Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence
There was recently a fight over the 3C starter line for Ohio's High Speed Rail system, which Governor Strickland won ... and the presumptive Republican nominee for Governor took this position:
... GOP challenger John Kasich, who said money awarded to Ohio for the 3C rail project could be better spent on Ohio roads and highways.
These are High Speed Rail funds. Arguing that they could be "better spent on Ohio roads and highways" is a blatant effort to mislead Ohio's voters into thinking that this $400m will stay in state if Republican sabotage of the project succeeds.
And it seems that coverage has buried one of the ledes in this story - getting the presumptive Republican nominee on the record as a slimy politician willing to mislead the electorate in his efforts to sabotage investment in Ohio transportation infrastructure.
Betwixt and Between, I find myself. I observe the validity of D00m.P0rn shrill warnings about the future ... when seen as possible outcomes rather than when seen as certainties. Yet I also see the potential for better outcomes.
And with respect to the strategy of sitting on the sidelines, weighing the likelihood of one versus the other ... I'm against it. Simply the decision to sit on the sidelines makes the calamity more likely as a result. So I am for getting into the fray and trying to make the calamity less likely and the hopeful outcome more likely.
The Calamity Cavalcade
As far as potential calamities, we do not have to look far for those.
We are on track to have a higher concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere than at any other time in the Holocene. We are engaged in this experiments with absolutely no serious evidence to suggest that it is known to be safe. Indeed, those benefiting in the short term from the reckless experiment will even try to reverse the sane burden of proof and place it on those who do not approve of undertaking the reckless experiment.
The argument being, in essence, that if you are driving through a thick fog, then as long as you don't see any cars coming, its OK to speed.
And of course, before the peril of climate chaos came to our attention, there was already the risk of ecosystem collapse hanging over our head, as more and more populations on the planet rely on an industrial technology that is quite clearly ecologically unsustainable and therefore certain to collapse sooner or later, unless we restructure our technological base to approach sustainability faster than we approach ecosystem collapse.
And then of course, even before the risk of ecosystem collapse was widely understood, the threat of nuclear holocaust.
Flood, Nuclear fire followed by Nuclear Winter, Famine and Plague ... and all three involved in or certainly leading to War ... surely rather than Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, there is a whole Cavalry Unit.
Against that backdrop, it may seem provincial to worry about a mere collapse of a single national economy from first world to banana republic status, but that is the specific calamity that I am focusing on here.
But, pontificating aside, the reality is that we had a large scale grand robbery of the past few years. To make it simple: the Fed printed money, gave it for free to rich people, who lent it to poor people at at nice profit instead of paying them wages; reimbursement was possible only if house prices went up, and that lasted for a while. The rich made out like bandits on their assets, financial or otherwise, and the poor thought they were more or less keeping up with the Joneses (the reality was a large-scale transfer of wealth from one group to the other, no bonus points for guessing which was which). Now that it's no longer the case, the poor lose their house, stop paying their debt at some point, put the banks in a pickles, and the economy unravels. Except that the banks are being bailed out, which means, fundamentally, saving the owners of financial assets (bank bondholders specifically, and bond holders in general) at the expense of taxpayers, thus having the goverment validate and consolidate the past transfer of wealth.
So leverage is the central problem ... or rather, the central problems:
For those looking to hold onto their ill-gotten gains, how to maintain the maximum amount of wealth while they deleverage, which means how to convert what was always in a large part fantasy wealth into actual claims on actual productive capacity
For the other 99% of us, how to prevent those who obtained fantasy wealth from converting it into real wealth at our expense
That is why we set forth this $85-billion initiative from our committee. It's been reduced in the final going. We expect that it'll come out somewhere around $63 billion, but $30 billion for highways.
The reason for the reduction in overall funding ... was the tax cut initiative that had to be paid for in some way by keeping the entire package in the range of $850 billion.
As I described in Transport Stimulus: You're Doing It Wrong, actual effective stimulus spending was shortchanged -- and in particular spending with substantial long term economic and strategic benefits -- to "pay for" tax cuts.
In reality, if we want to be able to "afford" tax cuts, what we need first and foremost is growth, and economic growth requires effective government investment in the infrastructure of a New Energy Economy.
And I have asked for Electric Trains (Part 1) and High Speed Electric Trains (Part 2). But I am greedy, so I want it all. What I really want is SUSTAINABLE High Speed Electric Trains.
First, it appears that Electric Trains, and Electric High Speed Trains, offer an important step in that direction already, since they offer substantial energy efficiencies ... the most sustainable Watt is intelligent design that eliminates the need for that Watt.
Second, the foundation of the nationwide Electric Train system, the electrification of STRACNET, could be the "donkey that carries its own lunch" ... there may be an opportunity to use the program to cost effectively accelerate harvesting of our nation's sustainable renewable energy resources.
So, yes, I want a coast to coast, 100mph, electric freight and passenger train system. Yes, I want the break through the bottlenecks for the Acela in the NEC, establishment of the Empire Corridor, Keystone Corridor, Ohio Hub, Midwest Hub, Southeast Corridor, Gulf Corridor, T-Bone Corridor, Front Range Corridor, Cascadia Corridor, and the CA-HSR.
For the last eight years, development of Energy Independent transport has been faced with a dog-in-the-manger administration fighting furiously to move forward into Cartopian vision of endless crude oil fueling endless road works so people can drive endless hours to actually get wherever they need to go to do whatever it is they need to do.
However, there is hope. This year, the Amtrak funding bill included substantial funding for restoring the North East Corridor to an adequate state of repair. On November 4, California passed Proposition 1A, providing $9.95b in bonds for the California High Speed Rail (HSR) and connecting infrastructure. And then, on November 19, John Kerry and Arlan Spectre introduced the a bill for funding High Speed Rail projects:
Titled the High-Speed Rail for America Act of 2008, the bill would provide money for tax-exempt bonds to finance long-stalled high-speed rail projects.
So let's look at the projects that are on the drawing boards.
Three special Federal tasks are the provision of a coast to coast system of electric trains, support for a nationwide "Rapid Rail" network, and support for inter-regional corridors providing true High Speed Rail.
If we pursue the opportunities available to use now, using existing, well tested technology, we can have a big chunk of this job finished within eight years, and can have set things in motion to see an absolute Energy Revolution in inter-regional transport in this nations by 2024.
So it may not be this Christmas, but if we hit hard on this issue, its possible for us to say, "New York, you get an electric train. Boise, you get an electric train. Detroit, you get an electric train. Atlanta, you get an electric train. Amarillo, you get an electric train. ..."
(cuz it's always midnight somewhere... :D - promoted by poligirl)
Welcome to the Midnight Oil. This diary is open for discussion from a few minutes after midnight through a few minute before (maybe two days later, maybe three). The intro remains the same, but the body is always changing.
....................................
Populist movements don't build themselves, they grow from a process of people learning how to support a series of populist campaigns in a populist way, rather than as passive consumers of corporate political marketing campaigns.
It doesn't matter what the "horse race" outcome of the campaign is, if we fight the campaign. Fighting it, we learn how to fight. Learning how to fight political battles, we become citizens again. Becoming citizens again, we reclaim the Republic that lies dormant beneath the bread and circuses of modern American society.
(It's always midnight somewhere... :D - promoted by poligirl)
Welcome to the Midnight Oil. This diary is open for discussion from a few minutes after midnight through a few minute before (maybe two days later, maybe three). The intro remains the same, but the body is always changing.
....................................
Populist movements don't build themselves, they grow from a process of people learning how to support a series of populist campaigns in a populist way, rather than as passive consumers of corporate political marketing campaigns.
It doesn't matter what the "horse race" outcome of the campaign is, if we fight the campaign. Fighting it, we learn how to fight. Learning how to fight political battles, we become citizens again. Becoming citizens again, we reclaim the Republic that lies dormant beneath the bread and circuses of modern American society.
Welcome to the Midnight Oil. This diary is open for discussion from a few minutes after midnight through a few minute before (maybe two days later, maybe three). The intro remains the same, but the body is always changing.
....................................
Populist movements don't build themselves, they grow from a process of people learning how to support a series of populist campaigns in a populist way, rather than as passive consumers of corporate political marketing campaigns.
It doesn't matter what the "horse race" outcome of the campaign is, if we fight the campaign. Fighting it, we learn how to fight. Learning how to fight political battles, we become citizens again. Becoming citizens again, we reclaim the Republic that lies dormant beneath the bread and circuses of modern American society.
(it's always midnight somewhere... :D - promoted by poligirl)
Welcome to the Midnight Oil. This diary is open for discussion from a few minutes after midnight through a few minute before (maybe two days later, maybe three). The intro remains the same, but the body is always changing.
....................................
Populist movements don't build themselves, they grow from a process of people learning how to support a series of populist campaigns in a populist way, rather than as passive consumers of corporate political marketing campaigns.
It doesn't matter what the "horse race" outcome of the campaign is, if we fight the campaign. Fighting it, we learn how to fight. Learning how to fight political battles, we become citizens again. Becoming citizens again, we reclaim the Republic that lies dormant beneath the bread and circuses of modern American society.
There was recently a fight over the 3C starter line for Ohio's High Speed Rail system, which Governor Strickland won ... and 
Betwixt and Between, I find myself. I observe the validity of D00m.P0rn shrill warnings about the future ... when seen as possible outcomes rather than when seen as certainties. Yet I also see the potential for better outcomes.
So leverage is the central problem ... or rather, the central problems:
OK, so, to make an egregiously long story merely excessively long, a very strange thing happened on the road to the Stimulus Package. As 
For the last eight years, development of Energy Independent transport has been faced with a dog-in-the-manger administration fighting furiously to move forward into Cartopian vision of endless crude oil fueling endless road works so people can drive endless hours to actually get wherever they need to go to do whatever it is they need to do.
....................................
