Mn-prog-events Mailing List: Progressive Calendar 08.05.05

[David Shove (shove001]

             P R O G R E S S I V E   C A L E N D A R     08.05.05

1. Peace crane          8.06 7:30am
2. Legend of Sadako     8.06 9am
3. Remembrance vigil    8.06 9pm
4. Rainwater recycle    8.06 10am
5. Green potluck picnic 8.06 11am
6. StPaul Greens        8.06 12noon
7. Wirth House tour     8.06 12noon
8. Peace lantern float  8.06 7pm
9. Frinj frinj          8.06 7pm
10. Peace concert       8.06 7:30pm

11. Sensible vigil      8.07 12noon
12. PlanSun/ActMon AT   8.07 1pm
13. KFAI/Indian         8.07 4pm
14. MN activists plan   8.07 7pm

15. PC Roberts        - Kelo: a Supreme assault on personal liberty
16. Amy/David Goodman - The Hiroshima cover-up
17. Michael T Klare   - The twilight era of petroleum
18. Wallace Stevens   - The Emperor of Ice-Cream  (poem)

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From: humanrts [at] umn.edu
Subject: Peace crane 8.06 7:30am

August 6 - Peace Crane Ceremony.  Time: 7:30 am.
There will be speaker, music, and peace proclamations from the mayors of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki will be read. A moment of silence will be observed
at 8:15 am.


--------2 of 18--------

From: Charles Underwood <charleyunderwood [at] hotmail.com>
Subject: Legen of Sadako 8.06 9am

Saturday, 8/6, 9 am, hear story "Legend of Sadako," and learn to fold
peace cranes, Lyndale Park Peace Garden (NE of Lake Harriet).
jab229 [at] cs.com


--------3 of 18--------

From: Charles Underwood <charleyunderwood [at] hotmail.com>
Subject: Remembrance vigil 8.06 9pm

Saturday, 8/6, 9 am to 4 pm, All Day Vigil of Remembrance, Lyndale Park
Peace Garden, Minneapolis.  jab229 [at] cs.com or 952-922-0308.


--------4 of 18--------

From: Mark Snyder <snyde043 [at] tc.umn.edu>
Subject: Rainwater recycle 8.06 10am

Wanted to make sure that folks are aware of this upcoming opportunity to
see first-hand how you can remake your yard to be rainwater-friendly. I
went on the guided tour last year and it was absolutely fascinating!

3rd Annual Marcy Holmes Rainwater resource Recycling Tours
Saturday, August 6th (guided tours:  10 a.m. & 1 p.m.)

Meet at University Lutheran Church of Hope, 601 SE 13th Ave. in parking
lot (free parking in lot)

Learn to use rain water as a valuable resource via raingardens, rain
barrels, pervious pavement and green roof technology to increase the
health of your watershed. See examples throughout the Marcy-Holmes
neighborhood. Also available - Self Guided Tours between August 5th - 7th;
Begin at 706 14th Ave. SE., look for self guided tour brochures in project
mailbox next to "Marcy Holmes Rainwater Resource Recycling Tour" sign.
Project funded by matching grants from the Mississippi Watershed
Management Organization. For more information, contact The Kestrel Design
Group, Inc. at 952 928-9600 or tkdg [at] kestreldesigngroup.com

Having recently installed a rain barrel and started a small rain garden in
my yard, I can say for certain this is worth the work (and it's really not
that much work), whether you apply for a stormwater fee rebate or not.

I'm looking forward now to getting additional garden ideas so I can start
thinking expansion and also learning more about pervious paving so I can
make sure to use that when I eventually replace my crumbling front walk.


--------5 of 18--------

From: Tom Taylor <tom [at] organicconsumers.org>
Subject: Green potluck picnic 8.06 11am

On August 6th Bruce Bacon's farm will unfold before us for some Fun For A
Change ~ come be part of it.

Get the heck out of town, break some bread, have a time and open your mind
and use it.  Attendance is limited so please let us know if you are planning
on attending by RSVPing to Florianne Wild at (612) 251-3652.

Children are welcome as they will lead us but please no pets.

Camping is available for Saturday evening but please RSVP and as a matter
of fact PLEASE RSVP (to Florianne Wild at (612) 251-3652) if you are
planning on just attending for the day so we can plan accordingly.

A soul or two is in demand to help me with the food so please ring me up
if you are interested in helping with that (612-788-4252).

This is a pot luck picnic so please feel free to flex your own culinary
prowess for us all.  Please feel free to call me if you have any questions
about food and drink (think SHARE).  Grills will be going.

Please feel free to send this message onto friends that you would like to
spend some time on the farm with; help make it all what it will be ~ take
responsibility ~ PARTICIPATE.

Bring your beautiful self, fine attitude and lets have some Fun For A
Change.

Tom Taylor
612-788-4252

FUN FOR A CHANGE!
GREEN POTLUCK PICNIC PARTY at the Garden Farme of Bruce Bacon in Ramsey,
Minnesota

SATURDAY, AUGUST 6

11:00 a.m. 'til MIDNIGHT ~ some folks are camping over.

Hosts:  Bruce Bacon, Ken Pentel, Tom Taylor, Tori Johnston, Todd Bockley,
Florianne Wild

There will be a children's art table in operation

11:00     Arrive and orientate
Noon:     Sweet corn, watermelon and pot luck lunch
1:00     Welcome and site tour of Garden Farme with Bruce Bacon
2:00     Medicinal herbs walk
3:00     Local contemporary Anishinabeg art with Todd Bockley
4:00     Permaculture talk by Jen Adams
5:00     Tour of the Garden Farme CSA with the gardeners
6:00     Potluck dinner
7:00     The Wonder of Oaks with Dan Keiser and a walk amongst them
8:00 - Midnight     Bonfire and tales

What to bring:  a favorite picnic dish, a plate and eating utensils, a lawn
chair, provisions that you love to share and your beautiful self with your
fine attitude

What not to bring:  your dog (sorry...)

Map and directions to the Farme:  See  website at www.gardenfarmecsa.com
For further site queries:  (763) 753-5099

LIMITED SPACE - Please RSVP early!

CONTACT:  Florianne Wild
fwild59 [at] hotmail.com
(612) 251-3652

Donations will be gratefully accepted.
There is no rain date.  This event will take place rain or shine.  There is
shelter for the picnickers.
Bios of some of the presenters:

Bruce Bacon
     Bruce lives on a 90-acre green island thirty miles north of the Twin
Cities.  His is one of the oldest remaining farms in Ramsey, Minn., and
once belonged to his grandparents.  His organic produce is served at
restaurants such as the Dakota, the Heartland, and W.A. Frost's, and is
sold at co-ops in the Twin Cities. Bruce continues to explore the
possibilities of "greening the suburban sprawl,"  to create community
through gardening, and to promote permaculture design for sustainability.
He has an abiding interest in systems theory.

Todd Bockley
     Todd operated the Bockley Gallery in the warehouse district of
Minneapolis from 1985-95.  Its focus was twofold, to exhibit and support
the work of local artists and to exhibit American outsider art and
European art brut.  Since 1995, Todd has pursued independent curatorial
projects.  In 1997 he organized and implemented his first Beuys-inspired
Tree Planting Project in conjunction with Joseph Beuys Multiples at the
Walker Art Center. The primary planting site was on the Leech Lake
Reservation.  Many similar projects followed, in Minnesota and at other
sites in the U.S.  In 2000, he curated "Listening with the Heart:  the
work of Frank Big Bear, George Morrison, and Norval Morrisseau," at the
Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis. He is currently working on an
exhibition of work by Barbara Kreft and Stuart Nielsen for the Rochester,
Minn. Art Center for fall 2005.

Dan Keiser
     Dan "the Oakman" Keiser grew up and lives in south Minneapolis.  He
majored in art and biology at St. John's University.  He is a certified
tree inspector, a certified arborist, and a member of the International
Oak Society, as well as an honorary member of the Mendota Mdewakanton
Dakota community.  He calls himself an urban forester; the Mdewakanton
call him Utuhu Tanka, or Forest Oak.  Dan will walk and talk with us while
visiting some oak trees at Garden Farme.  Topics will include the history
of oaks, globally and locally; the biology of oaks and other phenomena;
local Native American culture and the oak.


--------6 of 18--------

From: Elizabeth Dickinson <eadickinson [at] mindspring.com>
Subject: StPaul Greens 8.06 12noon

All people interested in finding out more about the Green Party of St. Paul
are invited to:

Our monthly meeting
First Saturday of every month
Mississippi Market, 2nd floor
Corner of Selby/Dale in St. Paul
noon until 2 pm
<http://www.gpsp.org>


--------7 of 18--------

From: Dastj02 [at] aol.com
Subject: Wirth House tour 8.06 12noon

HISTORY BUFFS from all over the cities, region might be interested in this
event in South Minneapolis.

INVITATION
You Will Be Welcome at the Wirth House
The Minneapolis Parks Legacy Society invites you
to tour the Historic Wirth House
3954 Bryant Avenue South in Lyndale Farmstead Park
Saturday August 6, 12 noon ? 4pm (Arrive no later 3PM for a complete
tour)
 a Public Event

Program at 12 noon
Please come if you can!
Refreshments will be served
contact: Joan Berthiaume 612-925-4194

Sincerely,
Joan Berrthiaume and Theodore J. Wirth (grandson)
You are welcome at the Historic Wirth House
3954 Bryant Avenue South in Lyndale Farmstead Park

A RARE OPPORTUNITY FOR THE PUBLIC.

Free tours of The Theodore Wirth Home and Administration Building,
National Historic Site.

Charles Loring agreed to build this home and studio to successfully lure
Wirth to Minneapolis in 1906. This is the actual location where Theodore
Wirth designed or re-designed and implemented the development of every
park in the unique-one-of-a-kind Minneapolis Park System. See the home
and the offices within.

The history that was made in this home contributed to making Minneapolis
such a livable city and it is the key to the Minneapolis Park System's
number one rating in the nation.
Program preceding public tours at 12 noon

Refreshments will be served.

Co-sponsored by - The Minneapolis Parks Legacy Society and The East
Harriet Farmstead Neighborhood Association. Free and open to the public


--------8 of 18--------

From: Charles Underwood <charleyunderwood [at] hotmail.com>
Subject: Peace lantern float 8.06 7pm

Saturday, 8/6 7pm, Peace Lantern Float, Silver Lake Park (east picnic
shelter), Rochester.  Make lanterns: kits and instructions provided.
WAMM calendar.


--------9 of 18--------

From: Charles Underwood <charleyunderwood [at] hotmail.com>
Subject: Frinj frinj 8.06 7pm

Saturday, 8/6, 7 pm, Frinj of the Frinj "San Visages," a percussive
journey exploring love and war by Les Gitanes, choreographed by William
Atchouelou of Ivory Coast, 4137 Bloomington, Minneapolis.  www.c4ia.org or
612-724-8392.


--------10 of 18--------

From: Charles Underwood <charleyunderwood [at] hotmail.com>
Subject: Peace concert 8.06 7:30pm

Saturday, 8/6, 7:30 pm, Peace Concert at Lake Harriet Bandstand,
Minneapolis.  www.worldwidewamm.org/calendar.html


--------11 of 18--------

From: skarx001 <skarx001 [at] umn.edu>
Subject: Sensible vigil 8.07 12noon

The sensible people for peace hold weekly peace vigils at the intersection
of Snelling and Summit in St. Paul,  Sunday between noon and 1pm. (This is
across from the Mac campus.)  We provide signs protesting current gov.
foreign and domestic policy.  We would appreciate others joining our
vigil/protest.


--------12 of 18--------

From: alliantaction [at] circlevision.org
Subject: PlanSun/ActMon 8.07 1pm

The People vs. Alliant Tech

Mark the 60th anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by
joining Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) and AlliantAction to put Alliant
Techsystems, INC on trial for "war crimes;" Monday, August 8, 7:00am, 5050
Lincoln Dr., Edina, MN (Lincoln and 5th St. exit off Hwy 169). Alliant
Tech produces radioactive depleted uranium weapons in violation of
international law. Eyewitnesses to the effects of such weapons on innocent
Iraqi civilians in the form of cancer and birth defects will testify at
the mock trial.

Come help with planning, banner-making and trial preparations from 1-9pm
Sunday at Hope Community: 2101 Portland, Minneapolis. RSVP to Kryss at
CPT: 312-933-8986; kryss [at] cpt.org.

Local contact numbers: Heather Carpenter - 612-522-3393,  Phil Stoltzfus
- 507-663-1859.


-------13 of 18--------

From: Chris Spotted Eagle <chris [at] spottedeagle.org>
Subject: KFAI/Indian 8.07 4pm

KFAI's Indian Uprising for Aug. 7th

ACLU DECRIES UNWARRANTED SPYING BY FBI by Brenda Norrell for Indian
Country Today, August 01, 2005.  The FBI conducted surveillance of
American Indians protesting Columbus Day in Denver, said the American
Civil Liberties Union in its announcement that the FBI amassed more than
1,100 pages of documents on nonviolent groups across the nation,
including Greenpeace and the Quakers, during the past four years.
 http://www.Indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096411337

LENGTHY HEARINGS ENDS WITH PLEAS FOR CONTROLS ON INTERIOR COMPUTERS,
Indian Trust ListServ Cobell v. Norton update, Washington, July 30, 2005.
 Citing the ease with which computer consultants hacked into the
computers, lawyers for Indians in a class action lawsuit over the
government's acknowledged mismanagement of the accounts finished 59 days
of hearings Friday afternoon with a plea to disconnect the computers from
the Internet.  It is not just a matter of computer security, said the
lawyers. It is a matter of the security of the Indian's trust accounts,
the only money that many of the nation's poorest citizens have, they said.
www.indiantrust.com

Repeat - RED LAKE KIDS FORM YOUTH COUNCIL TO IMPROVE LIFE ON RESERVATION
by Tom Robertson, Minnesota Public Radio, July 26, 2005.  Some of the Red
Lake Indian Reservation's brightest young people are coming together to do
what they can to tackle the tribe's problems.
www.news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2005/07/25_robertsont_redlakeyouth/

HONOR THE YOUTH SPIRITUAL RUN 2005 by Patricia Shepard, committee member.
"Native Youth between the ages of 15-24 years of age are at risk three
times higher of committing suicide then another racial/ethnic group in the
country.  In Minnesota it is nearly twice as high as any other racial and
ethnic group.  In the 2004 Minnesota Student Survey, American Indian Youth
12 graders were more likely to report suicide attempts then other racial
and ethnic groups."

INDIAN PRISONERS WEARING HAIR LONG, S. Wyeth McAdam, Attorney, Caifornia
Indian Legal Service, Oakland.  On July 29th, the 9th Circuit unanimously
ruled that the California Department of Corrections policy of punishing a
Native American male prisoner for wearing his hair longer than 3 inches
violates federal law (RLUIPA). "... this is an incredible victory for
Indian inmates in state prisons in California and this case will
potentially positively impact other Native prisoners incarcerated in other
state prisons who wear their hair traditionally long."  To read the
decision, see http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data2/circs/9th/0455879p.pdf,
wmcadam [at] calindian.org, www.calindian.org.

* * *
Indian Uprising is a one-half hour Public & Cultural Affairs radio program
for, by, and about Indigenous people & all their relations, broadcast each
Sunday at 4:00 p.m. over KFAI 90.3 FM Minneapolis and 106.7 FM St. Paul.
Current programs are archived online after broadcast at www.kfai.org, for
two weeks.  Click Program Archives and scroll to Indian Uprising.

--------x of 18--------

From: biego001 <biego001 [at] umn.edu>
Subject: MN activists plan 8.07 7pm

The Next Minnesota Activist Roundtable event will be a all-group
social/networking convocation, with FOOD, MUSIC, SPOKEN WORD, SIGNING-UP
NEW MEMBERS TO ALL COMMITTEES! Our target date is November 12, the Sat.
after the general election. All local activist groups: please send
delegates to help plan this event!

The planning committee meets next this Sunday, Aug. 7, 7pm, at the Dunn
Bros. coffee shop on Grand Ave., just 1/2 block east of Snelling Ave.
Contact Carolina, cmunozproto [at] macalester.edu, for more information on how
you can help. Ask not what the activist roundtable can do for you...
(Well, you should ask that, come to think of it! Find out what it can do
for you by joining us today)


--------15 of 18--------

The Horrendous Implications of Kelo
A Supreme Assault on Personal Liberty
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
CounterPunch
8.05.05

Readers' questions have prompted me to examine further the Supreme Court's
recent Kelo decision. Kelo is even worse than the calamity I declared it
to be.

Kelo does not mean the end of private property per se, but it does mean
the end of anyone's secure possession, be the owner an individual or a
corporation. To the extent that Americans still possess constitutional
rights, Kelo could mean their end as well.

In 1981 General Motors used eminent domain against the Detroit ethnic
suburb of Poletown. To make space for a GM assembly plant, 1,400 homes,
140 businesses, and several churches were destroyed. Today the exemplar of
this practice is Wal-Mart.

What if Poletown had been a Chrysler plant that GM wanted to eliminate as
a competitor? Under the Kelo ruling, if GM could show that its cars are
more successful and produce higher taxable profits than Chrysler's, and
the eminent domain authority is not in Chrysler's pocket, GM could
prevail.

Today, Toyota, for example, could seek to condemn Ford's River Rouge
plant, which is known to be largely obsolete, in order to obtain the site
for its own economic use. There appears to be nothing in Kelo to prevent
this outcome.

Note some of the implications: According to economic theory, monopoly
profits are higher than competitive profits. Kelo becomes a way to get
around anti-trust laws and increase concentration in the name of public
benefit.

Libertarians might be tempted to welcome the demise of anti-trust, as they
see it as government intrusion, but not if they consider Kelo's public
choice aspects. Kelo opens up new channels of rent-seeking that enhance
government power.

Consider, for example, Justice Souter's New Hampshire property, which Kelo
opponents gleefully note may be lost to the justice as a result of his
vote. A hotel wants the property and can produce higher revenues for the
community. But which hotel gets the property? Hilton? Hyatt? That decision
rests with the enlightened insight of the eminent domain authority. As it
is up to government to determine ownership, many considerations regardless
of fact can determine the outcome.

Kelo could introduce new instability into share prices and financial
markets as analysts factor into share prices the risks of firms being
Keloed by competitors.

With Kelo, eminent domain could be used to condemn cigarette companies on
the strength of the argument that the product produces more societal costs
than are covered by tax revenues from tobacco products. Producers of
alcohol products could find themselves Keloed as could gun manufacturers.

Indeed, as one astute reader noted, Kelo's public benefit concept of
eminent domain could be used to condemn privately owned firearms. The
Second Amendment would still be there. We would have a right to firearms
in the abstract just as we have a right to property in the abstract, but
every specific right can be condemned.

Did the five justices who inflicted this calamity intend the implications
of their ruling or are these implications the unintended consequences of a
thoughtless decision?

While left and right engage in combat over Judge Roberts. nomination to
the Supreme Court and Roe v. Wade, more far-reaching issues go unattended.
Left and right think control over court appointments is a life and death
matter, but no matter who is appointed, the trend is always more power
concentrated in government and more erosion of constitutional protections
and civil liberties.

Is abortion really more important than habeas corpus, the attorney-client
privilege, and the prohibitions against crime without intent, ex post
facto laws, and self-incrimination?

It is astonishing that no bar association, no political party, no
politician, no organized interest group, and no columnist or reporter ever
asks a court nominee's position on the legal principles, achieved over
eight centuries of struggle, that make law a shield of the innocent
instead of a weapon in the hands of government.

A country that so consistently neglects the basic foundations of liberty
will not remain free.


--------16 of 18--------

Published on Friday, August 5, 2005 by the Baltimore Sun
The Hiroshima Cover-Up
by Amy Goodman and David Goodman

A story that the U.S. government hoped would never see the light of day
finally has been published, 60 years after it was spiked by military
censors. The discovery of reporter George Weller's firsthand account of
conditions in post-nuclear Nagasaki sheds light on one of the great
journalistic betrayals of the last century: the cover-up of the effects of
the atomic bombing on Japan.

On Aug. 6, 1945, the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima; three days
later, Nagasaki was hit. Gen. Douglas MacArthur promptly declared southern
Japan off-limits, barring the news media. More than 200,000 people died in
the atomic bombings of the cities, but no Western journalist witnessed the
aftermath and told the story. Instead, the world's media obediently
crowded onto the battleship USS Missouri off the coast of Japan to cover
the Japanese surrender.

A month after the bombings, two reporters defied General MacArthur and
struck out on their own. Mr. Weller, of the Chicago Daily News, took row
boats and trains to reach devastated Nagasaki. Independent journalist
Wilfred Burchett rode a train for 30 hours and walked into the charred
remains of Hiroshima.

Both men encountered nightmare worlds. Mr. Burchett sat down on a chunk of
rubble with his Baby Hermes typewriter. His dispatch began: "In Hiroshima,
30 days after the first atomic bomb destroyed the city and shook the
world, people are still dying, mysteriously and horribly - people who were
uninjured in the cataclysm from an unknown something which I can only
describe as the atomic plague."

He continued, tapping out the words that still haunt to this day:
"Hiroshima does not look like a bombed city. It looks as if a monster
steamroller has passed over it and squashed it out of existence. I write
these facts as dispassionately as I can in the hope that they will act as
a warning to the world."

Mr. Burchett's article, headlined "The Atomic Plague," was published Sept.
5, 1945, in the London Daily Express. The story caused a worldwide
sensation and was a public relations fiasco for the U.S. military. The
official U.S. narrative of the atomic bombings downplayed civilian
casualties and categorically dismissed as "Japanese propaganda" reports of
the deadly lingering effects of radiation.

So when Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter George Weller's 25,000-word story
on the horror that he encountered in Nagasaki was submitted to military
censors, General MacArthur ordered the story killed, and the manuscript
was never returned. As Mr. Weller later summarized his experience with
General MacArthur's censors, "They won."

Recently, Mr. Weller's son, Anthony, discovered a carbon copy of the
suppressed dispatches among his father's papers (George Weller died in
2002). Unable to find an interested American publisher, Anthony Weller
sold the account to Mainichi Shimbun, a big Japanese newspaper. Now, on
the 60th anniversary of the atomic bombings, Mr. Weller's account can
finally be read.

"In swaybacked or flattened skeletons of the Mitsubishi arms plants is
revealed what the atomic bomb can do to steel and stone, but what the
riven atom can do against human flesh and bone lies hidden in two
hospitals of downtown Nagasaki," wrote Mr. Weller. A month after the bombs
fell, he observed, "The atomic bomb's peculiar 'disease,' uncured because
it is untreated and untreated because it is not diagnosed, is still
snatching away lives here."

After killing Mr. Weller's reports, U.S. authorities tried to counter Mr.
Burchett's articles by attacking the messenger. General MacArthur ordered
Mr. Burchett expelled from Japan (the order was later rescinded), his
camera mysteriously vanished while he was in a Tokyo hospital and U.S.
officials accused him of being influenced by Japanese propaganda.

Then the U.S. military unleashed a secret propaganda weapon: It deployed
its own Times man. It turns out that William L. Laurence, the science
reporter for The New York Times, was also on the payroll of the War
Department.

For four months, while still reporting for the Times, Mr. Laurence had
been writing press releases for the military explaining the atomic weapons
program; he also wrote statements for President Harry Truman and Secretary
of War Henry L. Stimson. He was rewarded by being given a seat on the
plane that dropped the bomb on Nagasaki, an experience that he described
in the Times with religious awe.

Three days after publication of Mr. Burchett's shocking dispatch, Mr.
Laurence had a front-page story in the Times disputing the notion that
radiation sickness was killing people. His news story included this
remarkable commentary: "The Japanese are still continuing their propaganda
aimed at creating the impression that we won the war unfairly, and thus
attempting to create sympathy for themselves and milder terms. ... Thus,
at the beginning, the Japanese described 'symptoms' that did not ring
true."

Mr. Laurence won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on the atomic bomb,
and his faithful parroting of the government line was crucial in launching
a half-century of silence about the deadly lingering effects of the bomb.
It is time for the Pulitzer board to strip Hiroshima's apologist and his
newspaper of this undeserved prize.

Sixty years late, Mr. Weller's censored account stands as a searing
indictment not only of the inhumanity of the atomic bomb but also of the
danger of journalists embedding with the government to deceive the world.

Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now!, and David Goodman, a contributing
writer for Mother Jones, are co-authors of The Exception to the Rulers:
Exposing Oily Politicians, War Profiteers, and the Media That Love Them.

 2005 Baltimore Sun


--------17 of 18--------

Published on Friday, August 5, 2005 by TomDispatch.com
The Twilight Era of Petroleum
by Michael T. Klare

Several recent developments -- persistently high gasoline prices,
unprecedented warnings from the Secretary of Energy and the major oil
companies, China's brief pursuit of the American Unocal Corporation --
suggest that we are just about to enter the Twilight Era of Petroleum, a
time of chronic energy shortages and economic stagnation as well as
recurring crisis and conflict. Petroleum will not exactly disappear during
this period -- it will still be available at the neighborhood gas pump,
for those who can afford it -- but it will not be cheap and abundant, as
it has been for the past 30 years. The culture and lifestyles we associate
with the heyday of the Petroleum Age -. large, gas-guzzling cars and SUVs,
low-density suburban sprawl, strip malls and mega-malls, cross-country
driving vacations, and so on -- will give way to more constrained patterns
of living based on a tight gasoline diet. While Americans will still
consume the lion's share of global petroleum stocks on a daily basis, we
will have to compete far more vigorously with consumers from other
countries, including China and India, for access to an ever-diminishing
pool of supply.

The concept of a "twilight" of petroleum derives from what is known about
the global supply and demand equation. Energy experts have long
acknowledged that the global production of oil will someday reach a moment
of maximum (or "peak") daily output, followed by an increasingly sharp
drop in supply. But while the basic concept of peak oil has gained
substantial worldwide acceptance, there is still much confusion about its
actual character. Many people who express familiarity with the concept
tend to view peak oil as a sharp pinnacle, with global output rising to
the summit one month and dropping sharply the next; and looking back from
a hundred years hence, things might actually appear this way. But for
those of us embedded in this moment of time, peak oil will be experienced
as something more like a rocky plateau -- an extended period of time,
perhaps several decades in length, during which global oil production will
remain at or near current levels but will fail to achieve the elevated
output deemed necessary to satisfy future world demand. The result will be
perennially high prices, intense international competition for available
supplies, and periodic shortages caused by political and social unrest in
the producing countries.

The Era of Easy Oil Is Over

The Twilight Era of oil, as I term it, is likely to be characterized by
the growing politicization of oil policy and the recurring use of military
force to gain control over valuable supplies. This is so because oil,
alone among all major trading commodities, is viewed as a strategic
material; something so vital to a nation's economic well-being, that is,
as to justify the use of force in assuring its availability. That nations
are prepared to go to war over petroleum is not exactly a new phenomenon.
The pursuit of foreign oil was a significant factor in World War II and
the 1991 Gulf War, to offer only two examples; but it is likely to become
ever more a part of our everyday world in a period of increased
competition and diminishing supplies.

This new era will not begin with a single, clearly defined incident, but
rather with a series of events suggesting the transition from a period of
relative abundance to a time of persistent scarcity. These events will
take both economic and political form: on the one hand, rising energy
prices and contracting supplies; on the other, more diplomatic crises and
military assertiveness. Recently, we have witnessed significant examples
of both.

On the economic side, the most important signals have been provided by
rising crude oil prices and warnings of diminished output in the future. A
barrel of crude now costs just over $60 -- approximately twice the figure
for this time a year ago -- and many experts believe that the price could
rise much higher if the supply situation continues to deteriorate. "We've
entered a new era of oil prices," said energy expert Daniel Yergin in an
April interview with Time Magazine. If markets remain as tight as they are
at present, "you'll see a lot more volatility, and you could see prices
spike up as high as $65 to $80."

Analysts at Goldman Sachs are even more pessimistic, suggesting that oil
could reach as high as $105 a barrel in the near future. "We believe that
oil markets may have entered the early stages of what we have referred to
as a .super-spike' period," they reported in April, with elevated prices
prevailing for a "multi-year" stretch of time.

Of course, the world has experienced severe price spikes before -- most
notably in 1973-74 following the October War between Egypt and Israel and
the Arab oil embargo, as well as in 1979-80 following the Iranian
Revolution -- but this time the high prices are likely to persist
indefinitely, rather than recede as was the case in the past. This is so
because new production (in such places as the Caspian Sea and off the West
coast of Africa) is not coming on line fast enough or furiously enough to
compensate for the decline in output from older fields, such as those in
North America and the North Sea. On top of this, it is becoming
increasingly evident that stalwart producers like Russia and Saudi Arabia
have depleted many of their most prolific fields and are no longer capable
of boosting their total output in significant ways.

Until recently, it was considered heresy for officials of the oil industry
and government bodies like the U.S. Department of Energy to acknowledge
the possibility of a near-term contraction in oil supplies. But several
recent events signal the breakdown of the dominant consensus:

*On July 8, Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman told reporters from the
Christian Science Monitor that the era of cheap and abundant petroleum may
now be over. "For the first time in my lifetime," he declared, major oil
suppliers like Saudi Arabia "are right at their ragged edge" in their
ability to satisfy rising world demand for energy. Despite the huge
increase in international demand, Bodman noted, the world's leading
producers are not capable of substantially expanding their output, and so
we should expect a continuing upward trend in gasoline prices. "We are in
a new situation," he asserted. "We are likely at least in the near-term to
be dealing with a different pricing regime than we have seen before."

*One week later, oil giant Chevron took out a two-page spread in the New
York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and other major papers to signal its
awareness of the impending energy crunch. "One thing is clear," the
advertisement announced, "the era of easy oil is over." This was an
extraordinary admission by a major oil company. The ad went on to say that
"many of the world's oil and gas fields are maturing" and that "new energy
discoveries are mainly occurring in places where resources are difficult
to extract, physically, economically, and even politically." Equally
revealing, the ad noted that the world will consume approximately one
trillion barrels of oil over the next 30 years -- about as much untapped
petroleum as is thought to lie in the world's known, "proven" reserves.

Oil Shockwave

These, and other recent reports from trade and industry sources, suggest
that the anticipated slowdown in global petroleum output will have severe
economic consequences. If prices spike at $100 a barrel, as suggested by
Goldman Sachs, a global economic recession is almost unavoidable. At the
same time, the slowdown in output is sure to have significant political
and military consequences, as suggested by another set of recent events.

The most notable of these, of course, is the domestic brouhaha triggered
by the $18.5 billion bid by the Chinese National Offshore Oil Corporation
(CNOOC) for U.S.-based Unocal, originally known as the Union Oil Company
of California. Unocal, the owner of substantial oil and gas reserves in
Asia, was originally wooed by Chevron, which offered $16.8 billion for the
company earlier this year. The very fact that a Chinese firm had been
prepared to outbid a powerful American firm for control of a major
U.S.-based oil company is immensely significant in purely economic terms.

Since abandoned by the Chinese because of fierce American political
opposition, the effort, if consummated, would have represented the largest
transaction ever by a Chinese enterprise in the United States. But the bid
triggered intense political debate and resistance in Washington because of
CNOOC's ties to the Chinese government -- it is 70% owned by the state --
and because the principal commodity involved, oil, was considered so vital
to the U.S. economy and was thought to be less plentiful than once
assumed. Fearing that China might gain control over valuable supplies of
oil and gas that would someday be needed at home or by U.S. allies in
Asia, conservative politicians sought to block CNOOC's acquisition of
Unocal by recasting the matter in national security terms.

"This is a national security issue," former CIA Director R. James Woolsey
testified before the House Armed Services Committee in July. "China is
pursuing a national strategy of domination of the energy markets and
strategic dominance of the western Pacific" -- a strategy, he argued, that
would be greatly enhanced by CNOOC's acquisition of Unocal. Seen from this
perspective, CNOOC's bid was considered a threat to U.S. security
interests and thus could have been barred by Congress or the President.

The notion of blocking a commercial transaction by a major foreign trading
partner of the United States obviously flew in the face of the reigning
economic doctrine of free trade and globalization. By invoking national
security considerations, however, the President is empowered to bar the
acquisition of a U.S. company in accordance with the Defense Production
Act of 1950, a Cold War measure designed to prevent the flow of advanced
technologies to the Soviet Union and it allies. This is precisely what was
being proposed by a huge majority in the House of Representatives. On June
30, the House adopted a resolution declaring that CNOOC's takeover of
Unocal could "impair the national security of the United States" and
therefore should be barred by the President under terms of the 1950 law.
This outlook then made its way into the omnibus energy bill adopted by
Congress before its summer recess: Citing potential national security
aspects of the matter, the bill imposed a mandatory 120-day federal review
of the CNOOC bid -- effectively ensuring its demise.

Further evidence of a growing amalgamation between energy issues and U.S.
national security policy can be found in the Pentagon's 2005 report on
Chinese military power, released on July 20. While in previous years this
report had focused mainly on China's purported threat to the island of
Taiwan, this year's edition pays as much attention to the military
implications of China's growing dependence on imported oil and natural
gas. "This dependence on overseas resources and energy supplies... is
playing a role in shaping China's strategy and policy," the report notes.
"Such concerns factor heavily in Beijing's relations with Angola, Central
Asia, Indonesia, the Middle East (including Iran), Russia, Sudan, and
Venezuela... Beijing's belief that it requires such special relationships
in order to assure its energy access could shape its defense strategy and
force planning in the future."

The unclassified version of the Pentagon report does not state what steps
Washington should take in response to these developments, but the
implications are obvious: The United States must strengthen its own forces
in key oil-producing regions so as to preclude any drive by China to
dominate or control these areas.

Just how seriously American policymakers view these various energy-related
developments is further revealed in another recent event: the first
high-profile "war game" featuring an overseas oil crisis. Known as "Oil
Shockwave," this extraordinary exercise was chaired by Senators Richard
Lugar of Indiana and Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, and featured the
participation of such prominent figures as former CIA Director Robert M.
Gates, former Marine Corps Commandant General P. X. Kelley, and former
National Economic Adviser Gene B. Sperling. According to its sponsors, the
game was conducted to determine what steps the United States could take to
mitigate the impact of a significant disruption in overseas production and
delivery, such as might be produced by a civil war in Nigeria and a
terrorist upsurge in Saudi Arabia. The answer: practically nothing. "Once
oil supply disruptions occur," the participants concluded, "there is
little that can be done in the short term to protect the U.S. economy from
its impacts, including gasoline above $5 per gallon and a sharp decline in
economic growth potentially leading into a recession."

Not surprisingly, the outcome of the exercise produced a great deal of
alarm among its participants. "This simulation serves as a clear warning
that even relatively small reductions in oil supply will result in
tremendous national security and economic problems for the country," said
Robbie Diamond of Securing America's Energy Future (SAFE), one of the
event's principal sponsors. "The issue deserves immediate attention."

Entering the Era of Resource Wars

>From what is known of this exercise, "Oil Shockwave" did not consider the
use of military force to deal with the imagined developments. But if
recent history is any indication, this is sure to be one of the actions
contemplated by U.S. policymakers in the event of an actual crisis.
Indeed, it is official U.S. policy -- enshrined in the "Carter Doctrine"
of January 23, 1980 -- to use military force when necessary to resist any
hostile effort to impede the flow of Middle Eastern oil.

This principle was first invoked by President Reagan to allow the
protection of Kuwaiti oil tankers by U.S. forces during the Iran-Iraq War
of 1980-88 and by President Bush Senior to authorize the protection of
Saudi Arabia by U.S. forces during the first Gulf War of 1990-91. The same
basic principle underlay the military and economic "containment" of Iraq
from 1991 to 2003; and, when that approach failed to achieve its intended
result of "regime change," the use of military force to bring it about.

A similar reliance on force would undoubtedly be the outcome of at least
one of the key imagined events in the Oil Shockwave exercise: a major
terrorist upheaval in Saudi Arabia leading to the mass evacuation of
foreign oil workers and the crippling of Saudi oil output. It is
inconceivable that President Bush or his successor would refrain from the
use of military force in such a situation, particularly given the historic
presence of American troops in and around major Saudi oilfields.

In setting the stage for its simulated crisis, Oil Shockwave identified a
set of conditions that provide a vivid preview of what we can expect
during the Twilight Era of Petroleum:

*Global oil prices exceeding $150 per barrel
*Gasoline prices of $5.00 or more per gallon
*A spike in the consumer price index of more than 12%
*A protracted recession
*A decline of over 25% in the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index
*A crisis with China over Taiwan
*Increased friction with Saudi Arabia over U.S. policy toward Israel

Whether or not we experience these precise conditions cannot be foreseen
at this time, it is incontestable that a slowdown in the global production
of petroleum will produce increasingly severe developments of this sort
and, in a far tenser, more desperate world, almost certainly threaten
resource wars of all sorts; nor will this be a temporary situation from
which we can hope to recover quickly. It will be a semi-permanent state of
affairs.

Eventually, of course, global oil production will not merely be stagnant,
as during the Twilight Era, but will begin a gradual, irreversible
decline, leading to the end of the Petroleum Age altogether. Just how
difficult and dangerous the Twilight Era proves to be, and just how
quickly it will come to an end, will depend on one key factor: How quickly
we move to reduce our reliance on petroleum as a major source of our
energy and begin the transition to alternative fuels. This transition
cannot be avoided. It will come whether we are prepared for it or not. The
only way we can avert its most painful features is by moving swiftly to
lay the foundations for a post-petroleum economy.

Michael T. Klare is the Professor of Peace and World Security Studies at
Hampshire College and the author, most recently, of Blood and Oil: The
Dangers and Consequences of America's Growing Dependence on Imported
Petroleum (Owl Books) as well as Resource Wars, The New Landscape of
Global Conflict.

 2005 Michael T. Klare


--------18 of 18--------

 The Emperor of Ice-Cream
 by Wallace Stevens

 Call the roller of big cigars,
 The muscular one, and bid him whip
 In kitchen cups concupiscent curds.
 Let the wenches dawdle in such dress
 As they are used to wear, and let the boys
 Bring flowers in last month's newspapers.
 Let be be finale of seem.
 The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.

 Take from the dresser of deal,
 Lacking the three glass knobs, that sheet
 On which she embroidered fantails once
 And spread it so as to cover her face.
 If her horny feet protrude, they come
 To show how cold she is, and dumb.
 Let the lamp affix its beam.
 The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.

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