Kunstler meets Colbert 16

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1. 

   Colin Wright Posted 5:00 am
   03 May 2008

   Maybe Kunstler will get his own show now?I thought Jim came off pretty well. It's good to see his many years of work of trying to get peak oil into public consciousness getting some air play. Good for Colbert, too!
   There is also a discussion over at the Oil Drum, and a link to a sympathetic review of "World Made By Hand" by Robert Rapier.

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2. 

   gogogreenguy Posted 11:09 am
   03 May 2008

   Not a bad messageI agree that Kuntsler came off sounding pretty good. I have seen a lot bigger personalities not able to banter with Colbert.  I know most people are turned off by his peak oil/financial collapse/doomsday predictions, but his general message that we are in for a big change in the way we live  in an energy/carbon constrained future due climate change is is not the worst message.   In the end he comes off sounding pretty sane to me.  
   A little footnote - at the end of the interview Colbert asks him about Y2K.  If you follow Kuntsler you may know that he made dire predictions about that too, which didn't come to pass  so some people feel his predictions on peak oil are suspect.  I wonder if that was a little dig from someone on Colbert's staff doing their homework.

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3. 

   David Roberts Posted 1:45 pm
   03 May 2008

   PredictionsKunstler has been monotonically predicting disaster on every front, every year, for decades now. Y2K is far from the only time the disaster hasn't panned out. Sooner or later something horrible will happen, he'll have predicted it, and a subset of people will hail him as a prophet.
   History is filled with people like him, whose keen insight into socioeconomic dynamics is mixed with overweening moralism. At any given moment, there are a few of them out there, predicting that their corrupt, decadent culture is on the verge of dissolution. For any given bad development, at least one of them predicted it. None of them ever predicted any of the positive developments. They play their part in the larger discussion, but what they are not is a reliable guide to the future. I wouldn't bet a thin dime on a single one of Kunstler's predictions.
   
   grist.org

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4. 

   Bart Anderson Posted 2:03 pm
   03 May 2008

   Thin dimesDavid: I wouldn't bet a thin dime on a single one of Kunstler's predictions.
   Careful, David!
   The full onset of the mortgage foreclosure crisis, coupled with demographic changes, rising fuel prices and a host of other factors means that the suburbs could be on the way out. One analyst has postulated a future in which the suburbs, which once promised so much domestic happiness, are transformed into the new slums, with rampant crime fuelled by poverty and decay.
   Mortgage crisis sees suburbs slump (UK Guardian)
   Faith Biro, chief economist of the International Energy Association (IEA):
    ... one day [oil production] will definitely end. And I think we should leave oil before it leaves us. That should be our motto. So we should prepare for that day - through research and development on alternatives to oil, on which living standards we want to keep and what alternative ways we can find.
   ... Schneider:
   
   But isn't it time to give a clear signal? Especially since a lot of money is wrongly invested by the OECD countries - for example for building new airports, even though there will not be enough oil to constantly increase air travel?
   Birol:
   
   We do not only tell that to our member countries, but also to Peking or New Delhi. We explained to our Chinese and Indian colleagues how higher energy efficiency can help them, how public transport can change their life and where infrastructure investments should be put. But in the end it is up to the governments, how seriously they take our statements and warnings.
   Fatih Birol interview (Internationale Politik via Energy Bulletin)
   
   Looks like two for two for Kunstler (end of suburbia, end of oil)
   Kunstler is not alone. He was one of the first and loudest to call attention to oil depletion and the problems with suburbia. But there are quite a few others saying the same things.
   Judge the argument, and not the man.
   
   Bart
   
   
   Energy Bulletin

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5. 

   Jon Rynn Posted 2:32 pm
   03 May 2008

   You two agree on most things, I think......peak oil, climate change, the need for public transit and walkable communities, the problems with biofuels, the need to overhaul the industrial agricultural system, wind/solar/geothermal...that's quite a bit, me thinks, but there may be one point of disagreement which would be interesting to sharpen -- the end of suburbia.  I tend to think that suburbia, or most of it, will end in it's sprawl-ish form.  It's possible the electric car will save a good chunk of it though -- if doing so doesn't prolong coal (again, which the two of you agree is the enemy of the human race).  Thoughts?

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6. 

   David Roberts Posted 2:48 pm
   03 May 2008

   Bart,Suburbia hasn't ended, or become slums. We haven't been forced to start hewing our own tools and growing our own food. A mention in the UK press doesn't make it "one for Kunstler." As for the end of oil, yes, many people predict that, but Kunstler goes well beyond that broad proposition into some pretty extreme specifics.
   Point is, he predicts the worst every time, with absolute confidence, and his certainty seems utterly unchastened by past errors. I share his alarm and agree with him on a great many prescriptions, but if you want to know what time it is you don't consult a clock that's stuck at a minute to midnight.
   
   grist.org

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7. 

   Colin Wright Posted 3:52 pm
   03 May 2008

   No one is perfect!I used to feel more critically towards JHK. I have a different political outlook, a different reading of the past and future. But I've come to appreciate him more and more.
   He's part artist, part analyst, part trickster, I think. And he gives me at least the courage to speak my own truth more, not to bow to convention, not be afraid of making wrong predictions. So in a way he moves us along the emotional and spiritual path to dealing in a healthy way with whatever peak oil has to throw at us. If you can make peace with a scenario like "World Made By Hand", then anything we retain above bare subsidence is a bonus.
   Who else has done more to break through the many layers of denial that envelop us? And offer us a positive message that we are each our own generator of hope.

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8. 

   Bart Anderson Posted 4:24 pm
   03 May 2008

   Prophets and journalists"You two agree on most things, I think..."
   Jon, I'm not sure whether you're talking about Kunstler and David or David and me.
   In any case, I think the differences are more of style than substance.  David and I are trained in journalism, whereas Kunstler is a prophet with a moral vision.
   David is right that one shouldn't expect literal truth from Kunstler. No more than one should read Jeremiah or Isaiah for a dispassionate history of the Biblical era.
   I do think that in times of change, prophets may have the more accurate view of the future.  Kunstler exaggerates and grandstands, but that's what you have to do to be heard by an inert public. It is looking as if he was right -- in his vision -- and the mainstream environmentalist views were wrong.
   Suburbia is not dead, as David points out, but I would be willing to bet that it's on the decline, and perhaps faster than we think.
   For Kunstler in a less fiery mood, see his The agenda restated
   
   Bart
   
   
   Energy Bulletin

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9. 

   amazingdrx Posted 10:35 pm
   03 May 2008

   Jim's storyDoes not stand up well under Colbert's satire.
   His vision depends upon the corporate/political  status quo holding sway.  Maybe it will?
   But with even the horse powered amish embracing solar PV, his post apocalytic scenario seems anachronistic.
   When Colbert pointed out that peak oil is surely a fantasy, given all the areas off limits to drilling or under exploited (siberia for one), Jim quickly shifted to claiming that oil wasn't about to end.  
   But rising prices would make Walmart's warehouse on wheels impossible.  No more salad shooters from china?  Say it isn't so Jim!  
   Most of us go through one salad shooter per month now.
   It is peak GHG, not peak oil that is the main problem.  Personally I think Jim is techno-phobic.
   He really wants to go back to a world made by hand.  Did he really have a big Y2K fixation too?  Hehey.  Colbert's research staff (an intern who googled "Kunstler" and "Y2K") busted him?  'Fraid so.  Check it, check it out now.
   http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=kunstler+y2k& ...
   
   http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

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10. 

    amazingdrx Posted 10:59 pm
    03 May 2008

    De-nileAin't just a river in Egypt Jim.
    http://www.kunstler.com/mags_y2kassess.html
    "So I'll stick with a wait and see flag for a while longer."
    (Kunstler on Y2K apocalypse fizzle, mid-January 2000.)  Didn't he see the Bushwacking coming?  
    What has been the biggest disaster in history that enabled oil war, peak climate change, destruction of habeus corpus and the US constitution, official state kidnapping, torture, and muder "special rendition", destruction of US manufacturing, job, and tax base.  Many others did foresee the horror of the Bush appointment and neocon ascension.
    Hmmm.  Some clairvoyant.
    Better polish that crystal ball a bit.
    Meanwhiile, how about a prediction on cap and trade?
    My prediction?  This mode of "pricing carbon" will allow corporations to avoid real GHG amelioration and hedge funds to build a bubble in energy prices.
    Starting at the emission permit stage it will be inflated all through the economy.  
    Just like the mortgage bubble started at the level of overlooking the individual customer's likely ability to make monthly payments.  This carbon permit/energy bubble will start by overlooking past hedge fund trading problems.
    And overlooking the warning sign.  Many corporate CEOs favor cap and trade.  Because it is a diversion?  Yep.
    
    
    
    http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

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11. 

    Jon Rynn Posted 12:17 am
    04 May 2008

    My take on KunstlerBart, I should have made clear that I was talking about your areas of agreement with Dave.  Here are my points about Kunstler:
    
    
    Kunstler does advocate solutions.  In particular, he has consistently argued for an immediate and massive rail construction program, and he's one of the few to make that the center of his alternative scenario.  In addition, he has always been an advocate for walkable communities, and his "nowhere" books are classics for understanding the whole issue
    Like Alexander Cockburn and Christopher Hitchens, the excellence of his writing tends to make up for various other sins -- he's fun to read.  Criticism and attack often makes for good reading -- as also occurs when Dave goes on the attack, which I always enjoy, even when I disagree.  Kunstler's Monday diatribe at kunstler.com is one of the highpoints of that otherwise gloomy day.
    Like many peak oil authers, Kunstler tends to overemphasize the importance of oil in the current civilization -- he's sometimes really referring to the role of all fossil fuels.  As I argued here, oil is not a necessary foundation of modern civilization, but electricity certainly is
    Like some authors such as Richard Heinberg and Sharon Astyk, Kunstler's new book assumes that people would move to fairly small settlements in the face of a "powerdown".  I think that, as in all of history (not prehistory), cities would still be at the center of a post-fossil fuel future, whether poor or rich.  Even in the case of a total powerdown, people would aggregate in cities, if for no other reason than protection.  Kunstler's new book is overly optimistic -- if history is any guide, small communities that were not within easy distance of a fortified city would be wiped out.
    
    
    If people want something a little less apocalyptic from Kunstler, they should check out "Geography of Nowhere" and "Home from Nowhere".  But "The Long Emergency" is well worth the read, even if he gets some of the details wrong.

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12. 

    Biodiversivist Posted 1:23 am
    04 May 2008

    I followed Colin's tip and read Rapier's reviewof World Made by Hand. The bottom line is this. If we don't find enough alternative energy sources, the human population is going to crash. How far it will crash will depend on how successful we are at harnessing and using new sources. If we are not successful, survivors will lump together into defensive enclaves and human history will continue as it always has, an endless cycle of resource depletion, population crashes, and warfare.
    In theory, peak oil could be given a soft landing by the higher costs of tar sands and coal to liquid. Unfortunately, we have a small problem called global warming that makes those solutions untenable.
    In theory, we can still stave this off. The Prius is a primitive first attempt yet is cuts oil use in half. This could be easier than we think.
     
    
    In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

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13. 

    Jonas Posted 7:47 am
    04 May 2008

    Doomers are importantThe thing some of us don't seem to appreciate is that doomers like Kunstler and the Peak Oil crowd are our contemporary 'mythologists'.
    They design warning signals and present a moral discourse that can open our eyes to the many problems we really face.
    I don't believe Peak Oil will be catastrophic, because we will adapt.
    But it is thanks to people like Kunstler that we have started discussing this topic more in depth. Even though his predictions may not work out, his "mythologies" and alternative scenarios are very useful.
    Nowadays we ask questions about our lifestyle as such, regardless of whether it is sustainable or not. Do we even want to perpetuate the suburbia model? Aren't hyper-efficient green and clean super highrise cities much more interesting? Shouldn't we shift our production models to localist strategies, etc....
    These questions will have popped up some day without Kunstler, but it's thanks to loonies like him that we ask them today, and keep asking them.
    Even debunking Kunstler is a very good exercise and opens discussions about sustainability.

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14. 

    hapa Posted 10:07 am
    04 May 2008

    tall tales of shortage"ha! kunstler says we'll have to knit our own mittens but climate models predict 90°F winters! what a loon."
    in defense i think the work done on Y2K was incredible. what didn't happen was due to capitalism's deep fear of downtime driving serious self-appraisal. seems to me. this is a skill of big business, marshalling resources to line up mission-critical ducks. since peak-everything is a problem of the commons, dire predictions have more to work with, because they run with the direction of industrial history -- refusing responsibility for what's not already on your books.
    what tells me he's on the right track with the oh-dear-lord-don't-go-down-there is who's pooh-poohing "alarmism." by and large it's not the good guys.
    
    

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15. 

    gogogreenguy Posted 1:46 pm
    04 May 2008

    Funny thing....that David  R liked 'Children of Men' so much when it came out.
    And I quote:
    The reason I mention it here is that it puts some flesh and feeling on the warnings of the doomers: the peak-oil doomers, climate-change doomers, nuclear-terrorism doomers, global-virus doomers, general-malaise doomers. The techno-optimist response to, say, peak oil, is hey, when oil starts to get expensive we'll respond in an orderly fashion and shift to something else, right? It's not like there'll be riots in the streets. Right? But one thing Children of Men shows to visceral effect is just how shallow civilization is. Just how quickly the veneer can be ripped away and the lawlessness and brutality let loose.
    Is Kuntsler's vision that much different?  It's at least as much of a wake-up call to the possible downside of climate change as that movie.  

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16. 

    amazingdrx Posted 2:41 pm
    05 May 2008

    Kunstler modifiedHow about doom for the status quo and boom for diverse small business that re-energizes renewably as the old world grows dark and chaotic.
    Stadiums full of city refugees from storm, flood, drought, and chaos.  Gas guzzlers stripped and abandoned.  Smokestacks idle.
    And a grassroots wave of innovation taking over in the aftermath.  I would think that sort of novel would sell better than Jim's are.
    
    http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

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