Ms. Rice says they made "thousands" of mistakes in Iraq. And yet, no one has been or will be held to account. No one will be held responsible. And nothing will change. Have we ever had a government as shameless as this one? Have we ever had a government as inept? Have we ever had a government as amoral as this one? We have not.
Those "mistakes" have names. Here they are.
If you click right here you will understand the fix we are in with immigration. Legal, illegal whatever - (if crossing someone else's border with impunity and taking up residence is what amounts to illegal then pretty much every white person in country has some illegal in 'em).
One little quip that says it all.
Sadly, Lou Dobbbs has no real response to Jay Leno.
You want 8 dollar lettuce to go with your 8 dollar gas?
me neither. We should be thanking the "illegals." Maybe take them to dinner at a place with a nice salad bar.
A prayer campaign has sprung among Evangelical "christians" to save the life of Abdul Raham, the Christian convert on trial in Afghanistan. Afghanistan is one of those places we have planted democracy, like soybeans, or positive stories in the Iraqi press. (Not quite sure how one connects a "prayer" and "campaign" - is God one enormous voter in the sky about to pull a lever? Will Diebold count God's one HUGE vote correctly? )
Nevertheless, I believe in prayer. In fact, I believe in the teachings of Jesus, and wonder often why most alleged "Christians" do not.
Here is my list of things I believe worthy of a prayer campaign. Please feel free to add your suggestions.
Let's also start a prayer campaign that Bush ends all torture by Americans.
Let's also pray that Bush apologizes for the torture that already occurred.
Let's start a prayer campaign that Bush gets off his ass an does something substantive about Darfur.
Let's start a prayer campaign that God's gay children are embraced and accepted everywhere as equals..
Let's start a prayer campaign that when the next category five hurricane hits that Bush does not ignore it and go on a fundraising trip.
Let's start a prayer campaign that Bush does not attack another sovereign nation that did not attack us.
Let's start a prayer campaign that Bush begins to respect and follow the U.S. Constitution.
Let's start a prayer campaign that migrant workers everywhere are respected for the invaluable contribution of their labor.
Let's start a prayer campaign that Cheney goes to his undisclosed cave suite, stays there, and is never heard from again. With his wife.
But first let's pray Cheney apologizes, and asks God's forgiveness for the loss of the lives of many thousands of God's children in the illegal, unjust, immoral invasion of Iraq.
Let's start a prayer campaign that the so called Evangelical "christians" in this country actually read the Beatitudes, beg Jesus' forgiveness for ignoring them, and get to work on a more just society.
Let's start a prayer campaign for Abdul Rahman. A Christian afghan under threat of death for his religious beliefs.
What else?
It has happened. I doubt it is a sign of the apocalypse. But it certainly is rare. I agree with Bush's proposal on immigration. We need a guest worker program. The proposal by those in his party further to the Right criminalizes millions of people overnight. It is wrong. It criminalizes people who are among the most industrious in our society. And the fact is - they are essential.
However, I do not think the status quo is helpful. Pretending that massive numbers of people crossing our southern border is either nothing to worry about or not happening is just foolish and invites an ugly backlash.
Bush's plan is not perfect. But it is better than doing nothing or allowing the far Right to incite racist fears to win a mid-term election.
There ya go. On this one issue, I agree with Bush. Maybe now the Dodgers will win the World Series, all reality shows will be canceled, and Bill O'Reilly will be replaced by Phil Donahue.
Anything can happen.
It is Saturday. We have survived another week of illegal, insane, inanity from the GOP. Take out some anger here. Go ahead. Whack Your Boss. Nothing political,just good clean fun. The Google ad strip is a bunch of Anger Management classes - so you know the site must be good.
Much of the Right has an obsession with the end of the "world". They call it the rapture or the End Times. Conservative Kevin Phillips has now written a book that details the animating power the apocalypse has for the Right. The Left has versions of end times obsession - it is called Peak Oil or Global Warming. Checking oil prices and the state of the Greenland ice sheet daily on Google news is the progressives' equivalent to a rightwinger reading all world events, however minor, as something directly out of the book of Revelation. The difference is, of course, that in the case of Peak oil the evidence has become powerful, and the case for Global Warming is now overwhelming. The progressive case for impending crisis relies, to a large extent, on a growing body of fact. The Revelation of John is an article of faith used by certain factions to codify a sense of doom.
The danger inherent in apocalyptic policy animated by belligerent faith and not facts are clear for the United States. The fracturing of civil society, religious intolerance, and finally the creation of a defacto theocracy in the place of Jeffersonian democracy. The real and final danger is this truth: The end of the world is not near. The End Game for the right wing endtimers is an article of faith, not fact. Much must be destroyed or the belief system is worthless. Those that have been "saved" will be whisked away, and the rest of us will be torn to shreds by the Four Horseman here on earth. To the Right wing endtimers the near future is both catastrophic and inevitable. This learned helplessness has been energized and monotized. It has infected a growing body of powerful interest groups who overtly desire an American theocracy. By extension this belief has infected the Republican Party. Once the party of fiscal responsibility, it is now the party of crushing debt. This wild disregard for any semblance of fiscal sanity is not a belief in the power of the future. It is a blatant disregard for it. The Real Politic of the GOP past has been thrown overboard for "preemptive war" and a contempt for world opinion. Endless war depends on hopeless populations.
We must not allow the most powerful to midwife armageddon.
The end of the world is not near. What is near, based on facts and an extensive body of evidence, is the end of a country and a world we recognize. Climate change is here. Nine trillion dollars in U.S. government debt is here. The dangers to a society completely ( and look around, I do mean completely) dependent of foreign oil are overwhelming - and here.
The fantasies of the Christian Right will not bring on the end of the world. Life will go on. Callous disregard for that future life is not a part of any reasonable religion. It is criminal neglect.
The Bush Presidency has been breached. The flood waters are swirling in the oval office. The problem with an administration that knows how to campaign but doesn't know how to govern is that you cannot spin a city back into existence. You cannot blame Clinton for the lack of a recovery effort on the Gulf Coast. You are in charge. You are actually accountable. Looking strong is not the same as strong leadership.
Conservatives are turning on Bush. 70% of the country think we are heading in the wrong direction. The war in Iraq is now a Civil War. Sandra Day O'Connor warned of the United States becoming a dictatorship.
We have to win at least the House this year so the fun can begin.
Oh, and since the President's poll numbers are so low we had a terror threat today. I'm hoping that I can get cheap tickets to the Final Four now.
More than likely you know someone who has been raped. Maybe they don't tell you because they're ashamed. Maybe because they don't want to deal with it. Maybe they don't want to see the pity in your eyes. I have a friend who was raped twice and I think I am the only person aside from her mother that she has ever told. She got pregnant from one of them and her mom took her to have the abortion. She was 16.
I was raped. I don't want anyone to feel sorry for me. I want you to know how lucky I am to have made it through.
I woke up with a knife at my throat and a strange man in my bedroom. No one heard me scream. It was hot and I was sleeping with no clothes on. I didn't fight. I tried to talk my way out of what I knew was going to happen. I am an excellent sales person and words have always been my sword. It didn't work. He made me shower afterwards and cut my phone lines. He told me that he lived in my apartment complex and that if I called the police he would kill me. I said Hail Mary's while I showered. He left while I was in the shower. I was terrified to leave the bathroom. I found an old phone with a phone cord attached and tried to call my father. He wasn't home so I called my uncle. We all worked for the same company. My uncle told me he would find my dad for me. I called my mother. It was so hard to tell her what had happened. She told me get off the phone with her and call the police then to call her back. I did as she told me. My dad called me then. No father should ever have to ask his daughter, "Did he come in you?" An officer arrived and took my statement and took me to the hospital. A volunteer stayed with me during the exam. They make you stand naked and take pictures of you. The pull your pubic hair out so they can differentiate. But I was so fortunate that they also made me feel cared for. I left that afternoon to stay with my cousin in San Diego. I went to the hospital there to pick up the morning after pill. It made me nauseous but I took it. I then went back and stayed with friends. I met with the detective who handled my case. I will love Detective Prostler forever for telling me that it was not my fault and that it was OK that I didn't fight because whatever I did that kept me alive was the right thing. For months afterwards someone from my family would call me everyday. I found a new apartment. I slept with my clothes and the lights on until I got my dog, Richie. The first night I got him I turned the lights off. I had a horrible nightmare that someone was in my room with me and apparently I screamed. I woke myself up. Shortly after there was knock on the door. My neighbors had called the police. After that I was able to sleep under the covers without my shoes on. My period didn't start and I was convinced I was pregnant. I called my dad and told him that I was pregnant and going to have an abortion. He said that's fine but you're not pregnant. He told me to go at buy a pregnancy kit and call him back after I took it. He was right - I wasn't pregnant; my period started the next day. I had to go for HIV tests at six months and year. I was negative. Every time I gave blood I had to say that I didn't know whether or not I had sex with a man who had sex with a man and I'd have to explain that I had been raped.
It's been almost 13 years. I know how lucky I am. I have a great, huge family that completely surrounded me with love. I have friends who took care of me. I got great care and counseling from the State of California. I didn't get pregnant.
I tell you all this because if you haven't been through it you cannot imagine it. No one should be forced to carry a pregnancy of a rape. No one should have a pharmacist tell her she cannot have the morning after pill. Rapist steal your dignity. I was blessed to have so many people give it back to me.
Let's be as simple and as brutal as we can about what South Dakota did today. One all too real example - Here goes: If you are a woman, and are raped, and become pregnant, after July 1 - YOU MAY NOT TERMINATE THE PREGNANCY in South Dakota.
That is the law.
This is the world according to the far Right. This is the world the far right wants us to live in.
There are many, many reasons why abortion must remain legal. I don't write tonight to argue them all. I write to render clearly one of the results of this law. If you are raped the rights of rapists' SPERM now trump you, as a victim. It is as simple as that.
All thinking people, ( but I hope that parents with daughters of any age realize what this law means) should be outraged. Direct the outrage at those who wrote, voted for, and believe in this law.
It sickens me to think of it but I want a Pro-choice candidate to run an ad with a father whose daughter was raped.
The far Right is relentless, ruthless, and dangerous. Believe it. What the governor of South Dakota did today was thoughtless and cold blooded.
Below is further proof that the ongoing support of George Bush by a loud, and stupid, minority is evidence of mental illness usually associated with cults. On the USATODAY blog a clarification from the AP story was run. AP used the word breached, the word used in the "bunker" tape was "over run" or "over topped". One can assume that those in danger that night would have wanted a President who knew a flood was a flood no matter how the water got there. But Bush went on a fundraising trip. This delusional comment really stuck out. I put it up in full, without the poor person's name. IT SCREAMS PERSONALITY CULT WORSHIP. And is, I fear, emblematic. They are in their own fantasy land.
"YES sirs... we need only facts nothing more. Leave to us smart constituents of America to decide, what to do with the news. Please do not feed us your biased news reporting because you're truly losing the battle here in audience and readership circulation.
Because with the advent of the internet, us, the rest of the citizens the United States of America have ways of finding out the truth by going directly to the source, mind you.
Now, in the case of the Katrina briefing fiasco you have managed to get people riled up and confused
You would be lucky if no one sues you for trying to damage the President of the United States of America...
I believe, AP from its publishers down to its journalists have one goal in mind... topple this great President of the United States, George W. Bush with misleading details. Not in this lifetime will you and the fathead, fat bellied, ingrate Michael Moore's of the world will succeed.
Please do not ingratiate yourselves with an after the damage is done correction... I am referring to your headline this weekend that reads: "AP clarifies what Bush was told about levees"...
YouÂre pathetic.
Yes, if you are fair, I challenge you if you dare, I give you permission to print this comment I am certain, I speak for a lot of people ... the silent majority."
Pathetic, indeed.
Hillary can win. I am not sure I want her to even run. But she can win. Too many Democrats are bent out of shape about a "Hillary" candidacy. There will not be a "Hillary" candidacy. There will be a "Clinton" candidacy. And let me postulate that the excitement on the Right at the prospect of the Democrats nominating her is largely fake. The truth is those who know how to win elections (which is to say the GOP) understand a real threat when they see one. The early assault on her from the Right by people like Chris Matthews is reality based fear. It is also tactical. And pretty good politics. Tag her as "angry" and hysterical early and often. Frame the debate about her around anger and the word "Hillary".
"Anger" from a female loses. Sexist, but true. The Right wing creation called "Hillary" loses. To any number of Republicans.
"Clinton", however is a winner.
Democrats have got to understand something basic, after all the good work being done with the "grassroots" and more and more Democrats being willing to hammer Bush, AND - bless my soul- a party that is FINALLY attacking on issues like healthcare and foreign oil - in the final analysis, Presidential elections are ABOUT BRANDING.
Bush=strong
Kerry=weak.
In those four words Bush got a second term. The majority does not and did not like Bush. The majority did not and does not agree with most of Bush's policies. Still he won. Kerry was branded in August of 2004 in almost the exact same way Dukakis was branded in the public mind in August of 1988. Neither had the basic political sense to brand Dad or son Bush. Or even respond for weeks. Just replace Atwater with Rove. Same election.
Let me make the obvious painfully clear: "CLINTON" wins. Twice already. Not always, but with astounding consistency, the Bill Clinton brand was controlled by Bill Clinton. It still is. Monica got him impeached. All the while his poll numbers kept going up. The economy helped but a lesser politician would have been removed. Dismissing "Hillary" is easy. "Clinton" is another matter.
Senator Clinton could also lose. The election is far away. The Republicans are ruthless in ways Democrats are still unwilling to come to terms with.
My brief take from this far out: 40% will vote for ANYONE who runs against her. But 30-35% will vote for if she is the candidate. That leaves a dog fight for 20%. If the election were today? She would be slaughtered.
3 more years of GOP trainwrecks, trials, scandals, and wandering in Iraq - the Clinton Brand is going to be hot.
If, by then, we also add in a sour economy - then Bill smiling and waving behind the Senator looks damn good.
She will give even the best GOP ticket a hell of a fight.
"Hillary" is a bad choice for Democrats in 2008. Senator Clinton has the brains, chops and team to win.
This is a comment that was posted by Harold on Fanatical Apathy, one of the funniest blogs ever. (If you didn't read Adam Felber's concession speech after the 2004 election click here and laugh 'til you cry).
How to think like a Republican:
1. Whenever possible, blame Clinton.
2. If this is not possible for obvious timeline reasons, blame Carter.
3. If #2 fails, blame Roosevelt and the New Deal.
4. If you've really screwed up, bring up Ted Kennedy and Chappaquidick.
Example: The mess in Iraq can be traced to a failure of leadership during the Clinton years, when the Democrats failed to deal with the emerging threats of militant Islam that had grown from seeds that first germinated during the Carter administration. Carter's failure to forcefully and decisively deal with emerging Islamic fundamentalists in Egypt, Syria, Palestine, and most notably Iran has directly led to the current Middle East situation. And FDR's so-called "New Deal" has led to a weakening of America's resolve. Also, Ted Kennedy once crashed a car and left his secretary behind to drown. So, clearly, the current administration is not to blame.
Watching the video of the President during the Katrina briefing, completely unengaged, well, he was on vacation after all, and then going to sites like RedState, Free Republic and the AOL message boards made me think of the comment above.
First off, Redstate, as of this morning has nothing on Katrina & Bush. Free Republic is blaming Nagan. AOL? Dear God, there are people who bring up Monica.
Let me tell you something, the moment you bring up Clinton's affair you have lost the argument. First, in case you haven't noticed, Clinton has not been in office for five years. Secondly, you only remind us that during the Clinton years we had the luxury of someone's sex life being the top news. We had a surplus, we were paying down the national debt, real wages were rising, anyone could make money on the stock market and we had a balanced budget. Good times.
Now there are so many scandals you can't keep up. Duke Cunningham, Jack Abramoff, Tom Delay, The Downing Street Memos, Jeff Gannon, Katrina, warrentless wiretaps, Valarie Plame, the Dubai deal, Abu Ghraib, torture, Harriet Myers, Terry Schiavo, Global Warming, Social Security, Mission Accomplished, Armstrong Williams, paying for "news" articles in Iraqi papers, Halliburton, lack of body armor for the troops, lack of armored vehicles for the troops, the largest trade deficit ever, a looming Iraq Civil war, 2296 of our troops killed so far, millions of dollars "lost" in Iraq. And does anyone remember President Bush putting Karl Rove in charge of rebuilding New Orleans? Heck of a job, Turd Blossom.
Amazingly everything takes this administration by surprise; nothing is anticipated. How exciting when everything is new to you. Please don't tell the President that Nick at Nite is made up entirely of re-runs.
The End of Oil
By ROBERT B. SEMPLE Jr.
When President Bush declared in his 2006 State of the Union address that America must cure its "addiction to oil," he framed his case largely in terms of national security - the need to liberate the country from of its dependence on volatile and in some cases hostile nations for much of its energy. He failed to mention two other good reasons to sober up. Both are at least as pressing as national security.
One is global warming. This is not an issue Mr. Bush cares much about. Yet there is no longer any doubt among mainstream scientists that the earth is warming up, that increasing atmospheric temperatures have already damaged fragile ecosystems and that our only real defense against even graver consequences is to burn less fossil fuel - which means, among other things, using less oil.
The second reason is just as unsettling, and is only starting to get the attention it deserves. The Age of Oil - 100-plus years of astonishing economic growth made possible by cheap, abundant oil - could be ending without our really being aware of it. Oil is a finite commodity. At some point even the vast reservoirs of Saudi Arabia will run dry. But before that happens there will come a day when oil production "peaks," when demand overtakes supply (and never looks back), resulting in large and possibly catastrophic price increases that could make today's $60-a-barrel oil look like chump change. Unless, of course, we begin to develop substitutes for oil. Or begin to live more abstemiously. Or both. The concept of peak oil has not been widely written about. But people are talking about it now. It deserves a careful look - largely because it is almost certainly correct.
I. Peak Oil
In oil-patch lingo, "peak oil" refers to the point at which a given oil reservoir reaches peak production, after which it yields steadily declining amounts, no matter how many new wells are drilled. As Robert L. Hirsch, an expert on energy issues told Congress last December, the life span of individual oil fields is measured in decades. Peak production typically occurs 10 years or so after discovery, or when the reservoir is about half full. An oil field may have large estimated reserves. But a well-managed field that has reached its peak (as most American fields have) has also reached a point of no return, no matter how much new technology is applied. And what's happening in individual fields will be reflected on a global scale, because world production is by definition the sum of its individual parts.
When will oil peak? At least one maverick geologist says it already has. Others say 10 years from now. A few actually say never. The latest official projections from the Energy Information Administration put the peak at 2037, or 2047 - depending, of course, on how much of the stuff is out there and how fast we intend to use it up. But even that relatively late date does not give us much time to adjust to a world without cheap, abundant oil.
II. Hubbertians vs. Cornucopians
Let's start with the true pessimists, proudly known as Hubbertians after the legendary Shell Oil Company geophysicist, M. King Hubbert. In the 1950's, Mr. Hubbert collected a wealth of historical data on oil discoveries and production, developed some complex mathematical formulas, and produced a bell-shaped curve showing that the rate at which oil could be extracted from wells in the United States would peak around 1970 and then begin to decline. Though perhaps not the most popular guy at Shell headquarters, he turned out to be right. U.S. oil extraction peaked at about 9 million barrels a day in 1970, and is now below 6 million a day. His basic methodology has been used ever since.
Various economists and geologists have applied the Hubbert technique to the world oil supply. Among the more readable and entertaining of Mr. Hubbert's disciples is another Shell alumnus, Kenneth S. Deffeyes, who is now a professor emeritus at Princeton. Mr. Deffeyes holds that nature's original oil bequest amounted to about two trillion barrels, of which nearly half has already been consumed. Armed with Mr. Hubbert's bell curve, and incorporating all sorts of up-to-date data, Mr. Deffeyes concludes with playful certainty that the apocalypse is not only upon us but has in fact occurred. "I nominate Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 24, 2005, as World Oil Peak Day," he says at the outset of his latest Hubbert-related book, "Beyond Oil: The View From Hubbert's Peak." "There is a reason for selecting Thanksgiving. We can pause and give thanks for the years from 1901 to 2005 when abundant oil and natural gas fueled enormous changes in our society. At the same time, we have to face up to reality: World oil production is going to decline, at first slowly, and then more rapidly."
Other prognosticators - Mr. Deffeyes dismisses them as "cornucopians" - paint a much cheerier picture. The most authoritative of these is not one person but 40 - the number of geologists and physicists the U.S. Geological Survey assigned to carry out the most comprehensive study ever conducted of the oil resources outside the United States. The study was done between 1995 and 2000. When combined with the results of an earlier survey of U.S. resources, it suggested that earth''s original oil endowment was 3 trillion barrels, not 2 trillion as supposed by Mr. Hubbert and his followers. It also suggested that the remaining inventory was more than twice Mr. Hubbert's - 2. 3 trillion barrels, consisting (in very round figures) of 900 trillion in proven reserves, 700 trillion in "reserve growth" (additional barrels that can be retrieved through advanced technology) and 700 trillion in "undiscovered" reserves, meaning oil the USGS experts think we can find given what we know about geological formations. These figures, admittedly speculative, are undeniably more upbeat than anything the Hubbertians have to offer (Mr. Deffeyes, for instance, puts the "undiscovered reserves" figure at 100 million barrels, max). And, of course, these rosier official calculations yield a much later oil peak - 2037, assuming a steady annual increase of 2 percent in worldwide demand, and maybe later, if another mammoth oilfield kicks in somewhere on earth. No reason yet to abandon the family S.U.V.
III. Consequences
Or is there? Think about it: the year 2037 is a mere half-generation away. Despite their differences, neither Mr. Hubbert's disciples nor the optimists showed the least interest in doing a straight-line calculation to figure out when earth will yield its last drop of oil (a calculation easily done, by the way - dividing USGS's 2.3 trillion by today's average annual consumption of 30--plus billion gives us about 80 years until the fat lady sings). But that's not the important date. The important date is the point at which demand zips past supply.
In the past several years, the gap between demand and supply, once considerable, has steadily narrowed, and today is almost in balance. Oil at $60 a barrel oil may be one manifestation. Another is the worried looks on the faces of people who fret about national security. In early 2005, for instance, the National Commission on Energy Policy and another group called Securing America's Future Energy (SAFE) convened a bunch of Washington heavyweights at a symposium called, alarmingly, Oil ShockWave, and asked them to imagine what it would take to drive oil prices into the stratosphere and send shockwaves reverberating through America and the rest of the western world.
It wouldn't take much - a terrorist attack on Alaska's Port of Valdez would reduce global oil supply by 900,000 barrels a day; unrest in Nigeria, 600,000 barrels; an attack on Saudi Arabia processing facilities at Haradh, 250,000. Throw in an unseasonable cold snap across the Northern Hemisphere, boosting demand by 800,000 barrels, and before long you're staring at a net shortfall of 3 billion barrels, or about 4 per cent of normal daily supply. This, in turn, is enough to drive oil prices from about $60 to $161 a barrel. The cost of fuel at the pump - indeed, the cost of most petrochemical-based products - rises dramatically. The U.S. economy slides into recession. Millions are thrown out of work. More broadly, the quintessentially American lifestyle - two-car suburban families commuting endlessly to office, school and mall - suddenly becomes unsustainable. But what the peak oil experts are saying is that we don't need terrorists to make this happen. Essentially the same scenario is unfolding now, right before our eyes, without benefit of bombings or cold snaps, simply through the normal laws of supply and demand.
The 2005 International Energy Outlook from the government's Energy Information Administration is instructive on this point. Over the next two decades, global oil consumption is expected to increase by more than half, from about 84 million barrels per day now to nearly 119 million barrels by 2025. U.S. consumption alone is expected to jump from 20 million to 30 millions barrels a day, one fourth the world's total. But the thirstiest consumers of all will be the emerging giants of Asia, particularly China, which is expected to quadruple the number of cars on its roads in the next 20 years and whose oil needs are expected to grow by a minimum of 3.5 per cent every year, well above the worldwide norm. Can supply keep pace? Put differently:: Can Saudi Arabia bail us out? ?
IV. The Mysterious Saudis
Conservative projections and simple arithmetic tell us that the world will need at least 35 million more barrels a day in 2025 than it needs now. The Energy Information Administration is cautiously optimistic that those barrels can be found. It foresees steady production increases in the old Soviet Union, Africa and the Caribbean. It hopes that Iraq's oil industry will survive the war and return to its old self. It does not even mention the possibility of blackmail by Iran. And it sees no reason why Saudi Arabia - the elephant in the oil patch, the country whose 260-plus billion barrels in proven reserves is one-quarter of the world's total, twice Iran's and ten times the U.S.'s - shouldn't be able to keep the oil flowing our way. Forecasters at the E.I.A. and elsewhere assume that the Saudis will be able to make a contribution commensurate with the overall 50 percent rise in production the world will need to produce those extra 35 million barrels, jacking up output from 10.5 million barrels a day now to 12.5 in 2009 to 15 million after that. But there are some people who seriously doubt whether Saudi Arabia can turn on the spigot as it's always done before.
Matthew Simmons is one of them. Indeed, Mr. Simmons is not sure that Saudi Arabia can do much of anything. Mr. Simmons is a Texas businessman and oil expert who runs a consulting firm in Texas, making good money advising energy companies. Like Mr. Deffeyes, he is seen as a maverick. His other trademark is pessimism - a pessimism nourished, he told Peter Maass of the New York Times Sunday Magazine, by months of poking around in obscure data about Saudi oil fields that left him with deep doubts about Saudi Arabia's ability to deliver the oil the world will ultimately need. His studies of Saudi Arabia's huge Ghawar field, which has produced an astonishing 55 billion barrels in the last half-century, left him particularly wide-eyed. "Twilight at Ghawar is fast approaching," he says in a new book, "Twilight in the Desert: The Coming Saudi Oil Shock and the World Economy." "Saudi Arabia clearly seems to be nearing or at its peak output." Or as he told Mr. Maass: "The odds of the Saudis sustaining [even] 12.5 million barrels a day is very low. The odds of them getting to 15 million for 50 years - there's a better chance of me having Bill Gates's net worth."
Publicly, Saudi officials and many American experts scoff at Mr. Simmons the way official Washington scoffs at Mr. Deffeyes. Other industry consultants, including the much-admired author Daniel Yergin, believe that Mr. Simmons and Mr. Deffeyes and "peakists" in general are being much too gloomy. "This is not the first time the world has run out of oil," Mr. Yergin wrote last year. "It's more like the fifth. Cycles of shortage and surplus characterize the entire history of the oil industry." Privately, however, a few well-placed Saudis share Simmons's doubts, and for one obvious reason: Hitting the Energy Information Administration's targets will require the Saudis to extract increasing amounts of oil from fields that may already be past their prime.
V. What Now?
There are many economists who believe that a nasty oil-price shock might not be such a bad thing, just as a big fat increase in gas taxes might not be such a bad thing. Sharply higher price increases might force us to conserve in ways we never have before, and lead also to a public outcry for fuel-efficient cars that neither Detroit nor the Japanese have been willing to build on a large scale. Higher prices for conventional oil could also make other sources of energy more attractive, including unconventional forms of oil. These include the heavy oil lodged in the Canadian tar sands, where there are thought to be many billions of barrels and where companies like Exxon are poking around. There are also the billions of barrels of unconventional oil trapped in shale formations out West. In the 1970's, during Jimmy Carter's synthetic fuels craze, a lot of people lost their shirts on shale oil, which needs to be heated and basically boiled out of the rock. Getting at tar and shale oil require heavy, energy-intensive mining operations. And despite the serious bets being placed on the tar sands, unconventional oil won't be available in large enough quantities to make a real difference until well down the road.
The same can be said of the hydrogen power President Bush has been touting ever since he came to office;; the National Academy of Sciences says we won't see affordable hydrogen-powered cars in meaningful numbers for 30 years, if that. This does not mean that we shouldn't keep trying - future generations will not forgive us if we don't. What it does mean is that we need to look quickly for near and medium-term solutions that can help us cushion the shock when we hit the peak, assuming we haven't hit it already.
There is no shortage of ideas about what to do to reduce the demand for oil. In the last two years, there have been three major reports remarkable for their clarity and for their convergence on near-term strategies - from the Energy Future Coalition, consisting of officials from the Clinton and first Bush administrations; from the Rocky Mountain Institute in Aspen, which concerns itself with energy efficiency; and from the above-mentioned National Commission on Energy Policy, a collection of experts from academia, business and labor. All three groups call for much stronger fuel economy standards, beginning very soon. All three call for major tax subsidies and loan guarantees to help the carmakers develop and market these more efficient cars on a massive scale without going bankrupt. And all three call for an aggressive program to develop gasoline substitutes from starch and sugars, known loosely as cellulosic fuels. These strategies would not only help reduce oil dependency but, in the bargain, greatly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, 40 percent of which come from vehicles. They would not threaten economic growth, especially if Washington stood ready to ease Detroit's transition from the S.U.V.'s and light trucks they depend on for their profits (such as they are)) to a new generation of cars and trucks. And they are not pie-in-the sky. Off-the-shelf technology can boost our average fuel economy from 26 to 45 miles an hour in a decade. Brazil already has its cars running on cellulosic fuels. What these groups are talking about - and what distinguishes them from the administration's rather more passive approach - is not more research but getting good ideas into commercial production in a hurry. This is going to take serious investment. It will also take real leadership, which may be the biggest missing ingredient of all.
A couple of years ago, David Goodstein, vice provost of the California Institute of Technology, published a slim, intelligent, and spry little book called "Out of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil." A Hubbertian at heart, he nevertheless thinks we have time to avoid the worst, but only if we stop deluding ourselves. He also knows, though, that human nature does not easily leap to a challenge that seems always to be receding, and for that reason he does not think that we will really act until the wave crashes down upon us. "Our present national and international leadership is reluctant even to acknowledge that there is a problem," he writes. "The crisis will occur, and it will be painful. The best we can realistically hope for is that when it happens, it will serve as a wakeup call, and will not so badly undermine our strength that we are unable to take the giant steps that are needed."
Lela Moore contributed research for this article.
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