Not that things aren't getting weird, I just think that a whole bunch of time and energy are being expended making sure that the lid stays on the pot. Things are burbling along merrily, but in truth, the strategy of kicking the can down the road has worked reasonably well and things aren't as bad as they could have been.
Oh, now I know that some of you are squawking about me saying this, but Bennie and Barry have ran up the credit card to keep the system afloat, and they have pretty much succeeded to this point. Whether or not they can keep the party going is another thing altogether. I am just waiting to see how the whole thing shakes out.
There is a school of thought out there that holds tight to the thought that the longer it takes, the more volatile the outcome. That is parroted around the internet in Doomerville as an undeniable truth, but I can't really say that I can find any concrete proof that it will work out that way this time.
I remember reading somewhere that if a woman was born on the day that Louis the fourteenth died, she would have been a elderly grandmother when the tumbrils rolled to the Place de la Revolution. I would argue that if you use the Eisenhower administration as a reference point as the pinnicle of American power, we are only 2/3's of the way to the party. If you use the Roosevelt administration as your reference point, we are only just getting ready to enter the home stretch.
Being a prepper and a doomer is an odd sport. I think that it important to hope that you are wrong and things will get through adequately. Your preparations and your fears are there as a gauge, not as an auto-pilot. I think that way that the world is being run will have to change. We will all end up poorer and living in a more fragile system. We will have to adapt to new realities and change our behaviors significantly. This simple fact doesn't mean the revolution will come tomorrow.
I certainly hope it doesn't and I sincerely hope that the can will be kicked down the road further. Times are hard enough now that making the adjustment to an even lower standard of living will not improve my temper.
1 comment:
I think is is an extension of the fairly common sense notion that if you ignore small problems while they are small, they can become big problems.
If you are going to "solve" a population problem it is likely easier to do it when we have 1 billion people, and not 7.
If you are going to ween yourself off of fossil fuels, it is likely best to try it before you actually reach peak production.
And if you are going to "do something" about global warming, it is best not to turn it into political football and kick the can down the road for a dozen years.
However, it is not really clear that we ever really wanted to "solve" any of these issues. So I agree, the timeline you speak of is to my mind somewhat a false one. We will get there when we get there, and when we get there. When the problems become sufficiently awful, awful things will happen, in proportion to their awfulness, unless some sort of tipping point-cascading collapse occurs, in which case we will get there quicker.
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