Petey's Pipeline E-zine

Issue #25

February 20, 2006

Business First Business as Usual vs. Reality
Random Ramblings & Miscellaneous Musings Democracy? What Democracy?
Write Thinking Improve Your Spelling (Rule #3)

Business First (Editorial)

Business as Usual vs. Reality

Like it or not, humanity is on a collision course with the future. This isn't surprising, considering that the mass of humanity has all the wisdom, foresight and social conscience of a termite colony.

Just as termites consume and weaken their habitat from the inside out, we humans are doing essentially the same thing to ours. In terms of population and the environment, we've already hit a wall, weakening critical parts of our support infrastructure. A cascade of events arising out of those disasters will soon cause us to hit another wall, with the total collapse of our support infrastructure a likely result.

Renewable energy resources, food security, potable water, transportation alternatives, health care, a sustainable economy, affordable housing, public education, government reform . . .. All are in jeopardy, and all are of immediate concern.

People will split into opposing camps over these critical issues, with the firmly entrenched status quo crowd lining up on one side and progressives lining up on the other. One group wants to preserve its accumulated wealth and privileged lifestyle, the other wants to preserve the world for future generations.

As history has repeatedly demonstrated, resisting change is futile. At some point a good idea—or cause—reaches critical mass, and then there's no stopping it. Such will be the case for a sustainable economy based on renewable resources.

For those intent on maintaining the status quo it will be business as usual and damn the consequences. Many businesses that adhere to old economic paradigms will fail. The good news is that visionaries who are quick to recognize the raw potential of new opportunities can build a new, strong, stable and sustainable economy atop the remnants of the old.

What kinds of businesses and industries will provide the best opportunities in the new economy? Look for nanotechnology and artificial intelligence to dominate. Any economy based on renewable resources means that agriculture would take a quantum leap forward. Manufacturing facilities for ethanol and biodiesel fuels would provide new areas for investments and job growth; manufacturing of carbon fiber-based materials and products show great potential, as well.

Expect transportation systems to change dramatically over the next 10 – 20 years. The era of hybrid cars is still in its infancy. Future generations of hybrid cars will employ revolutionary new engine designs and other technologies that are either in prototype stages or still on the drawing board. A likely scenario is that public transportation will become more popular, personal motorized vehicles less so, all for a variety of reasons.

Certain low-tech businesses might also prove popular in a post fossil fuel-energized society. These include bicycle manufacturing, accessories, sales and repairs, sailboats and other wind-powered craft, and retrofitting older internal combustion engines to run on ethanol or biodiesel. And let us not overlook horse breeding and the manufacture of horse-drawn vehicles; many people will prefer 19th century technology (with modern upgrades) over any system that requires them to exert themselves.

Naturally, all these predictions are predicated on the supposition that humans will survive the transition from a world powered by fossil fuels to one that isn't. There will be energy wars. You can bet on it.

The reality of unfolding events always dictates which course of action one must follow at any given moment. To act in ways contrary to existing or emerging circumstances is counterproductive, at best. At worst, it's self-destructive.

Your best course of action is to start making plans, now, for ways to survive in a world that's soon-to-be. Any delay will be costly, and there might not be time for planning, later.

At present, the only certainty is that a time of great change lies immediately ahead. A person will either be part of a workable solution or continue to be part of the problem. In critical matters such as those facing us today there is no middle ground. No one can claim the luxury of neutrality. And no one will escape the consequences of bad choices.

Random Ramblings & Miscellaneous Musings

Democracy? What Democracy?
by Phil Hanson

Before the U.S. tries to export democratic forms of government to the rest of the world, it should first implement democracy at home. By democracy, I mean a government of, by and for the people, not a government of the disenfranchised, by the corporations, for the wealthy.

Most people who were educated in the U.S. suppose that ours is a democratic form of government. That's what all of us were taught in primary school. In reality, few things are farther from the truth. (See U.S. Constitution, Article IV, Section 4)

In our government's early days, Electors representing the individual States cast ballots for elected U.S. Government officials (U.S. Constitution, Article II, Section 1, Clause 3. This was later annulled and replaced by Amendment XII, September 25, 1804). Did we then have a democracy? Hell no, we didn't.

After the Civil War, laws regarding citizenship were refined, and voting laws were rewritten to include males over 21 years of age (Amendment XIV, Section 1 &2, July 28, 1868). Sorry, no democracy yet.

Less than two years later, new legislation prohibited denial of voting privileges due to race, color or previous condition of servitude (Amendment XV, March 30, 1870). Rats! Still no democracy.

The women's suffrage movement of the early 20th century resulted in legislation prohibiting denial of voting privileges on account of a person's sex (Amendment XIX, August 26, 1920). Nope! That didn't make it a democracy, either.

Eventually, the District of Columbia got the right to appoint electors in the same manner as if it were a State (Amendment XXIII, April 3, 1961), voting rights could not be denied for failing to pay a poll tax (Amendment XXIV, February 4, 1964), and the minimum voting age was lowered to age 18 (Amendment XXVI, June 30, 1971). Unfortunately, none of these laws brought us any closer to democracy.

In fact, we've drifted farther away from democracy than we've ever been

In the waning years of the nineteenth century, citing the 14th Amendment, the U.S. Supreme Court awarded corporations some important civil rights, among them the right to free speech. Corporations have since used the rights so granted to take control of the political process and assume control of the federal government.

Today, our government has evolved into a plutocracy or, as some are beginning to call it, a corporatocracy. Vested interests—deep-pocket interests—control the election and legislative processes, and we, the people, have a smaller voice in the matter of how we are governed.

How democratic is that?

The short answer is that it's not. A longer version explains how George Duhbya Bush and his company of puppeteers and puppets have led the country into a dangerous flirtation with fascism. Each day, the Bush Regime takes us farther away from our democratic ideals and brings us closer to a fascist dictatorship. Even more frightening, an overwhelming majority of Americans are either too apathetic or too ignorant to care.

Write Thinking

*Improve Your Spelling (**Rule #3)*

When adding a suffix that begins with a vowel to a word that ends with a single consonant that's preceded by a single vowel, it's normal to double the final consonant of the root word.

Examples: sun – sunning, hot – hottest, big – bigger, slip – slippage, can – canned

The rule doesn't apply if the final consonant is preceded by two vowels instead of one . . .

Examples: Cheer – cheering, trail – trailer, sweet – sweetest

or if the word ends with two or more consonants.

Examples: palm – palmed, doubt – doubting, rough – roughest

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