Perestroika (James Howard Kunstler)

[Tace]

James Howard Kunstler -- World News Trust

Sept. 5, 2011 -- There's a difference, of course, between what this country thinks it needs and what it's going to get. The world has a way of dragging you, kicking and screaming, to where it wants to take you.

We think we need more American oil so we can "end our dependence on foreign oil." Despite the PR bullshit you see on CNBC, the oil is not really there in a form that will flow sufficiently to support our completely insane mode of living in cars. I get letters from crazy people every week who tell me that shale oil from the Bakken Formation in Dakota will keep this racket going. Forget about it. Marcellus shale gas? Similar story. These are phantom energy reserves. And we don't have enough capital to throw at it.

The world wants to take us to the place where you don't have to use a car eleven times a day, a different arrangement of things on the landscape than what we're currently stuck with in most of the United States. The American people are not disposed to taking this idea seriously, but we'll get to that place eventually. The first kickings and screamings are exactly what's coming out of the Tea Party. These are people who don't want to change the sacrosanct American Way of Life, but they don't want to have to pay for it either, so the contradiction produces a sound and fury.

This week, President Obama is on the spot to deliver a Santa Claus sack of "job initiatives." What a sad assignment. We're leaving behind that kind of economy, with secure salaried plug-in positions provided by giant corporations and governments. We're headed into a world not of "jobs" but of vocations, trades, crafts, situations, and a lot of casual labor, largely self-guided by those with who possess a functioning internal compass. Obama can pretend to keep the old way going, but that pretense will be along the same lines as keeping insolvent banks going. The Federal Government can pay people to work repairing highways and bridges but the road system is too big now for even an additional "jobs" crew to stay ahead on maintenance, plus why are we putting these capital and labor resources into gold-plating a car-and-truck system that is going to be functionally obsolete in a few years?

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http://worldnewstrust.com/perestroika-james-howard-kunstler.html

[ixion]

1. a good quote:

"We're headed into a world not of "jobs" but of vocations, trades, crafts, situations, and a lot of casual labor, largely self-guided by those with who possess a functioning internal compass."

Spot on, that.

[Tace]

2. Sure Looks Like It n/t

[enough]

9. A downright utopian vision. We should be so lucky.

I'm not disagreeing with the notion, only saying that this is an extremely optimistic view of what is before us.

[ixion]

11. I think he's talking about an ultimate destination

rather than something around the corner, but yeah, I see your point.

[swilton]

3. Agree with his vision of a future in local agriculture

[amerikat]

4. Thanks. I always check JHK on Monday. Guess the holiday threw me off.

Many people consider him a doom and gloom type. I think he's
way ahead of the curve when it comes to changes that are happening now.

edit for spelling.

[BiggJawn]

5. We'll have to go through our "Mad Max" phase before we get to

the "World Made By Hand".
At 55, I probably won't live long enough to see the end of the Mad Max stuff.

[amerikat]

7. I live in the town that World Made by Hand is based on.

It's interesting to view the present town through that lens.

[phantom power]

6. "(Christian Dominionists) are the corn-pone Nazis I've been warning you about."

[amerikat]

8. more like corn dog nazis vetted in Iowa.

But I know what he means.

[MisterP]

10. it's not just that the USSR collapsed bloodlessly under its own weight,

or even from ethnic tension (like Zviad Gamsakhurdia, the Georgian Milosevic)
Yeltsin killed hundreds overthrowing the Parliament