"It" just keeps popping up!

Cheney’s energy “cabal” at Home on the Range

“NUKE’EM ALL!
WE’LL TAKE THEIR OIL!”

Whenever I finish delivering the Flyer, especially in the hot months, I like to stop at one of the village taverns for a cold beer. The route is 22 miles long and much of it is on gravel roads (the shortest distances covered to four of the small towns; Effingham, Valley Falls, Nortonville & Potter). I heard the above remark at the stopover from a very proud corn producer – who wadded my sheet up and threw it across the bar in a missed shot at the waste barrel. Another grand fellow commented that there was “millions and millions of barrels, up there in Alaska.” I have learned from experience that most who read the sheet and hate it never admit to it in public.

One local supporter and reader said, “Mike, it’s a sheet that is loved to be hated around here. It makes people think, which can be a dangerous thing for a guy like you in Kansas.”

Well as I have on many occasions reminded people after moving here more than eight years ago, that I am a native Kansan and am not going away. I refuse to apologize for helping them “deal with reality, before reality deals with them” to quote from Matt Savinar’s outstanding Peak Oil: Life After the Oil Crash. They are neighbors and I trust them to try to get along, or at least be polite about our differences.

It is a sheet that bodes ill for the typical energy hooked American rustic and since the big Bush “State of the Union” oil addiction speech there has been widespread denial, and I mean real denial (as in how addicts react to physical withdrawal symptoms) about their fearless leader giving them just a little bit of truth about just how bad is “bad” in the energy industry.

I am of the opinion that all the elites in the energy industry are going to make every buck they can, all the way down what Congressman Roscoe Bartlett (R – Maryland) called the “peak curve” last March in a speech before the House of Representatives. It was a great speech and I encourage people to download and watch it from this web site. Store it on your hard drive and distribute it to your neighbors and local elected officials.

Every village government representative should have watched this speech and be preparing their citizens for this inevitable and looming energy crisis.


“While it's a very good find we should remember that 500 million barrels represents just six days of world consumption.” – from “Staring down the barrel of a crisis” the excellent Energy Bulletin Information Clearinghouse.


Below is an important section from the article “How to avoid oil wars, terrorism, and economic collapse” by Richard Heinberg

THE OIL DEPLETION PROTOCOL
WHEREAS the passage of history has recorded an increasing pace of change, such that the demand for energy has grown rapidly in parallel with the world population over the past two hundred years since the Industrial Revolution;

WHEREAS the energy supply required by the population has come mainly from coal and petroleum, having been formed but rarely in the geological past, such resources being inevitably subject to depletion;

WHEREAS oil provides ninety percent of transport fuel, essential to trade, and plays a critical role in agriculture, needed to feed the expanding population;

WHEREAS oil is unevenly distributed on the Planet for well-understood geological reasons, with much being concentrated in five countries, bordering the Persian Gulf;

WHEREAS all the major productive provinces of the World have been identified with the help of advanced technology and growing geological knowledge, it being now evident that discovery reached a peak in the 1960s, despite technological progress, and a diligent search;

WHEREAS the past peak of discovery inevitably leads to a corresponding peak in production during the first decade of the 21st Century, assuming no radical decline in demand;

WHEREAS the onset of the decline of this critical resource affects all aspects of modern life, such having grave political and geopolitical implications;

WHEREAS it is expedient to plan an orderly transition to the new World environment of reduced energy supply, making early provisions to avoid the waste of energy, stimulate the entry of substitute energies, and extend the life of the remaining oil;

WHEREAS it is desirable to meet the challenges so arising in a co-operative and equitable manner, such to address related climate change concerns, economic and financial stability and the threats of conflicts for access to critical resources.

NOW IT IS PROPOSED THAT

1. A convention of nations shall be called to consider the issue with a view to agreeing an Accord with the following objectives:

• to avoid profiteering from shortage, such that oil prices may remain in reasonable relationship with production cost;


• to allow poor countries to afford their imports;


• to avoid destabilising financial flows arising from excessive oil prices;


• to encourage consumers to avoid waste;


• to stimulate the development of alternative energies.

1. Such an Accord shall have the following outline provisions:

• No country shall produce oil at above its current Depletion Rate, such being defined as annual production as a percentage of the estimated amount left to produce;


• Each importing country shall reduce its imports to match the current World Depletion Rate, deducting any indigenous production.

1. Detailed provisions shall cover the definition of the several categories of oil, exemptions and qualifications, and the scientific procedures for the estimation of Depletion Rate.


2. The signatory countries shall cooperate in providing information on their reserves, allowing full technical audit, such that the Depletion Rate may be accurately determined.


3. The signatory countries shall have the right to appeal their assessed Depletion Rate in the event of changed circumstances.

(Note: the Oil Depletion Protocol has elsewhere been published as "The Rimini Protocol" and "The Uppsala Protocol." All of these documents are essentially identical.)