Sunday, November 15, 2009

Awash in Melting Ice Caps and Dollars

From Jenna Orkin:

Collapse (US)
Budget Deficits Soar Out of Control in Eurozone, Germany, US, UK, Japan; Yen's Last Hurrah Dollar Overwhelms Central Banks from Brazil to Korea
Which Big Country Will Default First? (from Rice Farmer)
Apocalypse everywhere: run for the hills!
And these are just the fictional movies; they don't even talk about CoLLapse.
CNBC - Dollar Will be Utterly Destroyed, Global Currency, New World Order (from Rice Farmer)
10 States In Deep Fiscal Trouble
U.S. Treasury Confident Congress Will Increase $12.1 Trillion Debt Ceiling
Economists see Fed raising rates near mid-term elections
Surge in the price of oil is a fresh threat to recovery
And vice versa.
Gazprom's American Ambitions
Saudi Arabia Pursues New Oil Trade Opportunities: Implications for the US (from Rice Farmer) JO comment: Another cut of the thousand by which the dollar dies.
Housing Agency Says Cash Reserves Are Down Sharply
Might need bailout.
Financial stocks tumble on housing market fears
Inside Trade 'Systemic' at Hedge Funds, Khuzami Says (from Vantage Point)
Americans Bypass Banks In Favor of Peer to Peer Lending
Commercial Real Estate ‘Crisis’ Looming for U.S.: Chart of Day (from Rice Farmer)
On a New Form of Indentured Servitude If you thought the housing meltdown was bad...
Reluctant Partners: Global Crisis Makes US More Dependent on China than Ever
China Signals It May Allow Its Currency to Rise Against the Dollar
Inflation Report is useless
Lieberman Shills for Big Pharma (from Vantage Point)
Lou Dobbs is Leaving CNN

America Abroad
Obama's advisers at war over Afghan conflict
Army Sends Infant to Protective Services, Mom to Afghanistan (from Vantage point)
How the US Funds the Taliban (from Vantage Point)
What Goldstone Says About the US (from Vantage Point)
U.S. Starves Children in Somali War (from Rice Farmer)
Navy watched helpless as pirates seized couple

Panic in Germany as Swine Flu Spreads

Climate Change
Greenland's Ice Sheet Melting Faster than Ever
Giant iceberg spotted off Australia Hurricane force winds to hit UK
Global Warming Brightens the Outlook for British Wine
I'll drink to that.
Keeping Warm Without Costing the Earth

Big Brother
Behavior Detection Officers Covertly Watch Travelers' Conduct
The Big Question: Why is Britain's DNA database the biggest in the world, and is it effective?
Top Scientists Fear Brain-Modified Foes
Murdoch Could Block Google Searches Entirely
Could Soldiers Be Prosecuted for Thought Crime?
Israel Mulls Viagra-Style Drugs to Keep Pilots Up
Insect Drones ‘Spotted’ on US Streets
Cyborg Flying Rats Invade China
The Pentagon Goes Into Show Business
Lockheed Whistle-Blower Over F-22

Gold
Gold supply running out
World's top gold producer, Barrick Gold, shuts its hedge book.
Barrick shuts hedge book as world gold supply runs out
gold won’t drop below $1,000 an ounce again

35 comments:

marketTrader2 said...

Jail to Start Charging Inmates $20 per day. Please post link on blog page if you wish.

http://wcco.com/crime/wadena.jail.charging.2.1312475.html

Rice Farmer said...

Re: "Keeping Warm Without Costing the Earth"

What we must do is give up central heating. That is an extravagance made possible only by cheap energy. In this post

http://ricefarmer.blogspot.com/2008/04/space-heating-proposal.html

I proposed the traditional Japanese model for heating, which involves heating the body instead of the building. At our house we heat only the family room; all other rooms are COLD (including the bath). You bundle up indoors, pile on the comforters at night, and learn to live with it.

dalex said...

Businessman: Thanks a bunch for the first-hand report on Mike and the CoLLapse showing -- and condolences on the tedious drive. (Yechhh!) Hope the trip home was faster...

"Soggy": The info about comfrey is surprising; I'll look into it!

Rice Farmer: Good point about space heating; a warm kotatsu is especially comforting when shared with loved ones.

Being earth-bermed, our basement/office never gets much below 60 degrees, so sweatshirts keep us comfortable here in winter. The problem is that it's easy to design a house for warmth -- but a pain in the butt to retrofit. (The upper floors here suffer the usual shortcomings.)

With friends and family in Japan, I have serious concerns about their 99% dependence on imported oil, and the 60% imported food dependency -- it's a good thing the culture is ambitious and cohesive...

I'm glad you're several steps ahead of the game there; karada ni ki wo tsukete, ne!

Unknown said...

Consumers urged to buy British produce

Energy is mentioned but only as a peripheral consideration.

Sebastian Ernst Ronin said...

Probing for a NAmerican Political Hybrid

Peak Oilers: Are you prepared to consider that collapse of the physical infrastructure implies the collapse of the institutional infrastructure, the institution of the large industrial nation-state inclusive?

Constitutionalists, States’ Righters and Three Percenters: Are you prepared to consider that your most sincere concerns are too late, that they are about to be engulfed by a Post-Peak Oil world and a relative NWO police state in your own back yard?

White Nationalists: Are you prepared to consider where, how and when to set up shop for the new land as the old land implodes and fragments all around you?

Pure Bioregionalists and Earth Firsters: Are you prepared to kiss the co-opted, liberal Greens good-bye and get back to some basics?

To have a respectable registration of 50-100 for the inaugural meeting of the proposed North American Secessionist Congress in October, 2010 then the corresponding FB will need to have its numbers cranked up to 500-1000. See:

http://www.facebook.com/inbox/readmessage.php?t=1242328213077&f=1&e=-12#/group.php?gid=195602320172

A ten percent return on the overture is the marketing rule-of-thumb. If you think that the proposal for a North American Secessionist Congress is timely and state-of-the-art, then please forward and inform sympathetic friends and contacts. Should the numbers not go up then the proposal tanks. A reasonable drop-dead timeline is for mid-March.

For further information:

http://namericansecession.ning.com/

http://novacadia.wordpress.com/

http://novacadia.wordpress.com/2008/11/17/post-peak-oil-and-namerican-regional-secession/

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?ref=name&id=606145963#/group.php?gid=13865634553

Thanks for your attention. The clock ticks.

Sebastian Ernst Ronin

Unrepentantcowboy said...

I decided to create my own blog after posting on the blogs of others for a number of years. There's not much to see there at the moment but I intend to change that.

http://donhenryfordjf.blogspot.com/

Thanks for allowing me to hang around this place.

don henry ford jr.

agape wins said...

Super Flu?

http://www.naturalnews.com/027503_Ukraine_super_flu.html

Don Hynes said...

TERESA FORCADES, doctor in Public Health, reflects on the history, and gives scientific data, of A type "swine" flu and lists all the irregularities related to this subject.

She explains the consequences of the declaration of a PANDEMIC, the political consequences from this declaration and makes a proposal to keep calm. She calls for an urgent activation of all legal mechanism and the participation of all citizens in this matter.

This link is to video segment 1 of 6. I recommend all 6 segments. The 50 or so minutes is illuminating, informative and well worth our attention.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0JqQyl09zQ

Paul said...

Over a week ago (7th Nov) I posted here that: "There is a lack of info about what is going on in the Ukraine. I searched bbc.co.uk and found absolutely nothing. The MSM is totally ignoring this. I do not know how much of this report is mere rumour and speculation. However, there are some very worrying rumours coming out. My suspicion is that this may be the next major play by TPTB."

This is still true, by which I mean there is still a deafening silence from the MSM about what is happening in the Ukraine (and now in Poland, Austria, Belarus, Norway and Hungary). This is VERY serious and the news blackout has been almost total.

The European BioWar outbreak, by Dr Rebecca Carley

Various extracts - quote

The biggest story on the Planet today is the outbreak of a very serious Advanced Biological War virus in Europe. 

The second biggest story on the Planet is the suppression of this story for almost two weeks by the corporate owned mainstream news media.
 
We do NOT know what disease the people were/are coming down with. We do know that doctors are describing the disease as Pneumonic Plague, or as some type of hemorrhagic fever, or as hemorrhagic influenza, or as hemorrhagic pneumonia. We know that the illness, whatever it is, does not appear to be A/H1N1. We do not know if the disease is a recombination of A/H1N1 with other viruses or some totally different virus or if it is in fact a virus. We know that the World Health Organization (WHO) has had several days to sequence the genes of the disease but has failed to release this data.

We know that the disease was spreading by about 200,000 per day but that this has slowed to about 100,000 day now, in the Ukraine, as people take extraordinary steps to contain the spread of the disease. We know that well over one and a third million people in the Ukraine are very ill with the disease (according to published official
sources) and that over 60,000 are hospitalized in serious to critical condition.

We do not know what effective treatments are for this illness. We do know that young adults seem to be more in danger of this illness. We suspect that 'cytokine storming' similar to that in the 1918 Spanish Flu, that killed approximately 50 million people, is taking place.

We know that the illness has spread to Poland, where over one quarter of a million people are now very ill. We know that it has spread to Belarus and to Hungary and elsewhere in central Europe. We know that 900,000 people are said to have Swine Flu in Norway but we do not know if this is related to Ukraine Plague in any way.

endquote

Apologies if this is seen as alarmist - but how could it not?

Namaste

OrwellianUK said...

Peak Oil Too Dangerous to Publicise

businessman said...

Paul...That's some pretty serious stuff in that article! Are there any other people in this Blog who are either in the Ukraine or geographically closer to the situation than the rest of us? F. Kamilov...do you have any information to report about this horrendous flu outbreak in the Ukraine?

F.Kamilov said...

Rice farmer,

Have you heard of the ancient Persian "Sandali"?It is a large collective sleeping platform made up of slate slabs, or for the rich, ceramic tiles, which is gently heated from beneath by a bed of charcoal in a chamber with a door and a smoke stack leading outside. It has bedding - usually a huge communally used used quilt - placed on top. Some versions don't use the platform, and use a centrally placed, sealed brazier to heat a huge quilt alone. This is known as a "Bokhari" Both are still used all over Central Asia, especially in the rural and traditional regions.

Jeff said...

China seems to be drawing some lines.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=annrZr9ybk7A&pos=9
India,the whole story is not being told here I'm sure.
http://in.reuters.com/article/topNews/idINIndia-43985320091116

v said...

In regards to the Ukraine flu story:

The mysterious case of Joseph Moshe and the pneumonic plague

I don't know what to make of this story, but it is curious that this man predicted way back in August that Baxter was producing a bio weapon disguised as a flu vaccine and that it would be 'unleashed' in the Ukraine. He was detained by the FBI anfd never heard from again...

What do you guys make of this?

GrTz,

V

Paul said...

Businessman - I have been searching for firsthand reporting of the outbreak. This is the closest I have found.

Ukraine Flu Outbreak: Virus Is a Mixture of H1N1 and Parainfluenza, Causes Cardiopulmonary Failure

quote

The Head of the Chernivtsi regional forensic bureau, Professor Victor Bachinsky M.D. makes a strong statement: all the victims of the virus in Bukovina (22 persons aged 20 to 40 years) died not from bilateral (double) pneumonia, as previously thought, but as a result of viral distress syndrome, i.e. the total destruction of the lungs.

unquote

Namaste

Unrepentantcowboy said...

Someone made a short video from Mike's presentation at the screening in LA.

Few tasty nuggets here, concerning a new publication of his book, details about the making of the movie and his ongoing endeavors.

See it at youtube.


I'm almost finished with Mike's POD book. It provides a good broad based view of peak oil, peak resources and the related geo-political concerns of our day.

For those that have followed the issues there's not much new here, but I bet you find at least a thing or two you didn't know.

I did. (In my case it's Mike's view of world politics.)

I highly recommend the book, but I hope it gets an editor before republishing.

A few throwaway lines, a few repititions, a possible error or two and an occasional typo gives the book four out of five stars in my opinion: five stars for subject matter, three stars for presentation.

Unrepentantcowboy said...

Another note: Mike suggests that he hopes the movie will cause people to read the book. I say I hope the book causes people to see the movie.

Like Mike, I am the son of a former counter intelligence operative. Unlike Mike, I am a former dope smuggler. Surprisingly, in order to survive that world, I developed similar traits and abilities an investigative cop uses.

I'd much rather see someone speak, off the cuff than read edited words, to watch body language, hear the rythym of the voice, see the eyes.

It's like the difference between reading a written confession or seeing and hearing that same confession.

Speaking is your strong suit Mike. I hope, for the rest of us, that you don't quit.

sunrnr said...

Paul - This from the RSOE Emergency and Disaster Information Service

http://hisz.rsoe.hu/alertmap/woalert_read.php?glide=EP-20091028-23630-UKR&cat=dis&lang=eng

Qoute "Situation Update No. 40
On 17.11.2009 at 03:37 GMT+2

In the Ukraine, a strain of the flu has infected 1.4 million people. The death toll, according to the Ukraine Health Ministry, is at 315 people as of November 16, 2009. The World Bank Database gives the estimated population for the Ukraine as a little over 46 million. While the percentages do not appear high, the reported symptoms and contagion patterns of this flu are of concern to some doctors. The virus is being tested at the Medical Research Council laboratories, in Britain. "We don't believe it's H1N1 swine flu. Neither do we know what kind of pneumonia it is," states Ukrainian emergency physician Myron Borysevych. The Daily Mail states that doctors are likening this strain of the flu to the Spanish flu, which included internal hemorrhage and edema in the lungs. Last week, the World Health Organization team working in the Ukraine stated that there would be a second wave of the epidemic. This prediction appears to be coming true. The Ukraine Health Ministry reports 16 new deaths in the past day alone. Samples of the Ukraine flu virus were provided to a British lab, for testing to conclusively subtype the virus. Learning whether the virus is a mutated form of the H1N1 swine flu, or an entirely new type of flu virus, will help health officials and members of the public take necessary measures for protection from this deadly disease." Enqoute.

Read carefully and compare to the information in your link. It's surreal the conflicting information coming out about what this is all about and what's causing it.

It kind of reminds me of the old buffalo hunters shooting into the herd. "Be careful, we don't want to spook, 'em!"

namaste

RanD said...

Don Hynes, Paul, and OrwellianUK -- Thank you all for your above reports. In RanD's previous accolade to Jenna, Rice Farmer, and Vantage Point for their work, we negleted pointing out our appreciation to FTW commenters in general for the invaluable research, linking-up and writing they do for us, too.

Again: Thank you all; very much.

RanD

{PS: C2C AM's 11/16/2009 (last nite's) show @ http://www.coasttocoastam
.com/show/2009/11/16, with Steve Quayle, nicely revisits and complements the info provided by Don Hynes' and Paul's links; and is followed up with top drawer personal health info provided in the final hour segment with Christian Wilde. To our chagrin C2C is also all but entirely closed-minded to Peak Oil, yet open to an uncommonly wide field of reportage that is of paramount significance and all but invisible through most other mass media outlets. (As should be expected, one can of course find material there fit for-trash-cans-only, as well.) However, the show we mention above w/Quayle & Wilde is well worth the $6.95 it costs for subscriber access for one month, and opens the door to examining and downloading C2C's entire body of archives and interviews to the present. R & D}

Michael Sloan said...

I agree with Unrepentantcowboy about Mike's new book... need to correct those typos, I think I caught about four, and no matter the convenience the two times that wikipedia is used as a source should be replaced with something more tangible. I suspect a lot of people will be reading it looking for any loophole to get out of believing, and these things, however small, may shift the scales for some.

Otherwise the book is great everyone should read it.

Ajijic said...

Hey guys look!

Collapse is the 20th most popular search on Google right now.

http://google.com/trends/hottrends?sa=X

businessman said...

For some reason the trailer for the movie "Collapse" has been removed from the movie's Web site. And when I go to YouTube people have uploaded the trailer but have put their own ads on top of it, or at the end of it.

This really ticks me off.

OregonSurvivor said...

Several articles written by "EP Heidner" have come to my attention. This individual also posts at Solari.com. Does anyone have any information as to the veracity of this author? Truth, or disinformation?

toner deeski said...

Hey Mike,

Collapse website and this blog says that the movie is playing in Berkeley on Dec 4, but Shattuck Cinemas website says the movie is playing on Dec 5 (the night after the SF screening). Which night will the film show in Berkeley?

Jeff said...

new virus in us.
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE5AG52F20091117
china gas shortage severe
http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSPEK31821
Here in anchorage we are in a cold snap,about -11 and we have had several sections of city blackout for hours over the last few days.of course the radio stations say the "conspiracy theorists"will say the blackouts have begun.While the city is dark with no explanation.Even after knowing that this was published not long ago,many may have allready read this.
http://www.alaskadispatch.com/news/energy/2193-gas-shortage-could-leave-anchorage-dark

Robert Paulsen said...

I wrote a review of Collapse on my blog. It looks like I exceeded the HTML limit posting here, so this is an abridged version. Check out the link for the full version.


When Technology Fails, Don't Panic A Movie Review of Collapse

Needless to say, I caught the opening credits and everything else. My high hopes were not disappointed: on an artistic level this is the best documentary on Peak Oil I've seen yet. Stylistically, what director Chris Smith has done is given this film, and by extension its subject matter, the sense of immediacy that it deserves. Title cards announcing what subject area would be focused on were in stark black and white. The score is one of the most evocative I've heard in any movie this year; mysterious and dark, moody and foreboding. What really sets this film apart from the rest is its editing. The first sustained cut to a completely black screen is jarring. My reactions jumped from, "Is this intentional-Did the projector malfunction-Did the electricity go out-Are we witnessing Collapse for real?" Experiencing this along with scenes where we see the cinematographer slate in front of the camera all help give this film the sense of "This is happening NOW. Pay attention! Collapse could occur at any moment".

As an adaptation of the book A Presidential Energy Policy, Smith does a marvelous job of keeping the nearly 90 minute interview focused within that framework. We get the explanation of Peak Oil (oil production follows a bell curve, peak is the halfway point where decline becomes permanent), geopolitical factors (Saudi offshore drilling, NEPDG), petroleum over-dependence (food production, pharmaceuticals), worthless alternatives (ethanol, clean coal), and worthwhile alternatives (localization). What keeps it from being an academic exercise is the personality of Michael Ruppert. In spite of the grim subject matter, there is an irrepressible spirit illuminating the map of this terrain. He can be very funny (the pregnant pause before the punchline that, "ethanol is......a joke" is almost professional comic timing), very passionate (the defense of his life's work being too important to "walk away" in spite of the adversity ranging from death threats to office sabotage is especially moving) and very straightforward (those who panic during the collapse, i.e. run to the hills, will probably be the first to perish).

more...

http://americanjudas.blogspot.com/2009/11/when-technology-fails-dont-panic.html

Tony Sturtevant said...

This guy seems to think Ukraine is part of something else:

Ukraine,WHO and the Politics of Swine FLu Panic

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=16129

Gustav said...

Reports of light planes spraying "suspicius substance" over markets and cities of Kiev, Lviv, Ternopil and throughout Ukraine. Although local radio stations were recieving dozents of phone calls from eyewitneses, the government put pressure on them to stop reporting the case...

Airplanes sprayed mysterious substance over Ukraine days before pneumonic plague outbreak

and IMHO the BAXTER's smoking gun:
The mysterious case of Joseph Moshe and the pneumonic plague.

Although Slovenia is cca 300 miles (500 km) distant from Western Ukraine, there are already reports from our neighbouring countries (Austria, Hungary, Croatia) of new severe cases there.

People from my region should IMMEDIATELY stock on COLLOIDAL SILVER and D3 vitamin!!!

I allready have...

Be safe.
Namaste,
Gustav.

kiki said...

re: flu or 'something' in canada:

http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE5AG52F20091117

i also noticed on cnn yesterday they interviewed the author of book: 'Collapse' who was most definitely not Mike - there was a blurb about it being repeated this morning - i find the timing interesting

MichaelW said...

Ethanol is not a joke, FYI. As a couple people have noted on this blog, when integrated into permaculture practices, it can provide petroleum-free fertilizer and herbicide all in one, plus a liquid fuel to be used for personal needs- heating your home, powering small engines, etc.

Read David Blume's Alcohol Can Be a Gas!, endorsed by Matt Stein (When Technology Fails) and Albert Bates
permaculture.com

(note- Even David Pimentel of Cornell agrees with the practices Blume details, and he otherwise hates ethanol.)

Mike

Peddler on the Hoof said...

@RF I lived in Japan for two years I know what you mean. Whole-space heating is an extravagant luxury reserved only for hotels, shopping areas, and not everywhere even then.

All the best.

Peddler on the Hoof said...

@Paul there's plenty of news at RIA:

http://en.beta.rian.ru/trend/flu_ukraine_171109/

looks like the real deal to me, tho still low fatalities per capita... but fast acting too

wez said...

French bank tells clients how to prepare for 'global collapse'


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/6599281/Societe-Generale-te...

Societe Generale has advised clients to be ready for a possible "global economic collapse" over the next two years, mapping a strategy of defensive investments to avoid wealth destruction.

RanD said...

"msnbc Top stories as of 6:13 p.m. Wed., Nov 18, 2009[:]"

"Obama: [']Alleged['] 9/11 leader will be executed[:]

"President Obama tells NBC News that [']he expects['] that [']professed['] Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will be convicted and executed."

The above says everything that needs to be said to eyes that see and ears that hear concerning what the USA has always/ever been about from day one of its existence; right along with the fun, tears, & learning of it all as well, of course.

OregonSurvivor said...

Global oil scam
$2.5 Trillion Scam