Resource Wars: Week 3

April 15th, 2008

(Notes courtesy of Jay Perrine)

Book arrived & Barry sold his spare Klare book to woman who arrived via bike and left handed (didn’t catch name). Barry reviewed syllabus for remainder of quarter which was e-mailed to all.

Watched movie, which Jay noticed included many names quoted from assigned text by Sonia Shah. No student spoke up or interrupted during the movie EXCEPT to get volume raised at start of film.

Following film (no one accepted option to take a short break) Barry seemed to do a stream of consciousness following the film (he didn’t refer to notes) and partly based on a question from someone in the class asking, ‘what can we do?’:

• Barry essentially indicated alternative energy
• Sen. McCain said, ‘we will have more wars’ and Barry wondered what he knew
• Lots of efforts toward alt. energy and conservation in the 70’s and 80’s, especially Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.) who put PV cells on White House
• Barry said biofuels are ‘counter productive’ and did not elaborate
• Barry pointed out that the movie had both Republicans and Democrats so it covered both views, but NOT right wing views
• The issues (from movie) will eventually have political consequences… Barry stated ‘this is going to happen sooner or later’. He mentioned that he is ‘old enough’ to remember when Rachael Carson’s seminal book The Silent Spring came out – he thought that would cause a big uprising but we Americans ‘thought our way through that one’. Jay here: the movie mentioned that in politics about oil “the best liar wins” and further Jay thinks about McCain’s suggestion today, on Tax Day, for the Fed’s to suspend the tax on gasoline/diesel for the summer to give folks a break (and enjoy the last Hoorah?).
• Barry came out with what he thought about during the movie that IF the warmer oceans caused the polar ice caps to melt (from global warming) that would possibly allow navigation (shipping) though the poles and (assumed benefit of reducing shipping costs between continents and possibly reduce delivery time)
• Then his biggest political message of the evening: This Administration did not push for climate change (he meant to fight or reduce climate change)
  • Faster it heats up the faster ice melts
  • Longer we can stay put with Petro (I might have missed something here)
  • THEN, when China, Russia and India want/demand more oil (at which point Barry slapped our new book by Klare) then there might be REAL military wars!
• Then a question/statement from the German PhD chemist. He pointed out that all the discussion in the film about alternatives to oil (none of which seemed promising in the film) was ALL from the perspective of Oil Consultants and experts (who don’t know as much about non-oil subjects).
  • He pointed out that we would need about 15% of the US land area (that’s all we would need to totally satisfy US needs he asserts) which would be 1,200 sq miles to grab that solar power
  • Jay spoke with him after class and he said solar is the ONLY solution (after I had asked about adding wind to his options)
• Then Barry quoted a politician with a different ilk than McCain – Clinton talked about ‘growing the economy’ (I was unclear whether he was referring to Mrs. or Mr. Clinton)
  • First he mentioned that ‘we academics’ don’t always take the same view as the political people
  • To Barry we would need a charismatic or magnetic personality like we have seen with Roosevelt, Nelson Mandela (Barry’s area of Africa) or Churchill
  • A personality (in politician/leader) is needed to connect/link with the population
  • However, we are seeing a decline in democracy (Barry thought Democracy was a terrific thing when Mandela was elected in So Africa) including things like Fixed Elections (and Barry mentioned he has more lately gotten smart on (country escapes me right now as several said, ‘oh no’ when he named it, but in the news a lot lately near S. Africa)
  • Barry mentioned Professor Jared Diamond’s work on writing about decline of civilizations
  • See you next week…
• Bonus: Jay chatted with the about to retire Wealth Advisor who said that a fund of Oil oriented stocks is OIH (wall street) know as Oil Service Holders. He is aware of one or more funds that focus on Alt. Energy but would need to bring in the name of that. So, one would go long on OIH and when then dips switch quickly to the yet to be identified Alt Energy.

Edit Page Add Page