PowerSwitch :: View topic - The case for a slow transformation rather than a fast crash

Persuasive post on an excellent forum:

"Future historians might indeed call the coming transformations of our societies a "crash", but it is not unthinkable that it will be a slow and gradual process, and that the generations who live trough it dont percieve it as a crash at all. We have a tremendous way to go before we actually start to die off on a grand scale. Our material standard of living could propably be reduced to less than 5% of what it is today before we get to starvation. "

PowerSwitch :: View topic - The case for a slow transformation rather than a fast crash

Ed Balls: Labour minister fears rise of fascism amid economic gloom

Well, I'm glad people in government have started talking about this terrifying prospect at least - if no-one with any say talks about it, it's bound to happen:
Ed Balls: minister fears rise of fascism amid economic gloom - Telegraph

Peak Oil Game

This game is kind of old already (last summer) but I just came across it. Scary:
Frontlines: Fuel of War Trailer

Interview with Mike Klare, contributor to TomDispatch

Bit of an abrupt interviewer but this guy makes a good summary of the basics of the short-term geopolitical situation:

Mike Klare discusses his latest article, "The Problem with Cheap Oil."

Play:
For cable:
For dial-up:

Download: MP3 File Interview with Mike Klare, contributor to TomDispatch

Short Term Invstment - Long Term Security

This website blew my mind - they are marketing this warplane like it's some kind of charity mission...

"That's right brothers and sisters - old, fat, black, or female - you too can find a GREEAT job making hi-tech death for Infidels.... and America NEEDS these jobs - reach out in your heart, and just pray, children - repeat after me -

'Verily, we will have this Rrraptor .... and yay, it will preserve the right to buy twinkies on credit for Americans everywhere, and yay, it will deliver high yield explosives unto the heads of non-believers, it will produce 10000's of USEFUL JOBS for TRUE BELIEVERS.... Nations of Evil-Doers will quake in FEAR before our might, but yay, they will love us, for we are The Land of The Free, and the Home of DISNEYLAND - SAY AMEN!"

An advocacy page? Unbelievable... Thankfully preserveraptorjobs.com doesn't work - let's hope their jumble sale to raise the funds was a flop.

F-22 Raptor

Link from here: Tomgram: Chalmers Johnson, Economic Death Spiral at the Pentagon

UK Companies Sort it All Out

Panic's off - Richard Branson's on the case. No worries, nothing to see here, get back in your car and drive to Virgin Megastore, er I mean Zavvi - no, didn't they shut already?:

Nice Maps

Oh man, here we go again - time to invent your enemy folks, know him well: The new boogy man



Here's one we took control of earlier:



Meanwhile in Africa... The oil protection agencies (sorry, I mean U.S. military) work continues...

Click this for an interactive version:Africom on Google Maps

I wish I was making this up.

Slo-mo Splat | Post Carbon Institute

Heinberg laying it down like he does:

"Remember the wall that environmentalists (like the 1972 "Limits to Growth" authors) have long been saying that industrial society would eventually hit?

Permit me to make the formal introduction: Industrial society, meet wall; wall, meet industrial society."

Slo-mo Splat | Post Carbon Institute

Also good:
The shape of the recovery | Post Carbon Institute

Alternative Fuels

You never know, renewable resources just might save the day:

"Miami's Jackson Memorial Hospital reportedly has signed a deal to supply Norwegian entrepreneur Lauri Venoy with 3,000 gallons-per-week of liposuction leftovers harvested by its clinics. This bio-fat could produce 2,600 gallons of biodiesel, sufficient to fuel a Hummer for a year."

Is this really how desperate things are getting!?

On America's New Energy Future / Tapping the fat of the land

Failing ocean current raises fears of mini ice age - environment - 30 November 2005 - New Scientist

This was a while ago but made interesting reading this morning - horizontal snowfall outside! Anyone heard of an update? Couldn't find any..

"The last shutdown, which prompted a temperature drop of 5°C to 10°C in western Europe, was probably at the end of the last ice age, 12,000 years ago. There may also have been a slowing of Atlantic circulation during the Little Ice Age, which lasted sporadically from 1300 to about 1850 and created temperatures low enough to freeze the River Thames in London."

Failing ocean current raises fears of mini ice age - environment - 30 November 2005 - New Scientist: "... prompted a temperature drop of 5�C to 10�C in western Europe, was probably at the end of the last ice age, 12,000 years ago. There may also have been a slowing of Atlantic circulation during the Little Ice Age, which lasted sporadically from 1300 to about 1850 and created temperatures low enough to freeze the River Thames in London."