Palin on CNBC: We have billions of barrels of oil still sitting underground, page 1

Hi There,

I would say that the 'addiction to oil' is both ways, the investors take their continued profit, and the buyers at the pumps pay for that profit whilst feeding their part of the addiction. It's very much like a supply and (dependency) demand relationship of the drug pusher and user.

The only way out of this vicious circle is to change the dependency by changing the energy type of consumption. Opening up Alaska to consume the fossil fuels there is not the answer in the long term, but more of a short respite from the pressures - economically, environmentally, socially - that we are experiencing now world-wide.

We, as a species need to focus our technological efforts on developing cleaner and more efficient fuel sources, of which both the ingenuity and the technology has been around for many years, but suppressed. Water, for instance, can be used to power vehicles, and is probably the cleanest and cheapest form of power, but if we were to change to this form of energy consumption, the impact upon societies around the world would be extreme, it would compel us to rethink society and to rebuild and reshape it to accommodate the 'new' mindset.

Just as much as we are addicted to fossil fuel, we are also addicted to the pyramidial structure of political power, where those at the top of the pyramid derive the greater benefit, and profit from the belittled position of those underneath. That those at the top would want to maintain this status quo, goes without saying, but you cannot change the addiction that keeps them there, without changing the hold the suppliers have on the addicted.

Ultimately, it's about changing one's own mindset. It's about finding the reason within yourself to gain a conviction on the necessity for delivering oneself from one's own addiction. Whichever path one takes, or continues to tread, it is going to become a hard and rocky road. If we do not make the necessary changes, we as a civilisation will go the way of past civilisations into obscurity and extinction, of which there are many more roads than there are for our continuance.

Through mankind's addiction to fossil fuels, we have subconsciously adapted a mindset to the incremental approach of the devastating effects which are wrought from that addiction, environmental, economical, societal. We rationalize statistically what we can live with, what we can put up with: it is better to have a cold than to have the flu; it is better to have the flu than pneumonia; it is better to have pneumonia than cancer. At some point, the quality of life is so reduced that we even rationalize on euthanasia...that it is better to be dead than to live a life of famine and thirst, yet we condemn many to death for the sake of our addiction, through bogus wars derived from spurious reasons, but whose primary purpose to was snatch at the resources of another country, so that your government can feed your addiction, and make a profit along the way.

Opening up Alaska will not save you from what is inevitable; more impactful environmental destruction, resource wars, political and social unrest. If the supplier is not willing to change, then the addicted needs to deliver themselves from the addiction...how that is to be achieved is what the debate is all about, that is what needs discussing.

Best wishes

Now and Then:

Much better idea would be to find ways to ditch oil all together, short sharp shock would be best - like a drug addict kicking the drugs. Necessity is the mother of invention.

Quite agree. Minds thinking alike here.

[edit on 7/9/08 by elysiumfire]