nice site. interesting topic

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A razor blade has four sides, two edges; it's shiny in places, thicker in some places and thinner in others.

When all is said and done, the sharp edge is what matters.

A Peak Oil discussion has many sides, different angles; it's clear in some places and murky in others.

When all is said and done, the price per barrel is what matters.

The Peak that matters is the point when demand permanently exceeds supplies.

That is here now. No more cheap gas. Lots of more expensive gas.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/GF24Ae01.html

Supply problems in Asia.

antifa: With all due respect, it's slightly more complicated than being just a matter of absolute price level. If you're interested in the overall effect of PO on humanity, which I'm guessing is the case, then you have to take into account the timing of the price increase, the timing of the awareness by the mainstream of what's happening, and political reactions (war, tax and trade policy changes) that are driven in large part by the mainstream reaction.

The good news right now is that a lot of mainstream news organizations have run serious articles on oil issues, and some have even (gasp!) used the forbidden words "peak oil." So average consumers are learning about it quicker than I and many others expected. The bad news is that the US didn't pay attention to Jimmy Carter over 20 years ago and get serious about PO when we could have made a much more comfortable transition.

To extend your (very good) rzaor blade analogy a bit further, you don't just care about the blade, but how it's used--where it's pointed, at what angle, how hard and fast it's applied, etc.

Well said, Lou;

You are right, and so are the many posters making similar points on previous threads. Lest I seem obstreperous -- my intent is not to oversimplify an incredibly intricate topic, but to focus on actions arising out of it.

This is a public problem, yet the agenda so far is being driven by moneyed interests who like the public anxious, dumb, divided and ever hoping to be saved.

It irks me that so many PO discussions move immediately on to the near-infinite causes and effects of the coming crisis. The press is currently at the stage of asking if it is real or not. Like Bigfoot.

During the Great Depression, discussions of 'what caused it' went on endlessly wherever people gathered. Hobos talked it over around their campfires, and so did bankers around their shiny tables, and so did sailors and moms and Cabinet Secretaries.

All the while, it was eating everyone alive, and concentrating wealth in a very few hands.

If we, nationally, are to be effective at dealing with the approaching crisis, it will NOT come through subtle understanding of the beast. It will be through unflinching public grasp of a few key action ideas. As your memo points out, Listening To Carter Back Then Would Have Been Wise.

We need now to focus the public discussion, not dilute it. We need public consensus to act in certain intelligent ways, so the spinmeisters don't herd us all right over the Peak.

I assure everyone, that's what the Bush clan has in mind. It was George Herbert Walker Bush who said it best, back in 1992. The conservative program is "The continuous consolidation of money and power into higher, tighter and righter hands."

So I tend to restrict my comments around the web to effective memes like:

No More Cheap Gas.
(Get real. Stop hoping prices will come back down someday.)

Get Local Or Lose.
(build up your regional economy in preference to globalized commerce, which will fade, leaving you with only what you've built up regionally.)

Corporate is Fascist.
(Corporations effectively own and operate our Federeal government. This is 'higher, tighter, righter' in action, and needs to end. Stop all corporate funding of candidates -- 110%. Only when they are hired by the public will they work for the public.)

We Can't Flush The Planet.
(The mess we've made can't be ignored, and won't disappear. We clean it up or we live in it..)

The Press Is A Public Trust
(The Fourth Estate must be a free and independent public trust, not corporately owned and ad-funded corporate shills.)

We Was Robbed
(the military-industrial complex, consumerism, corporatism, endless growth -- was a giant fraud. It was, and is, unsustainable thievery and piracy on a planet-wide scale.)

Memes, you see.

I fear that by discussing Peak Oil endlessly, we will find ourselves sitting around the campfire in 2020 discussing it yet again.

I want the nickel to drop, publicly. So I push one button at a time.