Capitalism or Survival

Here is an oldie from six years ago....it gets a lot of traffic and given the current talk about vulture capitalism, its pretty timely.


*
It's nice, and unfortunately all too rare,

when I see an author or a story that seems to say it

like I see it.

It is clear to me that our present system will not fix our problem.

The control and love of money in our institutions makes them incapable

of seeing our situation clearly

and responding creatively

and courageously.

Here is a nice piece from the Guardian that gets it.

It's capitalism or a habitable planet
- you can't have both
Our economic system is unsustainable by its very nature. The only response to climate chaos and peak oil is major social change

Robert Newman
Thursday February 2, 2006
The Guardian

There is no meaningful response to climate change without massive social change. A cap on this and a quota on the other won't do it. Tinker at the edges as we may, we cannot sustain earth's life-support systems within the present economic system.

Capitalism is not sustainable by its very nature. It is predicated on infinitely expanding markets, faster consumption and bigger production in a finite planet. And yet this ideological model remains the central organising principle of our lives, and as long as it continues to be so it will automatically undo (with its invisible hand) every single green initiative anybody cares to come up with.

Much discussion of energy, with never a word about power, leads to the fallacy of a low-impact, green capitalism somehow put at the service of environmentalism.

In reality, power concentrates around wealth.

Private ownership of trade and industry means that the decisive political force in the world is private power. The corporation will outflank every puny law and regulation that seeks to constrain its profitability.

It therefore stands in the way of the functioning democracy needed to tackle climate change. Only by breaking up corporate power and bringing it under social control will we be able to overcome the global environmental crisis.

(snip)

To get from here to there we must talk about climate chaos in terms of what needs to be done for the survival of the species rather than where the debate is at now or what people are likely to countenance tomorrow morning.

If we are all still in denial about the radical changes coming - and all of us still are - there are sound geological reasons for our denial. We have lived in an era of cheap, abundant energy. There never has and never will again be consumption like we have known.

The petroleum interval, this one-off historical blip, this freakish bonanza, has led us to believe that the impossible is possible, that people in northern industrial cities can have suntans in winter and eat apples in summer.

But much as the petroleum bubble has got us out of the habit of accepting the existence of zero-sum physical realities, it's wise to remember that they never went away.

You can either have capitalism or a habitable planet.

One or the other, not both."

So, in order to survive the change in real climate,

we will need to change our economic climate.

In my view,

We will move from the present dominance of Corporations

to the creation of a new era of Cooperations.

We will see that we are not consumers who exist to feed these leviathons,

but Family members of an Earth that can no longer be ruled by them.

Their domination on earth will, in time,

look like the era of the dinosaurs that they have emulated.

They will look as wierd to our descendents,

as the T Rex looks to us today,

big, powerful, and

extinct.

And yes,

their demise,

may not be pretty.

But at least it will be they

who will have become extinct.

And the Earthfamily will have become alive.


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art courtesy of Stephanie Han Windham

Turn the Engine Off

One of my favorite sites for good Climate Change science and good framing is Climate Denial Crock of the week.The site also has a Utube channel. Mr. Greenman3610 (Peter Sinclair) is a very busy guy. There are at least 75 short videos on the site that are worth watching and more importantly worth sending to those few folks left out there who truly don't understand the science well enough to make an informed decision on our climate change dilemma.

I'm not talking about the 30 something % of deniers out there who can't believe in the science. If they did, too many other things in their belief system would begin to work loose. Even though the science for evolution is very compelling, it can become a kind of wrecking ball of the mind. "The bible says the earth is 6,000 years, so don't talk to me about things that are millions of years old. (like Fossil Fuels) Climate Change science is similar. Although Climate Change science is quite compelling, it becomes a wrecking ball of economic theory and thought.



Conservatives are actually pretty smart. They know that often the "Light at the end of the Tunnel" no kidding really is a train. They realize that the simple admission of anthroprogenic induced climate change is a poison pill for the consumer society we have today. Many of them seem perfectly willing to buckle their children into those fancy carseats in the garage with the door closed... and the car motor running.

Despite the crazy warm winter in the NE, the terrible drought in Texas, the incredible shrinking North pole, the need to respond in a sane and strategic way has never been greater and the will to do so has never been weaker.

Climate Crock of the Week is bound to be helping in making a dent in that.

Another Climate Change hero is James Balog. The new documentary of his time lapse glacier photography is truly powerful. The title is Chasing Ice

Powerful Images can do powerful things. And Mr. Balogs images are truly that. In the documentary, he says that when it comes time that everyone knows and understands the challenge ahead for our species surviving climate change, Mr. Balog wanted to be able to say that he did everything he could to ring the clarion call.

Mr. Balog and Mr. Sinclair are doing their part.

We need more of us so we can

open the garage door and

Turn the engine off.

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John Collins Andrews

John Collins Andrews (1948-2012)

Just 12 days ago, around three o'clock, I was talking with Sarah in my office at the Utility when my cell phone vibrated. It was Ted. "I have bad news", he said. "How bad?" I asked. "JC has stage 4 lung cancer."

Within a few hours, I was sitting next to him on his bed in the hospital. He had thought he might have pneumonia when his son dropped him off at the south Austin hospital just two days before.

Jay turned to me. "Wow, this dying shit is really weird", he says.

There with Jimmy, his long time pal from childhood, Sherry, who looked like his long lost sister, and Dana, the Angel Doctor, we chatted with the oncologist. We chatted about palliative care, about future testing, about money, about wills, power of attorney, about S.S.I, about M.A.P., about who would do what and when.

The oncologist was particularly polite but blunt. "Texas is one of the worst states for someone in your situation, " he said. "You will need a champion...someone who will break through the system...someone who will stubbornly work in your behalf." He said he would give us some time and order some more imaging to see if the cancer was in the brain and in the bone.

It was.

Over the next few days, JC's room was busy. Mick brought him Torchy tacos, which Jay ate. His Plainview friend Dee brought soup. Ted, his neighbor, co-worker, former lawyer, and friend hovers like a helicopter parent. Gazork, another boyhood friend flys in from Boise. His son Daryl comes in and out, doing his best to cope with the situation.

Because you see, John Collins Andrews and Susan Bright, the poet/activist were a couple. And just 13 months ago, we had Susan's service at Barton Springs Pool after her short bout with cancer.

By Thursday, plans were finalized. Jimmy and Gazork would drive Jay to a hospice in his boyhood home, Plainview. There he could see his aging mother Dorothy, and meet up with the rest of the family on Friday. The drive took all day, but JC sat up as they drove up the caprock onto the high plains.

On Saturday, Liz, Jay's doctor sister from San Francisco arrives to join their brother James. They all visit as Jay grows weak. I never heard him complain or saw him weep.

At midnight, our brother crossed over.

Liz's obituary captures him pretty well.

John Collins Andrews. Beloved son and brother, cherished father, boundless friend, John Andrews died in Plainview, Texas on February 25th, 2012 after a brief illness. John, known as J.C. to his family and close friends, was such a colorful person. He lived on his own terms in many ways, forever questioning the status quo but also taking time to appreciate all that was around him. In equal measure he could passionately discuss the politics of wind and water or convey an infectious wonderment in the geologic formation of the Llano Estacado.

John was active in the evolution of capturing the wind power of the Panhandle and an advocate of the Save Our Springs (SOS) Initiative in Austin.

John was born April 26, 1948 in Lubbock, Texas. He liked to say that Buddy Holly lived on his block. He loved his West Texas roots and returned often. He graduated from the University of St.Thomas in Houston with a degree in history. There he was introduced to the art scene of the DeMenil’s and to the era of independent film production. John was an early guerrilla documentary film maker when the art was first developing and he had a special talent for editing that was well respected and recognised in the film community.

After graduation and travels, John settled in Austin where he and wife Susan Bright later established the venerable Plain View Press and began publishing poetry, essays and other literature. This literary venture spanned over 25 years.

John discovered his love of street vending when he and a friend created the very first “rolling armadillo” toy and began selling on the drag at the 24th Street Market sometime around 1971. This evolved into, and thus began, the tradition of having a booth with his family at the Armadillo Christmas Bazaar every year and providing a lively place for friends and visitors to stop by and chat, purchase literature, jewelry and trinkets, and enjoy stimulating conversations. Truth be told, John was known for giving away almost as much as he sold mostly because John loved the conversations as much as the sale.

John was a true renaissance man, equally at ease at art openings and political meetings as he was working on carpentry projects in his garage or in a bass boat on the lake. John was a friend to, and involved with, so many different groups of people in Austin it would be impossible to name them all without leaving some out. Moreover, his dedication, loyalty and love for his friends, and especially his family and his son, Daryl, is one of his most endearing and memorable traits.

John was preceded in death by his father, John P. Andrews, and his wife, Susan Bright. He is survived by his mother, Dorothy Andrews and brother, James Andrews both of Plainview, sister Liz Andrews of San Francisco, CA, son, Daryl Bright Andrews and grandson, Tristen Cinelli of Austin.

A celebration with family of John’s life is planned for this summer in West Texas somewhere near the Caprock where the wind blows. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donation to Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP.org), a healthcare reform advocacy group.

I first met JC when he and Jimmy came out to Space City Video at the mansion in Taylor to edit some videotape. At the time, they were doing vanity horse jumping videos. That was 38 years ago. Soon, they were making more meatier films. One, was the Grok Book poetry readings. I watched Jay fall in love with Susan as he edited her fire and form. They were married not too long after.

JC, as much as anyone in my life made ideas manifest. He made the video documentary of my Pampa Wind Farm in 1981. He helped me build my first passive solar houses. He was the contractor when Eddie and Phil and I completely rebuilt Sholz Garden in 1987. He helped me manage my West Campus properties during the real estate black death of 1988.

In the nineties, we went west and put up the first met towers to pave the way for the wind industry 10 years later. He shot (and lost) my first attempt to create a light bending solar laser in the bowels of the UT Austin physics lab. He helped me build my Frank Lloyd Wrong home in Elgin and countless other projects.

He even cut all of the little tiny pieces that we used to build Argonon, so I could build that giant model City of the Future.

In the last 10 years, I was busy at the Utility and he was busy with Plainview Press. He also truly found his calling working on the street, tying those beautiful knots to carry those gods and deities from his trinket wheel.

When Susan passed, he asked me to direct the service.

JC was as important to me (and so many others)

as track is to a train.

And he is right....

"This dying shit is weird."

Over the last few years,

we would always say goodby by saying

"love you Brother."

love you Brother...

safe crossing





Note: There is a JCA Memorial Altar forming at 1509 Dexter. Please bring flowers and mementos....a central texas service has not been planned yet.

Important...There is a memorial for JC Tuesday, March 6th at 5:30 at Marias Taco Express, 2529 South Lamar

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The Respecticon: Seeing the Brand of Respect is Part of Believing

The first step towards a respectful society is relentlessly advertising respect for self, others and place, individual and institutional.

We who believe in respectism need to brand ourselves.

The disrespectful have always recognized one another by their actions, thereby coming together in every place and time to create an unconscious, international web of selfishness and cruelty.

The respectful everywhere must consciously choose to know one other to create their own web of global dialogue and cooperation.

Symbols have power.

We need an icon that says instantly: "Let us give to the respect."

Once we recognize and get to know each other, then we can work together to build a respectful society, if enough of us believe.

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Gasland

About six years ago, a film maker friend and I were chatting in the locker room after our workouts, and I asked him what he was working on. He said he was doing a piece on the new gas play that was happening in Fort Worth. He was pretty excited about it. He was being paid by a promoter to tell the story about the exciting future about shale gas...how it was going to change the energy landscape big time. He was working for the CEO of Chesapeake, now the second larger producer of natural gas in the US.

He threw out some numbers and they were impressive. Being an energy geek, I listened with a half believing ear. Later, my film director friend sent me the link to his film. His piece was a glowing puff piece of the future of shale gas. However, as I began to look at the claims of the reserves that were going to be opened up with this new technique, I realized that natural gas, the prince of carbon fuels, the perfect transition fuel for moving beyond carbon was about to be in more plentiful supply than was generally understood in a lot of energy planning circles.

It would be soon known as the shale gas revolution.

And indeed, as more fields were brought in, the decline in natural gas production has been reversed ever so slightly. And imports of natural gas have declined slightly. More importantly, the price of natural gas has plummeted from highs of 12 dollars/ MCF to lows in the $2.25 range.

All is good. The Barnett, Haynesville, Bossier, Marcellus and Pearsall natural gas shale plays are going to save us. Then, about three years ago, I saw an early cut from another film about this new shale play. And it showed the shadow side of shale gas. The movie was called Gasland. And it showed credible evidence that the toxic liquids used in the fracking process used to open up this shale was migrating into our water supplies.

Horizontal hydrofracking is a means of tapping shale deposits containing natural gas that were previously inaccessible by conventional drilling. Vertical hydrofracking is used to extend the life of an existing well once its productivity starts to run out, sort of a last resort. Horizontal fracking differs in that it uses a mixture of 596 chemicals, many of them proprietary, and millions of gallons of water per frack. This water then becomes contaminated and must be cleaned and disposed of.

In 2005, the Bush/ Cheney Energy Bill exempted natural gas drilling from the Safe Drinking Water Act. It exempts companies from disclosing the chemicals used during hydraulic fracturing. Essentially, the provision took the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) off the job. It is now commonly referred to as the Halliburton Loophole.

This week, the producer/ director of Gasland was arrested in a "R" controlled subcommittee for trying to film a public hearing on the issues that his award winning documentary has stirred up.

Yes, arrested.

This coming kerfuffle between cheap fuel and safe water has gained the interest of many a policy maker who are concerned about humanity and its march into the abyss.

"World class scientists and researchers have been pointing out the dramatic consequences of climate change.

In an excellent documentary film by French director Yann Arthus-Bertrand, entitled Home, and filmed in collaboration with prestigious and well-informed international celebrities, published in mid-2009, he warns the world with irrefutable data about what is happening. Using solid arguments, he shows the deadly consequences of consuming, in less than two centuries, the energy resources created by nature in hundreds of millions of years; but the worst of it is not the colossal squandering, but the suicidal consequences for the human species.

Referring to the very existence of life, he admonishes the human species: “…You benefit from a fabulous legacy of 4,000 million years supplied by the Earth. You are only 200,000 years old but you have changed the face of the world.”

The writer continues:

“Professors Robert Howarth, Renee Santoro and Anthony Ingraffea from Cornell University in the US have concluded that this hydrocarbon (shale gas) is a greater pollutant than oil and gas, according to the study ‘Methane and the traces of greenhouse effect gases from natural gas coming from shale formations’ published in April last year in the Climatic Change review.

“‘Carbon trace is greater than that from conventional gas or oil, seen on any time horizon, but particularly within the lapse of 20 years. Compared to carbon, it is at least 20 percent greater and perhaps more than double in 20 years’, the report underlined.” (clip)

“These indicators put into question the industry argument that shale could replace carbon in generating electricity and, therefore be a resource for mitigating climate change.

“‘It is an adventure that is far too premature and risky’.”

And this guy knows risky.

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The Red Pill

We're in the mountains for the end of the year and thus I was able to read a book called Escaping the Matrix that DC gave me. It's written by an Irish American, Richard Moore. The book opens with a quote from Frances Moore Lappe:

"We've lived so long under the spell of hierarchy-from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses-that only recently have we awakened to see that regular citizens have had the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crisis cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let along thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high."

The first Chapter is on the Matrix and of course there is the Red pill and Blue pill story. In the movie, Neo takes the red pill and he awakens to a reality that is outside of the Matrix. For what Neo had assumed to be reality was only a collective illusion, fabricated by the Matrix mainframe and fed to a population that is asleep within it. Like Plato's famous metaphor of the cave, true reality and perceived reality exist in different planes.

The author, apparently finding his own pharmacy for red pills, finds that our consensus reality-as generated by official rhetoric and amplified by mass media-bears very little relationship to actual reality. Starting with Imperialism and the Matrix, he quotes Abraham Lincoln: "Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object." He then moves to the London banking elites, their strategy of oil based dominance, and of course the Anglo-American Pax.

He sees World War I as the first oil war, which of course it was. At the beginning of the war, the newly discovered mid east oil fields were under control of the Turkish-German alliance. After the armistice, they were controlled by Britain and their allies.

So, within the Matrix, we had "unfortunate entangling alliances", where in reality, we had a trap secretly set by the British which was intended to ensnare Germany into war.

The same goes for the Versailles peace conference. In the Matrix view, it was dominated by the personalities of Clemenceau, Wilson, and the other victors who because of their vindictiveness and shortsighted policies were responsible for the post war debt regime which brought stagnation and hardship on Europe and ultimately another war. In reality, it was the House of Morgan just collecting its debts.

Most of us who work in the public life know that there is almost always a back story. And rarely does the back story make it to the light of day. Far too many of our brethren have been domesticated to see the world within the images and framing of those who profit from those who live their life within the pharmacology of the blue pill. Like other domesticated animals, our keepers come to us and scare us with their shouts and arm waving to move us out of the barn and into the green field where we find food and drink. As the day ends, they come and scare us again back into the barn. They keep us on their leash.

We actually allow ourselves to be called consumers.

But this book is not about describing the world of the Matrix, it is about escaping it. It is about envisioning a transformational movement and a liberated global society. Its about understanding and employing the dynamics of harmonization and cooperation.

In our little village in the mountains, the Red pill is known. Many here understand that the reality that is painted on their TVs (if they watch at all), in the newspapers, and in our Hollywood movies is shaping...a form of mind control that was developed long ago, but perfected in the previous century by Sigmund Freud's nephew Edward Bernays.

It is impossible to fundamentally grasp the social, political, economic and cultural developments of the past 100 years without some understanding of Bernays and his professional heirs in the public relations industry. PR is a 20th century phenomenon, and Bernays was widely eulogized as the "father of public relations" at the time of his death in 1995.

The Father of Spin actually wrote the book on PR in 1928. It was called Propaganda.

Escaping the Matrix gives real hope for finding practical ways for each of us to act by taking personal responsibility for changing the world through local action.

But how do we awaken from this dream?

How do we shake this shaping?

Where is our Red Pill?

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photo courtesy of red pill films

Eleven Eleven Eleven

I wanted to post something on 11/11/11, the 11th month of the 11th day on the 11th year of the century, but the day, like so many days these days, was in my rear view mirror seemingly before it even came. But it's still eleven eleven, although just barely. And indeed, it is the 11th hour.

The eleventh hour is a colloquial expression meaning "a time which is nearly too late". The phrase originates in the book of Matthew of the Christian Bible and references workmen being hired late in the day (Matt 20:6). "And about the eleventh hour he went out, and found others standing idle, and saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day idle?"

Certainly, it is the 11th hour on climate change, and once again another meeting on the subject is most likely going nowhere. Take this story:

Leading American environmentalists complained to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton Wednesday that her negotiators at U.N. climate talks risked portraying the U.S. as an obstacle to fighting global warming because of its perceived foot-dragging on key issues.

Separately, European delegates and the head of the African bloc at the 192-party talks also denounced U.S. positions at the talks, which are seeking ways to curb the ever-expanding emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases. (clip)

Discontent directed at Washington came as the U.N.’s top climate scientist, Rajendra Pachauri, warned the conference’s 15,000 participants that global warming is leading to human dangers and soaring financial costs — but that containing carbon emissions will have a host of benefits.

Although he gave no explicit deadlines, the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change implied that the world only has a few years before the Earth is irreversibly damaged by accumulations of carbon in the atmosphere. You see it everywhere, in the drought in Texas, in the bleaching of ocean coral, in the oysters in the Northwest.

Meanwhile, for the first time ever, there were more investments in renewables last year than in conventional sources. So, even as our political system continues to sleep walk into the dark night, there are workmen everywhere toiling late into the day on the new energy systems we need now.

Yesterday, while lunching with a true pioneer in the electric industry, I was criticized for being too conservative in a recent solar plan I had authored. And I suppose it is true. When you are working for real in an unreal world... a world where Capital has artfully hypnotized a great many folks into believing a great deal of nonsense, you learn to advance your cause with caution.

But thanks to many in the Occupy Wall Street movement, a few more folks are now at least looking in the right direction. For our nemesis is not the Rs or the Ds or even the 1%. For "the fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars but in ourselves that we are underlings".

For until we understand our own shortcomings, our inability to truly see our culture and the belief systems that provide the foundation for the cultural edifice we take for granted, we will be lost in a endless Sisyphian do-loop of wasted effort. For we must re-envision ourselves.

Thanks to Michael Moore, here is OWS's first try:

We Envision: [1] a truly free, democratic, and just society; [2] where we, the people, come together and solve our problems by consensus; [3] where people are encouraged to take personal and collective responsibility and participate in decision making; [4] where we learn to live in harmony and embrace principles of toleration and respect for diversity and the differing views of others; [5] where we secure the civil and human rights of all from violation by tyrannical forces and unjust governments; [6] where political and economic institutions work to benefit all, not just the privileged few; [7] where we provide full and free education to everyone, not merely to get jobs but to grow and flourish as human beings; [8] where we value human needs over monetary gain, to ensure decent standards of living without which effective democracy is impossible; [9] where we work together to protect the global environment to ensure that future generations will have safe and clean air, water and food supplies, and will be able to enjoy the beauty and bounty of nature that past generations have enjoyed.

But we must go much further than this.

And our Principles must address the very foundation

of the unreal, unjust world we have created.

For after the 11th hour,

Is another day.

Why stand ye here all the day idle?

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