, when we talk about survival in the book, we talk about two different things. One is the survival of our species, Homo sapiens. We actually don’t think that’s in jeopardy. Now, Homo sapiens of some form or another is going to survive no matter what we do, short of blowing up the planet with nuclear weapons. What’s really important is trying to decide what we would need to do if we wanted what we call “technological humanity,” or better said “technologically-dependent humanity,” to survive.
https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-collapse-is-coming-will-humanity-adapt/
With or without technology the number of humans will be limited. It can be by the natural means i.e. the four horse persons. It can be a rigid class hierarchy like India that pushes the needed death and dying down onto the lower ranks of society. It can be by a humane system that limits couples to two kids. I expect it will be a mix of all three.
The British elites prior 1914 were simply the creme of humanity, never to be replaced.
The late Dr. Robert Firth, who would NEVER have seen Oxford if Chucky and his 200/400 Worcestershires didn’t ‘do his duty’, praised the British Empire but it was precisely the kind of people the Duke of Wellington would have called as the ‘scum of the earth’, including the late Dr. Firth, who killed the creme of creme.
I do not know the backgrounds of the British posters here, but some of most staunch patriots of the dying no-longer-that-Great Britain are precisely those who belonged to the ‘scum’ class who would have been treated like shit if Chucky and his 200/400 Worcestershires, who are no less guilty, didn’t do ‘their duty’.
Companies are ‘unbossing’ the workplace, and millennial managers are getting axed
https://www.businessinsider.com/companies-are-unbossing-workplaces-and-millennials-are-at-risk-2024-5
Cost cutting. No more, no less.
Perfect timing..can see this being done with AI android personnel with an interface of a central network locale center ….fantastic …with the middle management we have now, they are being slowly marginalized…
We have much now via the computer work brain system…call outs, Shift
/Vacation bidding, and a host of other tasks.
Basically, Shift managers are baby sitters and someone to shoulder any blame on or endure any unpleasantess.
The operators in the production are more important than the management, so the management is replaced.
In some circles, they say a ‘restoration’ of ‘American values’, by Trump or someone in his vein, will restore USA its former glory.
USA already had a revival, during the Reagan-GHW Bush era.
The ‘working class’ of USA enjoyed a standard of living which vastly exceeded their utility in the 1910s-1970s, and their shoddy treatment now is just a reflection of their actual value.
The American economy, right from the start, had Latin America as its backdrop. Which is why to this day that region is still under US thumbs to various degree.
Few people know that USA had feudalism. The Van Ranselaars in New York state ruled a vast estate, along with many other prominent families from Holland, and their independence, which was recognized by the founding fathers who owned huge plantations of their own, continued till 1840s.
The City of Irvine, CA is owned, to this day, by the Irvine family, and similar arrangements exist throughout USA. The most notorious example seems to be the island of Niihau, HI, which is still owned by the family who bought it in 1840s from some Hawaiian King, and whose denizens, by some technicality, are still not US citizens and not allowed to leave that island. (Some have left but they are never allowed back to the island, and since they have been totally dependent to the island, and lack the skills to live in the modern world ans the island’s owners prefer not to introduce modern technology to there, they remain. The owners live there, too, although they fly to Honolulu to do their shopping.)
USA will rapidly turn feudalistic, when it loses its hegemony. Back to manorism. Back to Middle ages quite quickly.
Kulm, this is one of your best pieces. I agree with you.
Civilization does not always advance.
It can remain stagnant for a long time, and also sometimes regresses too.
If the Hordes crash the door, the Dark Ages would look like a good time.
The Hordes do not give a crap about any decency or honor. They will just pillage everything, ending the advance to Type I Civ once for all, and will probably extinguish human potentials for the next 10,000.
The hordes have all the lion’s share of resources and industry. Technology follows resources and industry, not Visa versa. That was part of the big lie. Yes we will outsource manufacturing, but the engineering and prototyping will always be done here. What a supremacist argument! How could anyone believe such an argument after witnessing how Japanese culture revolutionized manufacturing and demonstrated some of the best engineering ever witnessed on the planet?
The truth is no one ever believed it. It was a narrative to keep people happily outsourcing. The engineering and prototyping left directly after the industry. DUH.
China has everything it wants from the West now. Sure there is a crumb or two left on the table, but they have eaten the Turkey and pie. Now they are ditching the West’s financial system that they are so immersed in. Not an easy thing. It will take time.
The hordes don’t want to fight. Fighting is an intersection. Fighting is an expression of relationship. China doesn’t want a relationship with the west. It’s the West that wants and desperately needs a relationship with China. You can’t make someone like you. You cant make someone respect you. You can punch someone in the nose and get hit upside the head with a chair. That’s how a relationship is demanded. IMO That’s what your posts are about.
It’s over! Get over it. It was never all that. The mystique and exceptionalism you promote is not without basis, but your clinging and promotion demonstrates serious flaws. Is drag queen story time now the epitome of western civilization? Is that not an appropriate question since you have said woke society must prevail to defeat the hordes?
You’re not a real student of history. You know history very very well I’ll give you that. A real student of history enjoys it in all its wonderful expressions and manifestations. You desecrate that. History is just a tool for you to pursue your personal vendetta. Just a tool to assert exceptionalism. Scratch a Russian and you will get a Tartar. Good god man! Can you even see what you have become?
I have a question for you. You seem honest in a twisted sort of way.
Do you regret empires alliance with financiers in WW1 and WW2 against “the hun”? I use that term because the exact same arguments you now assert regarding “the hordes” were asserted about “the hun” in the ww2 and ww1 time periods in England. The similarities are remarkable. The contradiction is “the hun” also wanted to conquer “the hordes”. Wasn’t “the hun” a more suitable partner in exceptionalism from your viewpoint? Certainly more appropriate than financiers and mongrel yanks like me? Would that not make “the hun” a natural ally? I’m confused.
Yes, it was stupid, stupid and stupid. Basically cutting their right arm to fight the Russian hordes.
WW2 will create controversies, but I maintain that the Wrong Side won the Great War.
The Hun’s scientific and technological contributions are legion. What did the Tatars contribute? Other than Mendeleev and some Russian novels which are too long to read?
Appreciate your honesty. I knew could count on you. Honesty is a rare quality.
Why are young, healthy adults experiencing a rise in heart attacks?
Doctors say they are seeing an alarming number of seemingly healthy younger patients having heart attacks. Now doctors at Mount Sinai are tracking patients to see if they can uncover the new risk factors behind the trend. NBC’s Anne Thompson reports for TODAY.
https://www.today.com/video/doctors-work-to-uncover-heart-attack-risk-factors-in-young-adults-211925061898
Even the Today show is now discussing this..
Today’s diet?
Do you know who owns America’s largest food company (Kraft) ?
R.J. Reynolds Tobacco. Who bought them in 1988
Gail, I thought you might have a WSJ subscription. If so, here’s an article about it you might like. (or anyone else)
The Long, Strange History of Kraft Foods
https://www.wsj.com/articles/BL-DLB-34227
This is part of the early history given. A cheese seller sounds innocent enough.
Researchers Call for Urgent Action to Address Mass Contamination of Blood Supply.
Japanese researchers are sounding the alarm bells, warning of potential deadly risks to patients who receive blood from people who have taken mRNA COVID jabs.
Maay 27th 2024
https://takecontrol.substack.com/p/blood-supply-contamination
Mass contamination of the blood supply will be hard to fix if the majority of the blood-giving population has had mRNA COVID vaccinations.
I tell my unvaxxed daughter her blood will be especially valuable since she has had Covid-19, not because of a questionable PCR Test “confirmation” but because of presence of antibodies two years ago along with mild age appropriate systems while I contemporaneously suffered full blown symptoms for which I refused to seek treatment.
And now an underground of young people on dating sites are searching for others who are unvaxxed Others refuse transfusions unless documented blood from an unvaxxed donor, if you can trust the screening process.
“So give blood, and keep blood between brothers.
Give love, and keep blood between brothers.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4bD9w61Fs0
Pete Townshend, singer and writer
Pino Palladino on fretless bass.
Simon Philips on drums
David Gilmore on lead guitar
It doesn’t get more hard hitting than this.
Oh no! Cocoa shortage strikes again!
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/global-cocoa-shortage-much-worse-previously-forecasted-prices-surge
Can’t wait till I write my own version of Down and Out in Paris and London like George Orwell write in the good olde days…really good read and like to pen my own version when we have the next great and permanent Depression.
Think Chocolate and Coffee may be on our craving list and perhaps a good shave
Oh no!
and WW3 is beginning any day now!
call it a double whammy!
Told ya. This is the end of the world even without WW3.
This is how the worlds ends.
Not with a bang but a snickers!
Further news Wednesday regarding the North-South railway corridor connecting Russia through Iran with the Persian Gulf and a short sea leg to Pakistan, India and SEAsia.
So far, through Iran, the railway route extends from Bandar Abbas on the Persian Gulf to Rasht in northern Iran where there remains to be built a final 164km section linking to Azerbaijan and the rail network from there north into Russia. This remaining section is through mountainous terrain along the Caspian coast and it will take some years before becoming operational.
The official (Abbas Khatibi, deputy head of the Iranian Construction and Development of Transportation Infrastructure Company) further mentioned the complexity of the Rasht-Astara project, saying that it is a megaproject that requires over $20 billion of investment to be completed.
“The Rasht-Astara railway project is going to be financed through three methods of domestic financing, foreign investment, and bartering, and we are negotiating to finalize the resources through these methods,” Khatibi explained.
media.mehrnews.com/d/2024/05/22/0/4998405.pdf
p4
Countries that are close to land-locked, like Russia, have to go to extraordinary lengths to get their products out of the country in an affordable way. Your article says, ” it will take some years before becoming operational.” These are huge projects!
In the meantime, a first significant 16km section was opened this week, connecting Rasht with Anzali Port on the Caspian. This will allow shipments from the Persian Gulf and southern Iran, both by rail and road, to be shipped north to Astrakhan, where they connect with the Russian rail network.
It was my comment, not the article, that completion of the whole project will be several years away.
BEIJING, June 1 (Reuters) – China’s first food security law aimed at achieving “absolute self-sufficiency” in staple grains came into effect on Saturday, reinforcing efforts by the world’s biggest agriculture importer to lower its reliance on overseas purchases.
The law provides a legal framework for existing guidance by the Communist Party for local governments and the agricultural industry to raise food production, although it did not give details on how the law will be implemented.
It includes protection of farmland from being converted to other uses, protecting germplasm resources and preventing wastage.
Passed just six months after its first reading, the rush to adopt the food security law reflects China’s urgency to resolve issues that have curbed production, such as a lack of arable land and water resources, labour shortages and a lack of agriculture technology.
The law holds central and provincial governments accountable for incorporating food security into their economic and development plans, ensuring that food supply remains a top priority in the country that has a painful history of famine.
,
“It shall adhere to the principle of storing grain in the ground and using technology to improve grain production,” it said, to ensure “basic self-sufficiency in cereal grains and absolute self-sufficiency in staple grains for food use.”
It also stipulates the formation of a national grain emergency plan and a food security monitoring system.
China expanded the definition of “coarse grains” to include millets and oats, in addition to sorghum, barley, buckwheat, mung beans and potatoes. Grains refers to wheat, rice, corn, soybeans and coarse grains.
Hmmm, looks as if someone is prepping…imagine that…buys massive gold amount
Increase its military …
Prepping food and gold good. It takes time to research, design, and build ICBMs, subs to deliver ICBMs, attack subs to protect the delivery sub.
Maybe China can buy some SARMAT IIs from Russia.
You’d want to hug someone that offered to help protect your people, wouldn’t you and if they also happened to be the largest exporter of wheat in the world and offered you help with that as well, you’d probably want the whole world to see and understand your true affection towards them.
A serious turn of events . India becomes a wheat importer from a wheat exporter . I have in earlier posts informed that 800 million survive on 5kg of wheat/rice + 1kg of chickpeas provide free per month/per person . This was a short term plan during Covid but is now extended till 2028 officially . There are elections and the opposition has promised to increase it to 10kg . In the meanwhile the lagging effect of El Nino is hitting and 50% of the country is having temperatures above 50 celsius and a drought is hitting . The weather department forecasts a delayed and weak monsoon . The hunger games begin .
https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/russia-india-set-spark-major-swing-global-wheat-balance-2024-05-31/
Drought conditions were confirmed over northern, eastern, and southwestern parts of India on the India Drought Monitor, covering about 27.7% of the nation at the end of April, which is a little more than last month.
Let us recall the star chamber.
https://dictionary.law.com/Default.aspx?selected=2004
any judicial or quasi-judicial action, trial or hearing which so grossly violates standards of “due process” that a party appearing in the proceedings (hearing or trial) is denied a fair hearing. The term comes from a large room with a ceiling decorated with stars in which secret hearings of the privy council and judges met to determine punishment for disobedience of the proclamations of King Henry VIII of Great Britain (1509-1547). The high-handed, unfair, predetermined judgments, which sent the accused to the Tower of London or to the chopping block, made “star chamber” synonymous with unfairness and illegality from the bench.
Hi Gail and everyone, I have been recovering from a cold but I am feeling nearly better now. It really puts health into perspective.
This is today’s Duran episode on the UKR conflict.
00:00 President Pavel’s artillery shells scheme failed as predicted
02:31 Western leaders not in touch with reality
05:02 European taxpayers’ money lost in bizarre operation
07:29 Ukrainian troops trapped in Volans and Chuia with dire consequences.
09:58 Russian forces surrounding and advancing on Ukrainian troops
12:59 Russian army still has large reserves, and the West is struggling with shell production and weapon support for Ukraine.
15:49 Ukraine is running out of soldiers, with forces 40% below strength.
18:21 Demand for Ukraine to mobilize its youth is a cruel act influenced by the West.
20:39 Russian preparations for potential offensive
Pavel ammo debacle. Hieronymus Bosch frontline
Welcome back. Thanks for updates.
I’m glad you’re back with us! And glad you’ve recovered from your cold.
The Ukraine situation on the ground is moving much faster now, and the surrounding situation with NATO rattling whatever they’ve got left to rattle is also developing apace.
A question younger Britons are going to have to start asking themselves soon is, “Am I going to volunteer, or should I wait until my call-up papers arrive?”
Caption this: https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/biden-sunak-speak-about-middle-east-ukraine/
Oh dear. The Wicked Witch of the West is back. Where’s Dorothy when you need her?
Sorry can’t find the right place
for those that say Optimus can not fix a leak in the roof how to teach your robot
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8710T79xyc
A massive readjustment of the living standards of so-called Five Eyes countries and their friends.
In the old days, when things were more sane, people knew their places and those not in the rank did not overconsume, and more resources were used to advance civilization.
We are simply going to such days. Starship or whatever schemes being pushed on will not really lead to anywhere if there are 8 billion consumers; that will have to change.
Living in cold parts of the world will be much more difficult. Human got their start in Africa. Early increases in population were in warm, relatively wet parts of the world.
It wasn’t until the wonders of coal were discovered that the heating of homes could sort of work for more than the very wealthy. Also, businesses, could use coal for cooking food and smelting metals.
Without much less coal and other fossil fuels, cold parts of the world will particularly suffer fall in their standards of living. It is hard to have running water if the temperature of a house is below freezing. Also, bicycles don’t work as well in parts of the world where it is very cold and icy.
I first came to Miami back in the early 70s, 1-95 highway was two lanes and no traffic…today…LA California style.
Earlier this month, New Times shared a story about a new study that found the average daily commute in Miami has worsened in recent years.
According to the study by business-resource website LLC.org, the typical daily commute in Miami is 58 minutes, which works out to 17 more hours sitting in traffic each year compared to ten years ago. To determine its findings, the study analyzed commute times for full-time workers 16 years and older across the 170 most-populous U.S. cities, along with data from several databases, including the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey.
“Among full-time workers, Miami commuters spend 236.86 hours or approximately ten full days in traffic,” the study reported.
Those numbers came as no surprise to us. Nor did the fact that when we shared our story on social media, readers were quick to chime in about their own soul-crushing (or “car-crushing,” as one commenter punned it) commute.
Where are the public servants and their plans for smarter and better infrastructure?” they asked.
And who’s to blame for Miami’s congestion and traffic issues? New Times readers say the culprit is constant high-rise development, more cars on the road, people “cruising” in the left lane, and, of course, elected officials.
Yes, more and more cars along with high rise developments….
When the gas pumps run dry..look out..
And regulators who hold down insurance rates, so as to make housing right along the coastline more affordable. At some point, something goes wrong!
We just reroofed our house to appease the Insurance company after they threatened to not renew our policy….our policy then was offered at a 25% increase. In one year…
Can’t complain..
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Florida is in the middle of what many are calling a home insurance crisis.
Florida homeowners pay the most for home insurance, with an average annual rate of $10,996 in 2023, considerably more than America’s average rate of $2,377.
According to reports, average home insurance premium renewals rose 68% in Florida, the fastest increase in the country in the past two years. It also found that with $2.9 trillion in property exposure, Florida is the most at-risk state for catastrophic property damage from storms.
News 4 Jax.com
I moved to Miami in the late 70’s. By the early 80’s the traffic was horrific trying to get into downtown Miami via I-95 or SR 836. I can’t even imagine how bad it is today, as I moved out of Miami in the early 80’s.
Sea level rise makes Florida ‘beach renourishment’ projects more frequent and expensive Heavy hurricane season promises even more spending on sand that’s likely to wash away Craig Pittman
Once you could re-sand a Florida beach and you wouldn’t need to do it again for a decade or so, said Wayne Daltry, formerly the “smart growth” coordinator for Lee County. Not anymore. He summed up the reason in just three words.
“Nothing has changed from the futile and expensive sand rearrangement as the public agencies try to replace the littoral drift,” he told me, “except that it has gotten more expensive with sea level rise.”
With the hurricane season that starts Saturday predicted to be “extraordinary,” get ready to see lots more new sand washed away this summer.
Since then, from 1922 through May 2018, “more than 818 miles of beaches were restored using in excess of 1.5 billion cubic yards of material,” says the American Sand and Beach Preservation Association (more on them in a bit). “The total cost of these projects is estimated at $6.1 billion.”
Six years later, you can bet those numbers are considerably higher, especially since some places have had to be redone repeatedly.
“It was not a good idea a century ago [and] it is even more baffling today,” historian Gary Mormino, author of “Land of Sunshine, State of Dreams: A Social History of Modern Florida,” which includes an extensive history of how Florida regards its beaches, told me in an email this week. He compared these projects to “giving billionaire sports moguls new sport palaces.”
Take a wild guess which state has called on the federal taxpayers to fix its dwindling beaches the most in the past decade. If you said that it was the one whose name starts with F, give yourself an A+.
California is No. 1 for the century, said Nicole Elko, executive director of the sand and beach association, mostly for work it did in the 1960s and 1970s. Florida runs a very close second, she said.
You’d be amazed at how many Florida politicians who call themselves fiscal conservatives suddenly turn into fans of free-spending, big-government programs when the subject is beach renourishment. Back up that star-spangled dump truck, Uncle Sam!
More than half of Florida’s 825 miles of beaches are now classified as “critically eroded,” thus making them eligible for renourishment, said Emma Haydocy of the environmental group Surfrider Foundation.
https://floridaphoenix.com/2024/05/30/sea-level-rise-makes-florida-beach-renourishment-projects-more-frequent-and-expensive/
Of course, it has little to do with sea level rise..
How about ground water being pumped out, causing land to sink?
In a finite world, everything is made to change in response to all of the forces around. Investors want the status quo, but this is not possible. This goes with the deteriorating buildings, build over 30 years ago, along the beach front. It is hard to save them, also.
Agree, it is very hot there in the summer. You would know better, but I recall there being afternoon showers in both Atlanta and Fl after which it was pleasant.
Dennis L.
The frequency of showers in the afternoon in summer seems to vary with the year. This year, we haven’t been having summer showers.
How about these apples or oranges..whatever
https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/virginia-key-breaks-water-temperature-records-12-days-in-a-row-20034495
That’s a pretty big anomaly,” McNoldy says. “It was a record-breaker for air temperatures and heat index and now we are at 12 days of breaking records for water temperature.”
May has been a scorcher for the Sunshine State and the Magic City, with the heat index (AKA the “feels like” temperature, which takes humidity into account) reaching 112 degrees on May 18 and 19, exceeding the previous daily record by a whopping 11 degrees.
McNoldy says it will be the warmest May on record in Miami by about 1.5 degrees — a “pretty big margin,” in weather parlance — with an estimated monthly average of nearly 84 degrees. The average heat index, he adds, will likely break the previous record by two degrees.
McNoldy reiterates that it is not a promising start as the state heads into the warmest time of year.
The water temperature is already inching closer to last year’s 90-degree temperatures that decimated and bleached coral populations in the Florida Keys. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has predicted a “significantly above normal” hurricane season because of the warm Atlantic Ocean temperatures in the Atlantic basin
Oh well, whatever the cause we just going to make it worse
We got rid of the smog. Maybe, if we increased smog, the problem would get better.
How about the amount of sand being mined from the sea a rivers for concrete? Sorry to stretch your brain Mike
I’ll stretch your JesseJimmieJam..
How about concrete and why it sucks and is a ticking time bomb….so sorry 😐
Bloomberg reports that a ‘growing number of financial elites are throwing their weight behind Trump’
https://x.com/spectatorindex/status/1796610304635437291
Blackstone’s Steve Schwarzman backs Trump
https://www.axios.com/2024/05/24/trump-2024-stephen-schwarzman-blackstone
Hard to drain the swamp when your knee deep in alligators ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
According to the first link:
Trump reacts: “The real verdict is going to be November 5th by the people”
Too many people don’t like either candidate. Or they definitely don’t like one of the candidates. It is hard to make the system work with such discord.
Beating a drum, please forgive:
“Too many people don’t like either candidate.”
I was successful in my businesses not because I liked nor disliked an employee. My job was to make a team, to have others see that while they may not like a fellow employee, every two weeks if they were better with that employee in their paycheck, it would cover a number of transgressions.
The hardest job for me was firing someone who was liked but not a 1+1=3 employee. Oddly enough, when that person was gone the remainder seem relieved.
So much of our society is now a narrative, the goal is to get people feeling good long enough to vote and then everything will be fine, not.
The biggest problem with US politicians is they find more votes in sowing discord than making a team. The have learned the narrative and get too much personal pleasure out of creating a clever narrative than making things work.
We in the US have a wonderful country, there are many jobs to be done, some will not be fun. We can do it, some of what we need to do we will not like. That is why there is Friday night and happy hour.
Dennis L.
I am an equal opportunity hater! I have hated every president since Georgie Boy Bush! The united States has been in a quiet depression since 2008 and the Bozo presidents have become more and more powerful. This is mainly because the party in power protects their douchbag leader no matter what they do. If I had to pick I would much rather have Trump but that is not saying much. He seems to be about as smart as a box of rocks. The people he surrounded himself with….ugh not as bad a Biden though. The amount of debt has increased the likely hood of an economic slow down.
Dennis I know you will hate to hear this but anyone who has made money since george bush has done so on the backs of the future generations. If you had lived in another country you would not have gained your subsidized wealth. Be very aware the younger generations are starting to figure this out and they are not happy about it….cue the two old men in diapers to run for president maybe that will distract them!!!!
Sam,
Hate is a very bad emotion, all of us have pain, dealing with it is hard. Hate hurts the hater more than the hated. I claim we forgive the offender not to be gracious, but to free ourselves from some of the pain.
Dennis L.
Ok Mr. School teacher…. I dislike 👎 the leaders because they have all been really stupid in their responses to problems.
I forgive my offender on his/her funeral.
(Financial Times) – Asian Nato
We don’t see Austin in these days not because he is not feeling good, but because he is very busy to create an Asian Nato to put in a corner China.
US is going on pushing its allies to contrast or even making direct war to its enemies (Russia for Europe and China for Asia), at the moment its allies are so dumb that they are obeying.
Will it work?
Link https://www.ft.com/content/b889d33c-7745-48b7-b847-64f2b3003409
Free https://archive.ph/ywcfp
Asian NATO= Flop . They already tried 3 times
1. SEATO ( South East Treaty Organization )
2 . QUAD ( USA , Japan, Korea , India }
3 . AUKUS ( Self explanatory }
Waste of time .
Three Virginia class by 2030 is not going to cut the mustard. The 2040 wonder sub will never happen.
That’s it? That’s the plan to contain China? Three Virginia class?
https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3734934/aukus-countries-set-measured-pace-for-security-partnership/
Any kind of organization requires energy to operate: Human energy, energy associated with jets flying back and forth, energy embedded in pay for all of the people involved.
In a period of inadequate energy supply, we should expect these alliances to grow weaker and fall apart, rather than expanding. For example, the World Trade Organization is working less and less well.
Whatever the result of this organization will be, we should expect that China will not appreciate this effort from US & friends, and it will go on considering its alliance with Russia and its good relationship with Iran, good moves.
They warned us ahead of time.
“Scientists say an apocalyptic bird flu could wipe out half of humanity” (2020)
In his new book, “How to Survive a Pandemic,” Dr. Michael Gregor, a scientist and physician who once testified for Oprah Winfrey in her “meat defamation” trial, warns that an apocalyptic virus emanating from overcrowded and unsanitary chicken farms has the potential to wipe out half of humanity.
Greger, a vegan, writes that “In the ‘hurricane scale’ of epidemics, COVID-19, with a death rate of around half of one percent, rates a measly Category Two, possibly a Three. … The Big One, the typhoon to end all typhoons, will be 100 times worse when it comes, a Category Five producing a fatality rate of one in two. … Civilization as we know it would cease.”
https://nypost.com/2020/05/30/apocalyptic-bird-flu-could-wipe-out-half-of-humanity-scientists/
Scare tactics!
Weather-related power outages are getting worse. What will it take to keep the lights on as America’s grid gets thrashed?
By Mary Gilbert, CNN Meteorologist
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2024/05/31/weather/power-grid-outages-us-texas-climate
….That’s exactly the scenario that played out in Texas over the past few weeks, and these kinds of outages are happening more frequently as destructive extreme weather thrashes the aging electric grid.
From 2000 to 2023, 80% of all major US power outages were due to weather, according to analysis by Climate Central, a non-profit research group. The number of weather-related outages from 2014 to 2023 doubled compared to outages at the start of the century.
Being without power is not only expensive – keeping people out of work and school, and keeping businesses closed – it’s dangerous. There doesn’t need to be a heat wave in Texas for summertime temperatures to soar to unhealthy levels. Heat is particularly dangerous without A/C at night, which is when the body needs to cool itself after a hot day.
Experts say there could be ways to keep the lights on in the face of extreme conditions, even if there’s no single perfect solution.
Power generation, transmission and distribution within the US happens on a power grid, an interconnected series of power plants, power lines and electrical substations. But the grid’s infrastructure is aging fast and struggling to keep up with modern power demands, according to the US Department of Energy.
It’s also struggling as extreme weather gets more intense as the planet warms.
“Our (power) infrastructure was built for the weather of the past,” Michael Webber, a professor of engineering at the University of Texas said. “It wasn’t built for the weather of the future, and the weather of the future is already here.”
A majority of the US electric grid was built in the 1960s and 1970s, but some of the first parts of the system were constructed in the early 1900s. And 70% of transmission lines in the US are approaching the end of their 50- to 80-year lifecycles, according to the DOE.
Like Gail has pointed out, she doubts we have the means to explace what we already have, never mind expand it…
And of course, adding wind and solar adds requires disproportionately more transmission infrastructure. This happens because they are small sources (with respect to their actual average output), located at a distance from where more usage is needed. (Most solar is from utility scale solar, but even these are small compared to fossil fuel electricity generating sources.) They are also intermittent. They need to be sized for their maximum output, even though their output will vary from zero to the maximum amount, averaging something like 20% for solar–somewhat more for wind.
Yeah, the future looks bleak ahead for the AI and Green 🍏 Powered economy….can’t wait to hang my laundry on those collapsed electrical towers…of course the fell 🤯 n their own..nothing to do with the climate
Are We the Next Endangered Species?: Bioweapons, Eugenics, and More Hardcover – July 16, 2024
by Dr. Richard M. Fleming (Author), Charles H. Rixey (Foreword)
Readers will discover the intricate pathways of biowarfare and eugenics converging with the emergence of COVID. They will learn about the gain-of-function bioweapons responsible for the pandemic and the parallel development of eugenic genetic vaccines. Fleming reveals the control wielded by the military-industrial complex and world leaders over your life, movement, property, and freedoms.
We begin to see who is in power.
“BYD Co. unveiled a new hybrid powertrain capable of traveling more than 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles) without recharging or refueling, intensifying the EV transition competition with the likes of Toyota Motor Corp. and Volkswagen AG.
The upgraded tech, which aims to put more distance between BYD and its rivals, will be launched in two sedans immediately that cost under 100,000 yuan ($13,800), the automaker said at an event live-streamed Tuesday evening from China.”?
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-05-28/byd-shows-off-new-hybrid-powertrain-capable-of-ultra-long-drive?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_content=business
I don’t think the focus on trying to make EV”s travel long distances is worthwhile. If you can afford an EV. You can just rent a car if you need to travel far away from home for something. Hell, people can rent their own cars out via sharing apps now. (for cheap)
They need to figure out a way to make an EV that can travel 100 miles on single charge. That is as cheap as possible. The main reason they want to make them go long distances is not because people are going to use them for that purpose, it’s because people are scared they will run out of juice. And they way to solve that problem, would be to require all gas stations to have at least 1 ev charger. Sorta like the old pay phones, so people wouldn’t have to worry about running out of juice just driving around town.
Just my .02 cents
It depends. If you have a population who can charge their vehicle at home every day, then short distances are OK.
If people live in high rises, and they have no way of charging their vehicles except public charging, they might not want to charge very often. Perhaps they would like a long charging time.
My impression is that a huge share of people in China live in high rises (especially in the built-up southern and eastern part of the country). I don’t know what the charging facilities are like. These will be the bottleneck most places.
On AI ;;
“What do such machines really do? They increase the number of things we can do without thinking. Things we do without thinking-there’s the real danger.” Frank Herbert
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/05/how-ai-will-change-democracy.html
‘But when the roof is leaking or the car won’t start, negotiations favor the few who can actually fix the problem. Despite the overblown hoopla about AI, ChatGPT can’t fix leaky pipes or roofs, nor will it ever be able to do so because all it can actually do is play around with words. Since we can’t repair a leaky roof or prune a tree with words, Large Language Model (LLM) – Machine Learning AI is useless in the real world.’
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2024/06/charles-hugh-smith/the-150000-housekeeper-wage-inflation-kicks-into-second-gear/
Yes there are many skills we want our AI to have. Wazneack’s test is go into a typical American home and make a cup of coffee.
Patience grasshopper.
AI really messes up applying for jobs over the internet because so many applications are being made–hundreds or thousands for a single job applicant. It makes it hard to match up those hunting for jobs with those seeking them. It is difficult to see that it is a step forward.
The article has many interesting ideas, but I am not sure AI will actually evolve the way the article suggests. But it is interesting to think about.
1ourr children will not forgive us,” he said, if delegates did not go along with the U.S. amendments to the International Health Regulations.
Other issues that transpired during the debate on the way forward on Tuesday included calls for respect for sovereignty and national control of health policy from countries across the world, including Russian Federation, Gulf states, Israel, and others.
A delegate from Belarus also criticized efforts to try to isolate vaccine manufacturers from liability for vaccine injuries.
“People should not be used as guinea pigs,” she said.
the pandemic treaty seems to be deviating from its true intentions as debates are continuing this is good news because mandatory vaccinations will not occur that means the elders will need a new plan .
I suppose they could just ensure that the crucial ingredients are covertly added to ‘medical products’ which nearly everybody uses from time to time. Small examples: aspirin tablets, ibuprofen tablets, dental local anaesthetics.
In fact, how do we know that this is not already happening?
More things to worry about!
https://newatlas.com/energy/modular-nuclear-reactors/
Small modular nuclear reactors get a reality check in new report
This is a link to the report the article is about:
https://ieefa.org/articles/small-modular-reactors-are-still-too-expensive-too-slow-and-too-risky
If their opinions are worth taking at face value, then renewables like solar are the way to go, since that’s their final conclusion (the point of the report is to say no to nuclear and yes to solar and wind). If you think solar is not the way to go, maybe it would be worth digging into the legitimacy of their assessment.
I notice that they don’t get down to the reasons that costs are high and schedules are long and make any recommendations on how to improve those.
This was an interesting article a month ago.
globaltimes.cn/page/202404/1310452.shtml
The Brest-OD-300 is under construction at the Siberian Chemical Plant (SCC part of the Rosatom fuel company TVEL) as part of the pilot demonstration power complex ODEK – Opitno Demonstratsionovo Energo-Kompleksa, which is part of the Breakthrough (Proryv) project intended to demonstrate closed fuel cycle technology, according to the report.
…
Since their birth in 1960, fast reactors have been attracting increasing attention around the world because they can provide efficient, safe, and sustainable energy. The closed fuel cycle of fast reactors can support the long-term development of the nuclear power as part of the world’s future energy structure and reduce the burden of nuclear waste. Thus, the fast reactor has become one of the development directions of global fourth-generation nuclear power.
…
The main material used in these reactors is uranium-235, which accounts for only about 0.7 percent of natural uranium in nature. In comparison, fast reactors can fully utilize uranium-238, which accounts for as much as 99.3 percent of natural uranium, increasing the utilization rate of natural uranium to more than 60.
Because of his knowledge on NP, I sent this link to Kerl Denniger by email and he did a story on it, Closed-Loop Fission Energy? – which was then put behind a paywall. In the time it was public I read it but he didn’t acknowledge the source I’d sent on which it was based. His views were that fast reactors were clearly a great advance for the future and that the US was handicapping itself by not pursuing; although he likes lithium cooled (? can’t check his original, now) reactor designs better.
In the old days the fast reactors used to be called Breeder Reactors and the most advanced one of these was in Japan, Monju Nuclear Power Plant, which has had decades of trouble and I think the project has been abandoned. Although they reduce radioactive waste hugely, the problem with this class of reactors is they burn up all the plutonium and there’s nothing for bombs. Apart from being able to consume quantities of spent fuel, they would also greatly extend the usage time of existing uranium resources.
“greatly extend the usage time of existing uranium resources”
This sounds like a big advantage, if they can be made to work.
Well you know Pepe that crazy man with that eternal knowing smile on his face! But he makes a good point here. When asked about Macrons push for strikes deep in Russia Putin responded that they could not be placed without space assets.
I myself have pondered what Russias response would be to the strikes. Hitting France or Germany is surely premature but merely hitting Ukraine targets is not really a response. So we have our answer. Satellite or satellites come down via s500.
https://x.com/realpepeescobar/status/1796113801038676361
Gonzalo Lira was talking the truth so he was taken care of.
I think this Pepe guy is a disinfo agent.
Could be could be. We will find out soon enough.
is this tonight’s WW3 thread?
strikes and retaliations always seem to be a few weeks or months away.
A https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pFIOWa58YiM
The hardest thing today is to find who is NOT a disinfo agent!
It would be a whole lot safer for the West if leaders would stay away from trying to provoke Russia to attack a NATO target.
I agree Gail.
My impression is that as hitting targets with Nato weapons by Ukraine has de facto already started, Russia has decided to respond in the same not-direct way (please see link below).
So we could see some heavy chaos and sabotages inside Europe to punish Euopeans States which decided to follow US suggestion to fight Russia in a not-direct way (i.e. giving permission to Ukranians to use their weapons inside Russian territory).
https://www.byoblu.com/2024/05/30/incendi-e-sabotaggi-nuova-arma-russa-per-la-nato/
I’ve been considering the same. The U.S were bleating a while ago about a Russian satellite that was sent up and has been tracking the path of their own, then Putin’s words seemed to hint at the easiest way to put a halt to the incursions.
“My second point is that the final target selection and what is known as launch mission can only be made by highly skilled specialists who rely on this reconnaissance data, technical reconnaissance data. For some attack systems, such as Storm Shadow, these launch missions can be put in automatically, without the need to use Ukrainian military. Who does it? Those who manufacture and those who allegedly supply these attack systems to Ukraine do. This can and does happen without the participation of the Ukrainian military. Launching other systems, such as ATACMS, for example, also relies on space reconnaissance data, targets are identified and automatically communicated to the relevant crews that may not even realise what exactly they are putting in. A crew, maybe even a Ukrainian crew, then puts in the corresponding launch mission. However, the mission is put together by representatives of NATO countries, not the Ukrainian military.”
http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/74132
It would seem the myths of the western hemisphere are encountering the same difficulties that the myths of the church did when the enlightenment started pointing out the inconsistencies with the proclamations of the priests versus the revelations of natural science.
The church ended up with a convoluted and ever changing narrative to keep the earth, and thus themselves, at the centre of the universe; the orbiting of the planets around the earth were fine art masterpieces!
The western financial system, and the dollar in particular, is losing its central place in the overall scheme of things. The convoluted financial outcomes (Belgium buys all treasuries!!), bailouts, the corruption within the fascist-centrist state all centre around a controlled, censored media that shrieks the truth to those dumb enough to listen.
History rhymes; its going to be tuneful times.
I am afraid you are right.
“The western financial system, and the dollar in particular, is losing its central place in the overall scheme of things”
Where is this happening? What currency are you using are you investing your money in rubles? I’m not saying that it is not going to happen but it is not happening now or in the near future. Just because you want it doesn’t make it so. Believe it or not all systems are corrupted and failing now it will happen much later in the U. S … David has been right about this. I can admit when I was wrong
You’re certainly right; there is no way for anyone in the USA to use anything but dollars. Buying and selling Russian assets is illegal. If you have shares of GASPROM sitting in your brokerage account they sit there but cannot be sold. Yes there is a wall created, and it’s not coming down. There is no intention of dividing up the world. The intention is to conquer Russia.
The problem is China. China’s economy is 10x Russia’s. If we didn’t need China we would have already sanctioned and walked it off, too.
Instead China is not walking us off, but clearly indicating that they will not wall off Russia.
Which is why they are preparing for war with China. Not planned and not liked but that’s what they are going to do.
When that happens, Chinese assets get locked, too. Anything in China becomes zero dollars.
Poof
Gasprom
Poof.
The war on Russia was to get China under control by controlling its access to energy.
The trouble is the dollar relies on international use for its value. Knocking Russia off, it was a blow. Knock China off it, and it’s through.
Which is “no problemo,” as terminator would say.
When the war with China starts that will be the least of our worries. The dollar is not all that important. They used it and now it’s going out because they did.
Currencies come and go. What we call the dollar is not the same thing the dollar was in 1970. Different financial instrument. What we call the dollar is not the same thing that the dollar was even ten years ago.
Currencies only are defined in terms of other currencies, goods, and resources. Because of that, they represent a relationship to the world and that relationship is very, very malleable.
The war with Russia is not to end the relationship and have it exist as it is. It’s to assimilate it so no relationship is relevant. It will be the same with the war with China. If they fail and these countries continue to exist as independent entities, the dollar goes to zero as its relationship to other currencies, goods, and services goes to zero. If they succeed, the relationships no longer exist because they are the same organism and the dollar goes to zero in that scenario also.
Currencies come and go. They are only a reflection of the world, not the world. What’s the value of the west German mark? Certainly an enormously strong currency not long ago. Zero. Why did the Thai baht change 30% when devalued? What are Confederate dollars worth? Currency’s are reflections of relationships that are in constant movement. In fact they are demonstrably one of the most non stable things in the world and quite often cease existence permanently. A reflection of relationship. As such, there value is for spending in the present. Same as it always was. To try to grasp any currency as a stable fixture is like trying to fight water. To have fears about a currency is to live in fear. It’s like basing your happiness on how long your goldfish lives.
Bonds are like wedding rings–an attempt to give physicality to a non tangible relationship. Treasuries are being sold. Your best bet for a wedding ring is at a pawn shop.
You make some very good points. We cannot count on any currency. “Spending it now” can be a good strategy.
Wow! Lots of good points! I was talking about this to a Ukrainian friend of mine the other day. He explained how there is a lot of maneuvering going on. And what we see is not necessarily the same as what is going on in the background. Russia and China will never fully trust each other and are always suspect. But it makes for good theater and Zero Hedge goes nuts for it! I saw one commentator says that its like game of thrones and even though you want the one country to get there dues it doesn’t always happen.
Lack of liquidity ends payouts on one fund:
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/time-pay-satan-canadian-asset-manager-blocks-cash-distributions-private-credit-funds
Maybe this is the same issue affecting insurers and reinsurers. They can’t pay out big amounts without causing a problem. With higher interest rates, their bonds are worth less.
Wow. A accurate MSM article.
What is not discussed is the loss represented by the failure to realize that aircraft carriers are ineffective earlier. We have 11 of them.
The author thinks the USN should switch its focus to submarines and develop hypersonic missiles. I could not agree more but the reality is these things do not exist now. In this regard it’s sort of like the drive to switch to wind and solar except those are poor alternatives not better ones. The similarity is that neither actually exists now.
If you look at Russias or even Irans missile development it’s a long term proposition where research is built up over decades. The better designs only exist because of previous designs.
I question whether the contract way in which the navy acquires things is conducive to this process.
What the article leaves unspoken is that a naval war with either Russia or China will result in sunk carriers.
Can the USA actually some how just mothballing its massive investment in the carrier groups and manufacture hypersonics and submarines? The Ohio class subs are very old designs now also.
This will be a very difficult task and it requires creating design and manufacture that is dedicated to programs presently not just contract to contract.
It’s good to see a honest assessment but there are no indicators of change. Navy top brass is all top gun pilots immersed in the culture of the carrier group. It will take decades of multiple paradigm shifts and massive resource allocation to achieve what is needed. Possibly first results in a decade. Where will China and Russia be in a decade? This needs to be considered as well as what our strategic goals are in these investments.
I’m a bit torn on this. On one hand, I would like to see the changes made to create an effective navy. On the other hand, what’s the point? The bigger question: Can any navy really project force in the future? What will that force accomplish?
As other countries arm with inexpensive but capable ordnance, is projecting force practical? According to the article, the solution is that new types of force projection are needed–not that projecting force via a navy is no longer possible. I’m not sure that is correct. This of course is an inconceivable idea for the USA but is it not appropriate to consider?
Aircraft carriers being nuclear are very expensive to decommission. Some have jokingly suggested it would be better to have China sink them.
It seems to me we are trapped in multiple paradigms by our massive investment in them. Change will be very hard and has many barriers. Easier to just maintain the carrier groups and hope for the best.
https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/age-navy-aircraft-carrier-over-209780
I’m afraid that we can’t get anywhere with the navy. We are set in our old ways. We do not have the cheap energy and long investment needed to make much better devices. Even at that, simple but capable devices can shoot holes in important things. Using our expensive devices to counter inexpensive devices is a way to go broke quickly.
My take. For hypersonics, what you see is largely what you get. It is possible that another factor 2 in speed is obtained, but around Mach 10-12 you hit a wall because the flame in the engine (whatever the type of engine) propagates at around Mach 12. So Russia and Iran have a window of opportunity now, and I agree that it will last of order ten years, during which you have a weapon the enemy does not have. In ten years the US may well have a paralyzed ground force but can still lob unstoppable hypersonics at crucial infrastructure and make itself a nuisance.
By then Russia (and probably Iran) will have maneuverable hypersonics, which can not be stopped period. so I think military supremacy can be extended another ten years by having S-400, 500 or 600 which can stop ballistic hypersonics. But how? These missiles have a very low radar footprint. It has to be through a satellite constellation working in the visible-infrared. Though this proposition is very expensive. The US blew through 1+B dollars in much inferior Patriot missiles to stop Iranian aircraft coming at Israel in a single night.
The other crucial question is whether a viable submarine detection system can be developed. Right now no one has it. Even a crippled US can make itself a nuisance just by sinking tankers. Although with the inelastic demand for conventional oil that shale has created, the US would soon run out of workable refinery solutions when tankers going to the US are also sunk.
“by then Russia (and probably Iran) will have maneuverable hypersonics”
Do they not already?
I thought the Kinzhal was a manoeuvrable hypersonic. Is this not correct?
Yes it is. Iran does not have them, although they have one that splits in the final leg (I assume into decoys and payload). Kinzhal can maneuver but it is relatively short range. It can not cross the ocean. Vanguard and the other (nuclear powered) can but are not in production yet.
Thanks, I didn’t consider the range of the Kinzhal.
How about the Sarmat?
Carries the Avangard and Yuri Borisov said last year that it had been put on combat duty. Limited numbers I assume, so maybe not correct to be considered a true part of the arsenal yet(although a single one can apparently wipe out the whole of Texas).
Going back to the attacks on the Duga’s, this is an interesting view on possible reasons(first 3 minutes) and marks Iran as the real target.
Correct. Factually, you can only account for fully working delivery systems. I do not remember all the details about the Sarmat, but I know it can carry multiple warheads and will split on re-entry. If nuclear war erupted now, much of the delivery systems would be Kinzhal from submarines or semi-ballistic Sarmat which will be visible in the visible-IR but very difficult to track with radar.
My take on hypersonics…. If you can hear ’em coming, you are probably safe.
A comment on the Russian development of a smallpox/ebola virus. 44:40 in:
https://rumble.com/v4x21oo-mel-k-and-dr.-richard-fleming-phd-md-jd-wake-up-call-are-we-the-next-endang.html
Russia already has this, according to Fleming.
Small pox Ebola chimera would not make a good pet. Soviets planned on firing via missiles into USA as a clean up after nuclear strikes.
One wonders if a smallpox ebola organism is currently being cultivated, to develop a vaccine of course.
Small pox has about a 12 day delay between infection and symptoms if they could get that characteristic with ebola it would be a gain of function. Ebola kills after exposure 24 48 hours. Ebola kills too fast to spread but its lethality rate is unsurpassed.
https://pswscience.org/meeting/smallpox-and-ebola-viruses-as-agents-of-bioterrorism/
Ebola countermeasure looks to be adenovirus vector.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebola_vaccine
“Single jump consistant with lab origin”
Ebola research facility located in area of 2014 ebola outbreak.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/did-west-africas-ebola-outbreak-2014-have-lab-origin-latham-phd
There wasn’t any sign of an animal epidemic that jumped to humans:
The entire document is fascinating and I find its arguments including the genome evolution to be extremely well considered and compelling.
Wasn’t Victoria Nuland managing some bio-weapons labs in Ukraine?
I am sure all that research was unsafe and ineffective…so far.
Thank you postkey great stuff.
A comment on ‘bird flu’. 43:46 in:
https://rumble.com/v4x21oo-mel-k-and-dr.-richard-fleming-phd-md-jd-wake-up-call-are-we-the-next-endang.html
Don’t be worried about bird flu. Same thing as escaped in 2014.
A comment on Oswald. 42:30 in:
https://rumble.com/v4x21oo-mel-k-and-dr.-richard-fleming-phd-md-jd-wake-up-call-are-we-the-next-endang.html
Oswald was trained by the CIA. The hit by Oswald was a CIA directed hit.
A comment on the Kennedy assassination: 39 min in:
https://rumble.com/v4x21oo-mel-k-and-dr.-richard-fleming-phd-md-jd-wake-up-call-are-we-the-next-endang.html
Fleming says that instructor he had was an attending doctor after the assassination attempt. The instructor, behind closed and locked doors, said that the story told the world was false.
“Western European companies are avoiding sanctions imposed on Russia by trading via third countries – and central Asian economies are cashing in. “?
https://cepa.org/article/central-asia-a-lucrative-back-door-to-russia/
https://safety4sea.com/oil-tankers-forced-to-depart-southern-greece-amid-navy-exercises/
They have been transferring the oil from the small tankers to the big ones off Greece. So it goes to Asia (round the Cape now?) Once there returns to Europe (round the Cape now?)?????
According to the article,
We also saw articles about companies in China selling their products through differently named affiliates to avoid sanctions against specific countries.
Yes Gail, it is happening also with resources sold by Russia, which arrive throuh intermediaries to whom is in need of.
The general take seems to be that everything is going on, but with more difficulties for everyone and with major costs than before for all.
So, it is a sort of attrition war of the two sides also on the economic point of view, not only on the battlefield.
Every economy is bleending, but the purpose is ‘a sort of’ to see who dies first for bleeding.
The system is reducing is size, not only with virus, experimental vaccines and wars, but also making economic systems more cumbersome and muddled.
I think that at certain point something could break and we could all fall in a more aggressive phase.
The american political system is rotten with the corruption of the anti-human left. These people are thoroughly vile. They persecute and bully their political opponents. They do not respect the democratic process. To them it is just a means to an end, that is only of value if it produces the result they want.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/trump-jury-says-it-has-verdict
The polls remain in Trump’s favour. If he does win the presidency, he needs to make it his mission to end these people. They are contemptable and acthreat to the democratic process.
No golfing where he’s headed, bubba may sink a few balls mind you.
And Trump is sneaky clean?
Yes, squeaky…please 😅…no need to write more..
I think he will start another war rather than clean things up. You don’t clean anything on the way down.
We will see. January is a long way away.
Trump remarks upon conviction.
Telling his base what they want to hear?
The MSM is interpreting this as the words of a tyrant vowing to eliminate the opposition.
So what’s the truth this or “I love Lindsey Graham”?
The president has a lot of power but it’s also limited.
IMO the EU and the USA seems very enthusiastic about continuing the Ukraine war. I dont think Trump could change that even if he returns to office. If he does there will be a fuss. The divivisiveness of his first term will seem mild. He’s fighting basically everyone now.
The only way this guy gets back in is if they need a patsy for the crash.
“This is the final battle,” he told supporters in the narration. “With you at my side, we will demolish the deep state. We will expel the warmongers from our government. We will drive out the globalists. We will cast out the communists, Marxists and fascists. We will throw off the sick political class that hates our country.”
Can someone remind me please what happened last time to drain the swamp and poison the dogs of war?
Son, you tried your best and you failed. The lesson is, don’t try
Homer Simpson
nah, I’d say give someone else a try. I understand Jill Stein is the only anti-war candidate so far
Disclosure: non-voter
Wow, Jill Stein you say, remember her way back to my days in Boston in the early 2000s.
Trump attended a Libertarian event to speak the other say..they booed him while he just pointed out, keep it up and you all will get 2% of the vote that you always do…
Disclosure …no party affiliation and seldom vote myself
Libertarian is woke with rainbow painted guns now.
I’m writing in Kim Iverson. Nice young sensible gal from Idaho who can see both sides and isn’t on team blue or red. Dont agree with her on everything. She actually hasn’t expressed any desire to run for president. It will be a surprise when she wins!
Looks like my girl Kim is endorsing Jill Stein. Sorry she is a commy and a unicorn believer.
I really think this guy is onto somthing. Pony based economy!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4d_FvgQ1csE&pp=ygUJZnJlZSBwb255
Trump “nicki haley will be on my staff”
Behavior always indicates operating principles.
Always.
Trump is out of the frying pan into the fire.
I endorse Jill Stein for president.
Were f*****.
Just a tidbit . Nikki Haley is of Indian origin . In India ” Nicci ” means younger and is used as a calling out for the younger sister . I agree with you ”Behavior always indicates operating principles. ” . 350 million and they have to choose between Trump and Biden . Tweedledee or tweedledum . What a choice .
This is the woman that went to the illegal encampment and wrote on a U.S supplied bomb “finish them”.
Well, at least you all have no doubt what you’re choices are. A vote for genocide, a vote for a quicker, more honest and in your face genocide, or non participation in the sham. Strangely, the same lack of choice is faced by the population of every majority white nation on earth. What’s the probability of that, if we were to accept, as we are told, that each one is a sovereign democracy?
I can’t wait for the candidates for non choice(we get 3 here) to knock on my door, asking for my vote. Each will be asked their parties stance on the mass murder of innocent children, informed consent, freedom to choose what enters my body and why they hate Russians and Ukrainians so much. I seriously doubt any will still be standing there after the first question and that will end my participation in their different tie, single choice sham.
Nikki Haley is a war monger she is the female version of Hilary Clinton. She is in bed with the war machine so maybe they have plans of putting her in charge. She is willing to play ball
Fast Eddys closes, marking the end of an era for Perth’s …
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
https://www.abc.net.au › news › fast-eddys-closes-as-pe…
May 10, 2019 — Fast Eddys was the first restaurant in Perth to open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, serving anything to anybody at anytime long before …
Wow, ain’t that ABC so woke!
Lived a few years in Oz many moons ago, but things have ‘progressed ‘ muchly since then.
State owned media is narrative to the max.
Never mind, the Real Fast Eddy is near Perth now, so all is good.
His new blog says he’s in NZ. That was where he allegedly lived when he used to entertain us here.
A total mystery.
Fast Eddy wants to be the center of attention. On his own blog, he can be.
where is this blog?
https://fasteddynz.substack.com/p/
He has written several pieces, since the middle of May.
Thanks Gail.
He seems quite happy educating his new students about the mysteries of the UEP and Bosch super viruses. A peaceful retirement as he smacks first graders into submission. Just too old for the OFW hockey rink I suppose.
Had a look(unbelievable extinction plan). He’s still using that silly TV show as evidence. Someone tell him that the year of the rabbit doesn’t come around again until 2035. I’m sure he’ll be relieved to hear that his own evidence states he’s still got over a decade(or two, or three) left. The move to WA won’t seem so pointless.
I don’t believe everything but something to think about:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dB0zL53FYLk
Oil apparently is going down, not up.
Energy is costing more in dollars than other currencies.
If this is correct, seems like H does not have a future, or a near future.
It is good to get varied opinions. The doomers have yet to be correct. This fellow has a different point of view from Art Berman. He sees demand peaking in the 2030 period.
He speaks of autos, cars. public transportation. In global marked EVs are replacing IC leading to demand destruction. Price of EV is < $20K. My 2022 Camry, Hybrid, all in was $37K, this is a base model. That is the price off the showroom floor, not the sticker.
Ebikes are becoming common here, try and walk daily, always see 3-6 in a couple of hours. Winters are a different problem, MN winters.
I like the guy, he is concise and seems to have good data. Need to research who he is, who he works for. He has links in the description and he gives a transcript.
He is somewhat like Gail, this was in the About.
"Several viewers have written, expressing their appreciation and generous offers to send money. This gives me great satisfaction to learn that we are sharing information that is helpful. Please send your contributions to support this beautiful ministry here. They are in Nepal, and doing wonderful work: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100041298318407 "
It appears he is at directequipmentcorp.com.
Hmm, wonder if I can get some help on importing solar panels. Alibaba generally starts at 100Kw per order.
It would be fun to visit him, does he speak Mandrin?
Dennis L.
Found Him.
https://directequipmentcorp.com/our-team
Dennis L.
The first link is another interesting video featuring Kevin Walmsley. He says many interesting things, plus a few things I disagree with.
He points out that electric bicycles are taking the developing world by storm. They are a whole lot cheaper than cars. They also use less electricity to recharge.
If trade moves away from the high cost areas of US, Europe and Japan, the remaining part of the world can use oil more sparingly. (This is why they have been able to grow, while the rich nations have had problems.) They can afford relatively higher prices, in my opinion.
There is a lot of heavy oil available in the world to develop, if the price of oil is high enough for it. Walmsley specifically mentions Venezuela, but Russia has quite a bit too, as does Canada. The poor countries will be able to use it, if they are mostly living in cities and using electrified public transit.
Well the U.s is heading for a recession/depression. This will make oil cheaper.. companies will pull back on investment in favor of keeping stock holders happy. This will cause a decrease in supply
” There is a lot of heavy oil available in the world to develop, if the price of oil is high enough for it. Walmsley specifically mentions Venezuela, but Russia has quite a bit too, as does Canada. ”
Two words will summarize the above
1. Unaffordable
2. Unobtanium
I have explained this several times .
”He points out that electric bicycles are taking the developing world by storm. ”
I know that they are nowhere to be seen in India . There it is a rich man’s toy , something to talk about over cocktails . Again an e bike is unaffordable for an average Indian to commute . I don’t think they sell much in Africa or MENA because of the poor roads , heat and dust conditions . So which devolping world ?
Maybe in China. It has better electricity and roads than other developing countries.
Where I live some are using the E bikes and they are very low income. They have old gas vehicles and the ebikes take the edge of maintenance and gas. Old cars have things wrong with them and are no fun to drive. Ebikes require no collision insurance like a car. Hopping on a bicycle for a 5 mile ride in the morning or after work is just too much but a ebike its not bad. A ebike takes the hills out of the equation. That’s huge. In the winter, of course, their utility is limited.
Except that the poor countries of the world can afford a higher oil price than the rich countries. We have seen the poor countries of the world outbid the rich ones in the past. Non-OECD countries have seen their oil consumption rise, and OECD companies have seen theirs fall.
https://ourfiniteworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/World-oil-consumption-OECD-and-Non-OECD.png
I am convinced that it is the overall cost of energy (including perhaps human energy), relative to the output obtained, that makes a difference. This needs to be affordable by a large share of citizens.
You will need a customs broker.
I like these guys.
Some of the China manufacturers can get merchandise to customs warehouses in the interior for much much cheaper than we can ship it from long beach.
A customs warehouse is a serious thing almost like an embassy. Until it leaves that place, the merchandise is totally under their jurisdiction; you don’t own it. If they say nay to the import, you are responsible to export it. That almost never happens, but if you decide to play with this you will see it’s a serious thing. In the past there have been instances where tariff increases have left goods stranded.
It can leave customs in long beach or at a customs warehouse in the interior.
The USA is the wild west when it comes to imports compared to Europe where many, many tariffs agreements and taxes come into play. There are many opportunities.
There are many PV panels being sold in the US and lots of competition. Personally I wouldn’t bother with the hassle of an import below $5k. It makes more sense and is much more efficient to bring goods in, in full shipping container quantities.
A customs broker dots the I s and crosses the T s on a shipment leaving customs. If that doesn’t occur, instead of flowing through smoothly it gets put in a different “bad” customs warehouse. You don’t have possession and are getting charged for storage. The onus falls on you to fix the problem and now you’re trying to get something bad declared good. The vendor in China is paid–not their problem.
https://www.gwlogistics.ca/our-services
I will also mention that imports is a tricky business.
Say you are importing wine from France. The wine broker knows wine. H e has good wine OK wine and bad wine. You contact him. You cant see the wine or taste it. You say I want 1000 bottles of wine. He says cool $2 a bottle. You get the product. It is indeed wine. It will get you drunk. You would have been better served with a different product. There is not a return policy..
You better know spec. You better know the differences between products.
THere is a VAST amount of PV products. Very hard to know what you are buying IMO.
You want those panels to last 20 years.
That being said there are opportunities. That cant be denied.
Power has started going out in my city occasionally. No snow or apparent reason; a clear summer day. The bumpy ride down begins.
Ps guilty all 34 counts. How you get 34 crimes from a single hush money payment is unclear… I look forward to hearing the sentence.
Up 14 points post felony conviction. First president elected while incarcerated? He could get four years. If they lock him up he will probably be up 30 points.
He will get Epsteined if locked up. How does that work anyway? He gets life secret service protection. They hang out with him at Rikers island?
Let’s hope I’m wrong about him because they just gave him both Nelson and Willy Nelson status combined and he will be our next president if he doesnt suffer a unfortunate accident assuming there is a election and were not in war “no election ” status.
https://polymarket.com/event/presidential-election-winner-2024
Zerohedge take on the conviction:
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/no-such-thing-bad-publicity
As soon as he is elected he can pardon himself. Then the fun begins.
It will be appealed.With a jury not located in NYC.
They can lock him up while the appeal happens. At this point in time he is a convicted felon awaiting sentancing and the judge owns his imediate future.
Off to the gulag. You think they wont? After those jury instructions?
They want him gone they hve wanted him gone for eight years. He has messed up their plans Way way way worse than JFK. This is personal.
They just guaranteed his win in Nov. He is up 14 points. No way they let that happen. Off to Rikers.
I doubt they want him gone. He’s their other option.
“They just guaranteed his win in Nov. He is up 14 points”
You think they didn’t know that this would happen?
He said he wants to bomb China and Russia. He has also said he will give the kiddie killers everything they want to finish the genocide of children, whilst basically calling the Palestinian people vermin. He’s their man and he’s telling the whole world very loudly that he is.
Voting in the west is looking similar to the old “just following orders”. I’d advise having nothing to do with it. The fraud is not tenable without participation, so why participate and be party to it.
>> He said he wants to bomb China and Russia
No, newspapers make unsourced allegations that he said that. Whether he did or not is unknown. Could just be another smear.
“Whether he did or not is unknown. Could just be another smear”
I accept that. It could be a smear, but could also be true.
I have yet to see a statement from him saying it’s not true, so until then I’ll accept he’s happy with that getting spread around.
Fitz, I read something saying his campaign denied it. I didn’t look into it myself to confirm one way or the other.
Had a look ivan and found nothing, but my search did remind me how they pervert any and all situations, so I’m happy to retract that as unfounded until shown otherwise.
I expect an appeal, also.
Where are you located?
Pacific northwest. Probably just a windy day or something took out a power line. It’s happened a few times in the last couple weeks and I’m guessing they don’t do enough maintenance. It does make me question its robustness and design and when it happens I realize how quickly society would devolve with an ongoing outage.
“Good news: amortizing the carbon cost over the decades-long lifespan of the equipment, Bernstein determined that wind power has a carbon footprint 99% less than coal-fired power plants, 98% less than natural gas, and a surprise 75% less than solar. “?
https://www.forbes.com/sites/christopherhelman/2021/04/28/how-green-is-wind-power-really-a-new-report-tallies-up-the-carbon-cost-of-renewables/?sh=13f45f9073cd
Nice. He can climb one of those towers in February with a mild Wyoming breeze of gusts of 60 mph.
It’s all in the envelope. He included the carbon cost of all the materials including the interface with the grid? Would he still have a job if his analysis was different? Would Forbes still publish if his analysis was different? Why isn’t Gail secretary of energy? Is he going to work for a turbine company next week?
That’s the trouble. In this environment, all credibility is gone. It would be an interesting analysis if all credibility wasn’t gone. I don’t care enough to pick apart specifics. I’ll just assume it’s propaganda. I could be wrong, but the overwhelming odds are I’m right. Money talks.
I’m a conservationist. I conserve in my personal life. I still consume plenty. At least I don’t wave a unicorn flag and justify infinite consumption.
Conservation means individuals consume less. It does not mean we get unicorn t-shirts and consume as much as we can get our hands on. Not a conservationist. Fine. at least that’s honest.
Am I a real conservationist? No. That’s the worker in Shanghai or Mumbai living eight to an apartment. If they had the chance they would consume whatever they could get their hands on too and wouldn’t even have to wear a unicorn t-shirt.
..and has a usefulness 199% less than a coal-fired plant, 198% less than natural gas and is about as good as a solar plant.
At least we free up carbon to amp up tyhe carbon cycle; wind turbines generate toxic waste.
https://energyeducation.se/massive-toxic-wastes-from-wind-power-plants/
‘Future generations will wonder how dumb their ancestors must have been to opt for a form of energy that blighted the landscape, destroyed ecosystems over vast areas, killed avian wildlife, was an unreliable and expensive energy source, made nearby residents sick and left millions and millions of tonnes of waste behind.’
I think that the NREL analysis misses the point that the electricity from these intermittent sources needs to be embedded in a much bigger system. In particular, it needs transmission lines to keep it going, and a fleet of people working on restoring power, every time it goes out. It needs paved roads to go with it.
The system also needs fossil fuels to balance out the intermittency. Wind and solar mostly replace fossil fuels, not the electricity made from fossil fuels. The cost comparison needs to be made to the whole system cost, with and without added intermittent renewables.
Most people mark the end of Western Roman Empire on 476, when Romulus Augustulus, about whom we don’t really know too much about, was deposed as the Emperor.
However, it ceased to have any meaning long before that, the emperor having fled to the more defensible city of Ravenna, current pop 150,000, visited by virtually nobody, on 402.
People pretended there was an Emperor, but now in Byzantium, and pretended to live as if nothing had changed. Various kings arose but they all claimed to be vassals of Byzantium, or now non-existent Western Roman Emperor who was at somewhere.
In any case, life was so hard and brutal that few people cared whether there was an emperor or not anymore.
A lot of people are still in denial that the current civ has died. It still seems functioning to some degree, although it will function less and less effectively every day.
I do not see a way to turn around this. Some people believe in angels, unicorns, space aliens or starships, while the world continues its downward spiral.
Hanging on to straws will not do any good.
I think this is a very good observation.
In the end, the Romans couldn’t find a way to keep the Empire from sliding into ruin or to keep the Barbarians at bay. And I doubt the modern West will find one either.
But in the meantime, my neighbors across the street are still running seven cars—no, make that eight—including two SUVs for a three-generational family of five adults, one college student and three younger children. And I’m wondering how long they will be able to keep that degree of mobility up.
Agreed.
In the US, the cost of healthcare has become particularly absurd, as has the cost of advanced education. Young people cannot afford to buy homes and raise families. These things, by themselves, push the economy down.
Meh, Good looking but uneducated (non-spayed) humans are reproducing fine. They’re not reproducing enough to support a growing elderly population, and no, they cannot afford the economic output of college graduates such as financial products, healthcare services, and educational services.
College graduates are proposing Communism to help the uneducated afford what they are selling but college graduates do not want to pay more taxes.
Solution: Just add more debt, and make the economy work more on debt, less on actual materials. Of course, this can’t work for very long.
I am afraid you are right.
(RadioRadio news)
Ursula Von der leyen proposes to ‘vaccinate’ the information, talking from her Ministery of Truth.
The video is in English so you can watch it…
These people in EU Presidency, Commission and Parliament are seriously dangerous…
https://www.radioradio.it/2024/05/vaccinare-informazione-la-proposta-della-von-der-leyen/
Italexit!
Italexit!
Italexit!
When they say you owe tell em kiss my **s. We default. Collateral is nationalized. We didn’t sign up for slavery. You want some, talk to the Italian military. They gonna fight you and Russia both?
It’s coming. If it’s on your dirt it’s yours. If it’s on their dirt it’s theirs. Bonds and debt is nullified and void. Time to grow some food. Where’s the problem? Life is good. Peace out EU. Enjoy your slavery.
If Italy has any gold you might want to get it back on your dirt first. A bit of Plutonium might be good to have on hand.
Is there the mechanism for a Italexit like there was a Brexit? I know the Italian people are not down with this BS. It ain’t personal. Just a parting of ways. Best wishes. No one should have to stay in a abusive relationship.
Dear Blastfromthepast,
relax.
Italian people are by now either groggy or detached.
The maximum that could happen is a low voter turnout to the next European election next June.
But leaders in general don’t care about that, I read that Tunisia scored 8% at last election and the parliament and the government are still there with no difficulty.
My impression is that what can happen in the future is what Kulm explained earlier about the collapse of Roman Empire: Emperors in their seats, but people living under local practical-empiric rules.
It is no time for revolutions, at least here.
But it is early to have this scenario for the moment, although we are on the right path.
Thank you for your correction.
As far as local rule goes.
One can always hope.
Entropy works toward that.
2/3 of the italian gold have been sequestered by the empire. they have nothing over there.
Maintaining oil production requires a steady supply of skilled workers.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/canadas-oil-resurgence-doomed-without-younger-workers
Demographic ageing and shrinking working age population will make sustaining energy supplies even more difficult. Maintaining energy supplies on a shrinking resource base is hard enough. Trying to do it with a shrinkihg workforce is even more difficult.
Big issues:
“The decision to revive the oil and gas engineering program is indicative of the talent crunch the industry has faced in recent years, but also of an uptick in interest in petroleum-related courses, following years of younger generations thinking of the sector as the villain in the fight for curbing climate change. ”
“Dirty-fossil-fuels stigma drives younger talent away.”
Young people are convinced that the new technology (wind and solar) will replace oil and gas (and coal). They have a hard time figuring out that our current economy really needs fossil fuels. Wind and solar don’t work well.
“Young people are convinced that the new technology (wind and solar) will replace oil and gas (and coal). They have a hard time figuring out that our current economy really needs fossil fuels. Wind and solar don’t work well.”
If they honestly believe that then they are not learning science, they are learning a belief system.
This will compromise anything they produce science-wise. They think the reasons why the majority of drivers do not drive electric cars is because of misinformation and irrational “range anxiety”. They will never improve or maximize the performance of evs if they think there are no shortcomings in the ev technology.
I thought that the purpose of the massive growth in adult education over the last sixty years was to supply industry with trained workers.
There ‘re plenty of immigrants entering Canada.
Aren’t they being steered towards these in-demand fields?