One day I was driving 60 miles from the road in Arizona, I was collecting semi
precious stones in the desert. I came upon a city boy in a new Mercedes with
Ohio plates that was having car trouble. I stopped to help and noticed that his
bottom radiator hose had fallen off and the clamp was gone. I had water,
clamps and tools and was about to fix it for him when he spoke up. “I will not
pay a desert rat to rip me off” said he. I had not intended to charge the fool
but listened quietly then offered him a ride to the service station as it was on
my way. I heard later that he had to pay $1,600 to get his car towed and
repaired.

The sad thing is that he is typical of North Americans. He was about to die
from his own stupidity and his only concern was that some bumpkin might
over charge him for saving his life (the tracks indicated that there had been no
traffic there for months). North Americans face extreme shortages of water,
food and energy in the near future but would rather die than lift a finger to
save themselves. A simple system of inter connected cisterns and aqueducts
could stop flash flooding and divert excess water to arid regions. Savonius
windmills could transfer the water cheaply and efficiently. The ancient Romans
and Persians built such systems over 2,000 years ago. Oddly enough such a
system would be very profitable as it would double the arable land. Other
nations would see that it works and follow suit.

Your government and corporations will not build it and they would laugh at
your petitions, marches and protests. If you want something done right, do it
yourself. KISS (keep it simple stupid) rules would apply if you want the system
to be reliable, complexity for complexity’s sake ruins logical projects. This is
what I would do, I have no idea what society will do.

“To suckle fools, and chronicle small beer.”

Maybe Obama doesn’t see $20 billion per year as “small beer” as Lord Stern does. In an ideal world, Reich and Volker would run our economy so we could afford “small beer”—but as long as Geithner is OK with the financial institution’s rip-off system, as long as the dollar isn’t keeping up with the Euro, and as long as we keep spending billions in military ventures, it’s understandable—though, in my opinion, completely wrong—for the President to decline to go to Copenhagen for whatever reason.

Overall, we should be so lucky that $50 billion per year could indeed stop global warming. It seems like a much larger commitment would be required. But then I’m no expert.

President Obama’s office claims he will not be there because it is not a “heads of state” conference. Whatever…