Source: Tim Kelly
Preface. The founder of the War on Drugs in the U.S., Harry Anslinger, wanted to build as large a bureaucracy as possible. But a war on narcotics alone—cocaine and heroin, outlawed in 1914—wasn’t enough. They were used only by a tiny minority, and you couldn’t keep an entire department alive on such small crumbs.
Preface. Using EIA International Data for world crude oil + condensate oil monthly production to compare January through October in 2024 and 2025, it looks like about 850 million more barrels will be produced in 2025 than in 2024. And add on some refinery gains, which I did not include. But 2026 will most likely be peak USA oil. And world oil due to the Iran War and shut-down of wells that will produce less after the Strait of Hormuz opens due to loss of pressure and other technical problems to re-open them.
Preface. In August 2017 President Trump pardoned Joe Arpaio for disobeying a 2011 court order that barred his deputies from detaining people based on their immigration status. He was found guilty of continuing these traffic patrols for 18 months after the order was issued. Although he faced a possible jail sentence, he was pardoned by President Donald Trump before he could be sentenced. resulting in the charge being dismissed.
But he committed much worse crimes. The New York Times has a description of what prisons were like here, and below is an account from Johann Hari’s 2016 book “Chasing the Scream: The First and Last days of the War on Drugs”, a book I highly recommend since explains how the war on drugs started way back in 1930, mainly a war to suppress minorities. Continue reading
Preface. This is a book review of Blake’s 2025 They Poisoned the World: Life & Death in the Age of Forever Chemicals.
This is a history of how the existential threat of PFAs and other forever chemicals came to be. How the U.S. government collaborated with Dupont since the 1820s and more recently helped the government hide the damage they did to people’s health and the environment so that both Dupont and U.S. government could avoid the financial consequences.
No wonder people don’t trust the government and voted for extremist politicians who will only make their lives even worse as institutions that protect Americans are being dismantled, such as the EPA, CDC and other health institutions, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and many others. It is up to you to protect yourself now, a good reason to buy this book, and for those of you concerned about overshoot and where to be, another consideration to research. Hopefully far from DuPont/DOW and other chemical manufacturers…
What really got me was when whistleblowers in small towns were shunned by Dupont workers, who say their lawsuit as having the potential to take away their jobs, if Dupont might move their factory elsewhere. When you consider how much damage manufacturing does to surrounding communities, it seems crazy to try to bring manufacturing back, especially since with peak oil in 2018 they won’t be in business more than a decade or so, and most of the jobs too low-paying and miserable for people to take them. Indeed, there are almost half a million manufacturing jobs open that people are not applying for.
I was also struck by how it was DuPont that taught the Tobacco industry how to cast doubt and hide findings of their own scientists that smoking was deadly. So this book will never be out of date because it has the history of how companies that made forever chemicals kept it secret for so long
For those of you who voted for Trump, the author has this to say that might interest you:
Preface. I first published this post in 2012 and have updated it today. Below I summarize a part of a 2012 article by John Howe on having one child per woman to stay under the oil depletion curve.
In the last two years, more and more experts in mainstream media are predicting collapse, which is quite startling since in the past it was obligatory to offer happy endings, because people expect that (especially in the U.S. due to TV and Science Fiction).
In the past, it was difficult to impossible to publish articles and books about collapse outside of scientific journals and university presses, since the publisher wouldn’t make money. Plus, most mainstream media is infotainment, and when serious articles are printed, forces blinders of economic and political over everything, ignoring the actual triggering biophysical factors, such as climate change, overpopulation, and drought. Also ignored are the dozens of factors in the overshoot polycrisis (biodiversity, freshwater and soil depletion). Only climate change is mentioned. And you certainly won’t often read about how the planet can only support about 400 million without our fossil fueled civilization.
Preface. This is the 6th part of my book review of: Graff, G.M. 2018. Raven Rock. The Story of the U.S. Governments Secret Plan to Save Itself–While the Rest of Us Die. What follows are some of the things presidents, generals, and other leaders said.
Truman stopped one Oval Office debate over civilian versus military control of the bombs cold, saying, “You have got to understand that this isn’t a military weapon. It is used to wipe out women and children and unarmed people, and not for military uses. So we have got to treat this differently from rifles and cannons and ordinary things like that.
As Eisenhower said at a cabinet meeting, if war happened, the nation didn’t have enough bulldozers to scrape the bodies off the street. The destruction might be such that we might have ultimately to go back to bows and arrows.
Preface. Clearly infinite growth on a finite planet is impossible. Returning the world to ecological health requires humans to live within ecological boundaries in a steady state economy. But today systems cannot exist without growth as Trainer explains in this paper, which you can also find online. I wish it were more well known because I think it sums up well how our current economic system needs to be revised.
Although Herman Daly’s (2008) “Steady State Economy” is a model for many ecologists, Trainer explains that what Daly recommends has some pretty serious implications that will require a radical cultural and economic change.
I don’t see any way this can happen. It is not even going to after societies crash and reboot. Inequality and slavery are too hard-wired in the human system across time and cultures. Societies will have to live within ecological limits, but without equality and often slavery. Though Scott (2018) offers some hope for slaves, in the past they could escape to join other groups or nomadic tribes.
Preface. This is the fifth part of my book review of: Graff, G.M. 2018. Raven Rock. The Story of the U.S. Governments Secret Plan to Save Itself–While the Rest of Us Die. There are many doomsday shelters listed in this book, plus many missing because they are Top Secret.
I’m interested in the government’s plans for a nuclear war because I have always assumed the government would have plans for the permanent emergency of declining fossil fuels. After reading this book, it is obvious there is no way to prepare for a permanent emergency of going back to a non-fossil fueled civilization mainly dependent on wood for energy, structures, and more. Although the aftermath of a nuclear war isn’t permanent, the nuclear winter will last up to 15 years, far too long to feed and house billions of people, especially since the UV radiation and ice age will drastically reduce crop production.
The only solution is for industry and government to ask for less consumption. But that can’t happen in a Ponzi capitalist economic system that depends on endless growth. And to do everything possible to prevent nuclear war. The way to go about this is explained in this July 16, 2025 scientists warning to humanity here: The Nobel Laureate Assembly Declaration for the Prevention of Nuclear War
Preface. Far more buffalo can be grazed per acre than cattle and improve rather than destroy the ecosystem like cattle do. It’s likely wild bison will return to the Great Plains in the future. Already there are fewer people in areas where the Ogalalla aquifer has been depleted than when Native Americans roamed the tall grass prairie. And a quarter of U.S. food.
Below are excerpts from O’Brien’s book “Buffalo for the broken heart”. It may make you think twice about being a bison rancher or ranch hand postcarbon, but the life and work sound more interesting than farming in many ways, especially if you love being in the Great Outdoors. Also below are excerpts from Lott’s book “American Bison”, mostly about bison behavior.
Source: aquamagazine.com
Preface. This is the fourth part of my book review of: Graff, G.M. 2018. Raven Rock. The Story of the U.S. Governments Secret Plan to Save Itself–While the Rest of Us Die. Simon and Schuster. Clearly if the U.S. government abandoned plans to help Americans survive for two weeks until they could emerge from their bomb shelters, there are certainly no plans to help the public survive world peak crude oil production and peak everything — a permanent emergency. On the other hand, with world peak crude oil production in 2018, let’s hope our ability to wage nuclear war runs out of gas.
