Sunday, November 23, 2008

There will be anarchy...

I have been proved wrong! Of course, this is not the first time that I have been proved wrong, but it definitely is the first time that I am happy that I have been proved wrong. Apropos to my previous blog post ***** I see the governments of the world taking action, together, to combat climate change. The US government, which has, since time immemorial, sucked up to the Big 3, finds itself to have finally caught the GM-Ford-Chrysler cartel by the balls.
As the Big 3 find it unable to sustain themselves, no thanks to their own business models, the people see a change emerging from the sidelines. The darkest cloud truly has a silver lining. In this case, all the layoffs from the auto biggies the world over has got them wondering where things went wrong.
Primarily, it’s time folks realized that the Internal Combustion engine is a part of the past now. We cannot afford to sustain ourselves by burning gasoline and the sort to run our vehicles. Electric vehicles and mass transit is the way to go. This had to be seen about 30 years back, during the Oil embargo of the 70’s. But highly effective lobbying on the part of the Big 3 saw to it that this solution never struck the collective imagination nor did any such suggestion ever be passed by the Congress. Time and again, these companies have warded off requirements to increase fuel efficiency on their part, which was an extremely stupid thing to do. These guys obviously did not see the next curve coming. The way IBM had infamously said in the 50’s that the entire world required just 5 computers, and the way that Western Union had said that they thought that the telephone was an impractical invention, and scores of other such examples of bozocities, hence missing out on being the next big thing of the curve. The Big 3 ought to have quit the oil dependency in the 70’s and begun research on engines running on renewable, clean energy sources. But heck, no! What did they do? They maximized their profits by refusing to retool and to re-train their workers, and to do more research. With the amount of cash those companies sit on, they could very well have retained their top spots for all these years, saved the climate from being ruined the way it is being ruined now.
Next, This might sound like a chapter lifted straight out of the Zeitgeist Addendum, but it’s true nevertheless.  All the while that the world has been using dirty fuel sources such as coal and gas and nuclear energy to power its energy requirements, we should have forced our governments to go for clean energy sources such as Solar energy farms, Wind Farms, and Tidal energy. These energy sources have practically no repetitive costs such as buying oil, coal and gas and paying all those “friendly” governments to remain so and to then pay for all the externalities of using these dirty fuels. Think about Chernobyl, and the Polar Ice caps melting the way they are, threatening to raise sea levels by about 10 meters. Just imagine how the world would look like if things continue the way they are right now. London, Florida, Bangladesh, Australia, all submerged under the oceans. The number of climate refugees would be overwhelming and economies the world over would be thrown haywire by unexpected arrivals.
Unexpected? Think again. All this is a very very plausible scenario. And it is not an alarmist’s point of view. As politics in all countries fight for votes and power and money, the world is going down the drain. Literally. It’s time we stood up for ourselves. It’s time we stopped worrying about our jobs and our security and the sort. Because fairly soon, there will be nothing to worry about. If things continue the way they are today, there will be anarchy.

1 comment:

Obscure Optimist said...

You sound like a professional columnist... That was an amazing insight into the present situation..
Keep posting, keep inspiring :)