The Peak Oil Movement Is Unprepared For Its Two Biggest Challenges

PLEASE DISTRIBUTE WIDELY


by Michael C. Ruppert

It is now only a matter of weeks before the truth about Peak Oil comes crashing through the mass media, the public consciousness and the imagined realities of life. In July we will see that OPEC (especially Saudi Arabia) cannot increase production. The long unconnected dots will become clear lines depicting a now inevitable collapse and die-off. The once impenetrable edifice of the old paradigm which locked our warnings away and blocked them from real public discussion will rupture. Peak Oil is certain to become an issue in the U.S.general election this November.

Two events are about to take place, and indeed have already begun. The Peak Oil movement, those of us who labored and sacrificed for years,have our collective pants tied round our ankles and our heads inserted deeply into non-energy-producing regions. The first event is easy to address if we focus. The second, however, may literally render what"was" the real Peak Oil movement ineffective and condemn hundreds of thousands, if not millions, to death. Because what people hear and learn in the first months of true Peak Oil awareness will determine the course of discussion, planning and of history, from here to eternity.

Problem 1:

Within weeks or months the major media will become "aware" of Peak Oil. They will come to the Peak Oil movement and say, "OK, what do we do now? What should a President do? What should congress do? What should people do? I have seen no serious or focused attempt to prepare for this demand. I am tinkering with a proposed Presidential Platform on the subject by myself and when I think I have something serious Iwill release it. The addresees of this email ONLY are encouraged to offer suggestions. [Ed: By this, Mike is referring to the recipients of his original email. Blog readers are encouraged to send suggestions to the blog. But Mike is not recommending that everyone start calling the media on their own.] But all of the people who have labored so long and sacrificed so much should be prepared for microphones to be thrust at them nationally and locally. What are you going to say?

Will you say, "It's time to go to Plan B"?...

Problem 2:

This is the most serious threat of all. Already, people who we have never heard of, and who have never sacrificed or contributed an iota, are starting to emerge saying that they have "disovered" Peak Oil. They are presenting themselves as experts. Their first approaches will be to local and regional media outlets who don't know their derrieres from a dry hole in the ground. The local and regional medias will be the ones funneling discussions and questions upward to the Larry Kings of this world. This is just the beginning of a deluge. More than half of those who will wind up on CNN, Fox, ABC and on the pages of our newspapers will be either one of two things: rank opportunists and snake oil salesmen who will distort and peddle bad ideas and self-promotion; or they will be out-and-out disinformation artists funded either by Wall Street or the US government. They will be intent on lining their own pockets, protecting the old paradigm and blunting a truth which has begun its demand for payment before foreclosure. These people will be murderers of the worst sort. Yet they will be flooding media switchboards, email inboxes and fax machines at media outlets around the country. And because they will be making noise they will get the air time that the real activists who have spoken truth will not.

How do I know this?

POWs, Iran-Contra, CIA drug trafficking, the 1992 presidential campaign and 9-11. It happened in every one of those "earth shattering" crises or events. I was there. I watched and felt it happen in every one of those sagas as it unfolded.

People who we have never heard of will be getting the spotlight and the Peak Oil movement will not -- because it gave up at just the wrong moment. The struggle to define Peak and what it means for mankind is just beginning. Are you willing to sit back and watch the snake oil salesmen, dilettantes, and wolves in sheeps clothing dictate the discussion and set the agenda, just when the window and demand for real education opens wide and beckons?


Michael C. Ruppert
Author: "Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire atthe End of the Age of Oil"

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The Moses of a Post-Peak Oil World

Jenna Orkin


"The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt." Bertrand Russell


Peak Oil is here or close enough, thank you. Those of us who've been dreading this moment for years are now waiting for the other shoe to drop, ie: the shit to hit the fan. When that happens, who will be the leaders who will carry us kicking and screaming towards the sustainable way of life that we should have been leading all along?

Will he be a Clint Eastwood type, far-seeing (you can tell from his squint), a man of few words? Or will he be possessed of that elusive quality, charisma, an Obama-type to whom people naturally turn because of his easy, loose-limbed command of the facts combined with that facility that Joe Biden kicked himself around the block for noting, 'articulateness?' Will he be tall? Will he be a woman?

What is 'leadership' anyway?

As Justice Potter might have said, you know it when you see it (or hear it.) As in the old E.F. Hutton commercial, when The Leader speaks, the rest of the room falls silent. Sometimes this is because he's making sense. Sometimes it's because he's wearing a suit. Sometimes it's because he's the loudest.

Whatever the reason, people accord him authority. He's the closest thing around to Daddy. While everyone else is scared clueless about what to do, The Leader seems sure of himself so they figure his confidence must be based on something.

Maybe he'll be an actor who played a leader in a movie. Knowing how to act the part, he will bark instructions.

"Finally we're getting somewhere," the others will think, regardless of where Somewhere is.

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A few years ago a band of New York City Peak Oil activists were discussing suitable crops to plant when they finally moved to their respective sustainable communities. Since New York City is in the Dark Ages when it comes to Peak Oil, these activists were, by default, leaders in the field.

But - and the activists were acutely aware of this - they were not farmers. They were novices, trying to scrape together what knowledge they could from the internet and the occasional bank-breaking weekend at an intensive Permaculture course.

So the conversation, while earnest and, by New York City standards, enlightened, fell short of providing useful information.

Until a young woman called Debbie spoke.

"Potatoes."

Her voice lacked the high-pitched excitement (the charisma factor) of the others, leaders all. And they seemed not to hear her.

But then a man who was sitting next to her said, "Potatoes! We forgot about potatoes!"

"Yeah, potatoes!" said another.

And so, by subliminal suggestion, Debbie's idea took over the conversation.

(A by-product of that evening is that I planted two potatoes on my windowsill in the hope of later writing an article called, "A Potato Grows in Brooklyn." One turned into a slimy mess; the other disappeared which must mean it morphed into soil. But that's another story.)

However, Debbie is not considered a leader either by the meet-up or by herself. She just happens, time and again, to have the information everyone's looking for.

The others know this. Sometimes they ask her for advice and she provides it, as when an adolescent ventures out on his own, only to turn back to ask Mom for money. The Peak Oil Leaders boldly go forth proclaiming Debbie's information, having incorporated it into their rhetoric and made it their own.

************************************************************************************

"We must change the paradigm!" goes the cry of the few brave souls who have for a long time seen what's coming and tried to warn those bits of the world to which they had access.

They're talking about infrastructure and the economy and other vital issues. But so far no one's addressed the assumptions on which we base our decisions, the notion that for the sake of simplicity and streamlined organization, there must be one person to whom we all look for instruction.

So it seems that when the world goes belly-up and the meek, if they know how to farm, shall inherit the earth, one thing shall emerge unscathed: that citadel, the grand social pyramid with drones at the base, some knowledgable folk in the middle and on top, the One, True Sun to whom all others turn for enlightenment; He or She who in Ancient Greece was a god, in 20th century America was a movie star and in the 21st century will be a Peak Oil activist - the Leader.

Letter to The Independent

The following letter was written to the editor of the British newspaper, The Independent, about their article, Fade to Black: Is This The End of Oil? Mike is asking blog readers to write to the paper in support of his letter.


Michael C. Ruppert


As one who has labored with Colin Campbell, Matt Simmons, and Chris Skrebowski to educate about Peak Oil, I have to say that your article has brought me to tears; tears of gratitude. There you have it. The words and truths we have fought so hard to get into the mainstream for so many years have appeared with an eloquence, judgment, and intelligence I had never expected to witness. We cannot get this kind of truth told in the States yet, but your story will crack a rapidly melting North American glacier even further. CNN embarrasses itself on a daily basis now. What's happening in the North Sea is happening in Dubai, Mexico, Indonesia, the U.S., and yes, even Saudi Arabia.

My own book is in the Harvard Business School Library. It committed the cardinal sin of linking Peak Oil to 9/11 yet it has never been refuted (acknowledged) by the U.S. government or major American media. It is in its fifth printing and ranks at Amazon in the top 5 for Political Reference and Public Affairs/Administration four years after its publication. In it, I predicted the exact economic and energy picture that now confronts us as a species.

I am circulating the link for your story throughout the North American Peak Oil movement. It will give American Peak Oilists a big shot in the arm. We have been kicked around pretty thoroughly for a long time,waiting for moments of sane coverage. It is my fervent prayer that Michael Savage's skills remain focused on the issue and that both his editors' courage and pocketbook will allow that to happen.

Michael C. Ruppert

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JO