Comments on WSJ headlines

1/13/2011



Today's WSJ page A1 shows two mid-page headlines side by side:


1) Tuna Fight Muddies Waters Over Damage From BP Spill


2) Crop Prices Soar on Supply Warnings


My interest here is not to report in detail WSJ's findings in these matters, but to try to relate by association how these events strengthen the theme of my book "reflections..."


Headline "1" demonstrates how globally we're mired in a state of an 'activities’ bubble. Japan is known to be in financial difficulties for the past two decades, but last week a bluefin tuna caught off Japan sold in Tokyo for ¥396,000, to be eaten as sushi. And the US is trying to soak BP with additional billions of dollars for damage. My book recommended a 5000 year margin of safety in fossil fuel usage. We simply cannot afford to burn oil, a free gift from God, at the rate we're doing it.


Headline "2" has to do with the class struggle that I described in my book. The big surprise is that it's happening now, instead of when the supply of fossil fuel shall begin to decline severely. China is buying US soybeans to fatten livestock. The ethanol industry is buying corn to feed their machines to increase production. Some analysts say US farmers need to plant an additional eight million acres; but where is the land? How many billions of people need to vanish from planet Earth in this Century?