ARTS & FARCES internet

What if our society should decide that no public, natural resources could be exploited for private gain? What if we decided (as Paul Hawken suggests) to change what we taxed (i.e., pollutants) instead of who we taxed? Refusing to become victims of supply lines, corporate misdeeds, and mismanagement, what if cities and regional entities once again pursued ownership and distribution of its energy sources?

My best bet: the energy and profits these new power companies generated would most likely be held to higher standards for safety measures (including appropriate storage solutions to cope with the scary life-span of plutonium); we would see research and development for clean and renewable sources become prolific; and we would eventually see energy costs fall. The most important “fall out” might be that we would immediately insist that Israelis and Palestinians either come to an agreement or risk cutting off all aid and funding of any kind for both parties. The threat to world-wide environmental and infrastructural safety represented by an all-out war between these two factions is simply incalculable.

Power concentrated in one location has historically proved dangerous. It doesn’t matter whether you’re examining government, banking, communications, energy, education, or an ethnic population. You name it—a concentration of power has always resulted in abuse. And our current main-stream energy sources (oil and nuclear) simply pollute—big time. They are more expensive than clean and renewable sources for all of society to support; requiring huge lobbies, a heavily centralized infrastructure, and more safety and security measures than money could every truly buy us. Most egregious of all our current energy sources encourage foreign dependency rather than self-sufficiency among a community’s residents.

Isn’t this rich? The Bush administration’s acting assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere affairs is seeking to bar a Nicaraguan official from entering the US because “...nations…were largely responsible for their own economic misfortunes and that they should not seek American financial support until they enforced official integrity and fiscal discipline.”

We cannot excuse the dastardly behavior of the likes of Mr. Byron Jerez of Nicaragua, or even attribute his behavior to the events that lead to putting that country in the tragic position of growing drugs for profit, rather than food for their own citizens. But, the following rationale from our assistant secretary is very rich, indeed.

Addressing the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Mr. Otto Reich had this to say: “When we are sure that there’s an individual or individuals who have stolen from the public treasury of their country, we are not going to let them into the United States of America.” (both quotes from the New York Times)

Has the price of cheese, bread, and eggs in your grocers increased this year—along with the price of health insurance, prescription drugs, and doctor office visits? But when your ears are to the ground, aren’t you hearing that inflation is so in check? The cut off date for the annual 1.1% increase in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) just released ended in January. Yet, since January, I’ve noticed more than a few major price increases in my own little budget.

According to economists at Merrill Lynch, Stan Shipley, and Bruce Steinberg, there are no inflationary pressures in the U.S. economy.

“Inflation remains completely under control,” Bill Cheney, chief economist for John Hancock Financial Services, declared. “Goods and even services are cheap, and businesses are eager for sales at almost any price. Bargains abound.”

Such unison in the declarations of well-known financial experts tempts me to think that January’s 0.2% increase in the CPI is just too low to be bothered about. Never mind that folks most able to take advantage of all Mr. Cheney’s bargains won’t be found among the current 5.6% core of our unemployed, nor the rising number of laid-off workers. The CPI is a broad one however, and supposedly it offers up a balanced history of inflationary trends. But to a lay person, like me, the history of the index itself seems flawed. Energy and food prices are often excluded from quoted rates because they fluctuate so widely. So, what else remains in the index that’s as fundamental to us when it comes to our quality of life—except the cost of health care?

I like George W. Bush. He’s cute—even when bruised. He’s so cute he likely got away with things his peers never could have. He seems afraid of the “s” word though. To be fair, many presidents have been afraid of the “s” word, and few have had the energy of this president.

Okay, that’s enough for those of you with your minds in the gutter. Solar energy seems to be something President Bush just doesn’t want to talk about. Apparently, he’s not alone. According to an article in The Economist, at least a couple legislators are also afraid of the “s” word.

I can’t pretend an ability to calculate the cost of safeguarding Middle-Eastern oil supplies. Determining whether or not some action might be appropriate to such safeguarding or whether it might constitute waste is even further from my repertoire. Donald Losman, however, in a paper published by the Cato Institute is prepared to determine just that. I can, however, think of a lot of ways many Americans might prefer to spend thirty to sixty billion good ol’ American dollars. That sum apparently does not include the monies entering OPEC’s coffers daily from oil consumption.

In the meantime, oil industry executives and politicians seem a little too hot to inform us how much it’s going to cost the rest of us to bring any non-OPEC energy sources (especially fuel-cells) to market, to market, legally, piggily. The International Energy Agency’s calculation now stands at $1 trillion. And you know what? Even on a very cold day, when keeping our faces turned towards the sun, we can still feel its warmth—for free.

Instead of worrying about supply-shock in the world oil supply, and praying for the Saudi’s to see fit to agree to all this “upstream” investment, wouldn’t the entire world be a safer place if every country just placed money in trust for the sun? After all, if the sun’s energy depletes, that moolah-lah and all the rest is nothing but history anyhow.

Both of my local papers—the Saint Paul Pioneer Press and the Minneapolis StarTribune—ran this New York Times story this week, on their front pages, above the fold. The story outlines an International Labor Organization (ILO) report finding that Americans are working more hours than their counterparts in other countries.

Unfortunately, the full text of the report, “Key Indicators of the Labor Market 2001 - 2002” is not available until its scheduled release during the Global Employment Forum, November 1 - 3, 2001 in Geneva. So, what follows is commentary based on the Times’ reporting on an ILO press release.

Americans work 137 hours more per year than the Japanese and a whopping 499 hours more than the Germans. According to the economist that managed the report, Americans are working harder than ever because they’re “eager to make the best impression, to put in the most hours.” Bullshit. Americans are working harder only because they have to in order to maintain a basic standard of living.