End Times are Near! Religion has taught that for a thousand years, and today prophet . Today, the End Times appear near, and it is called Peak Oil. Classical petroleum engineering, especially the HTTP://die off.org site by Jay Hanson PhD, teaches us that by perhaps 2012 to as late as 2020, there will be so little oil remaining that the United States especially (since it is the biggest oil hog) and every other country on the planet will find itself with insufficient oil to run its vehicles, power its electric power plants, make plastic goods, and most importantly make fertilizer. When the power plants blink off, we are back in the dark ages. This apocalypse conincides almost exactly with the dooms day predictions made thousands of years ago by the ancient Mayan civilization who predicted the end of the world on December 21, 2012, when the Maya's "Long Count" calendar marks the end of a 5,126-year era.

       Not only do we need to be concerned about Peak Oil, we also need to be concerned about gaining access to oil. Geopolitical aspects may seriously limit development of those resources, and an example is radical Islams resistance to U.S. involvement in Iraq. In Iraq oil production and pipeline equipment is repeatedly destroyed and production is far below expectations. The Peak Oil theory holds that at some point in this decline in oil availability, martial law will likely be declared by various countries, with the U.S. possibly leading the way via the Patriot Act, perhaps using a war between Israel and Iran as cover, since the U.S. will be implicated by association, thus allowing the President to avoid elections and rule as a monarch or king. It that happens, the availability of petroleum may be greatly restricted, especially if Iran responds by igniting the Gulf.

       Since the United States is dependent upon other countries for +70% of its oil, consider what would happen to the U.S. if those foreign countries decided to stop selling oil. It is entirely within their right to refuse to sell any oil at all. Perhaps they will become interested in preserving oil for their own future use. See how pecarious the life-blood of the western world is? If radical Islam wanted to turn off the western world, all they need do is gain control of Saudi Arabian oil production and the western world is toast. See why there are so many western military forces in the Gulf? Consider the amount of money spent on military force in that area and figure it into the price of oil, and you get $15 to 20 per gallon oil. Thus we pay taxes.

       The End Times are Near! scenario means that with a decline in energy resources comes a lessened ability to feed ourselves, loss of jobs, economic collapse and starvation. Even as early as the Spring of 2008, a time of the year when food should be in great abundance, the Earth is experiencing one of the greatest human food shortages in history. Notice that above figure shows energy per capita. Obviously, there are two ways of increasing energy production per capita; first, by increasing energy production, and second, by decreasing population. There are a few ways to simply reduce population, and birth control, wars, disease and famine come readily to mind. In fact, the United States has long considered excessive population of "other countries" to be a threat to national security, and plans written as early as 1974 by Henry Kissinger showed some ideas. Today, a recognized way of increasing energy supplies per capita is starvation though escalating food prices world-wide. Escalating food prices is an automatic response to higher petroleum prices. The poor, those living on a dollar or two a day seem doomed. Actually, the dollar itself is doomed, and all curencies will follow. A good example is the truck drivers' strike in India. Over 4.8 million truckers are on strike. They can't afford the high fuel prices, and the country is fed by truckers delivering foods to markets. Will India soon starve? NOT THIS TIME! The strike only lasted two days, with the government agreeing to some terms on tolls. There are similar problems with truckers in other countries too, such as Spain. Even in the U.S., there is evidence of food rationing. Many parts of America, long considered the breadbasket of the world, are now confronting a once unthinkable phenomenon: food rationing. Major retailers in New York, in areas of New England, and on the West Coast are limiting purchases of flour, rice, and cooking oil as demand outstrips supply. Truckers in the U.S. say that $150 per barrel oil prices will likely terminate their ability to continue delivering goods unless they get help.

       In the United States one man summed up the situation here in early summer of 2008 as:

• Oil up sevenfold from $20 to $140 inside of eight years...
• Truckers not able to deliver goods withough passing on fuel surcharges....
• Home values off over 20% for most US citizens...
• Fannie and Freddie on taxpayer life support and could cost trillions...
• Financial Institutions at every level in serious jeopardy...
• State and local governments facing unpredented budget shorfalls...
• Investment capital and consumer lending are drying up...
• The free-spending Joe-Sixpack has maxed out his credit card and no longer goes to the mall...
• Inflation/commodity adjusted stock portfolios, pension plans, and government holdings taking a nose-dive...
• Federal debt at over $55 trillion with off-books Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and unfunded infrastructure maintenance included...
• Airline and auto industries have tanked with no investors in sight...
• US imports 2/3 of its daily oil consumption...
• Chindia loaded with petrodollars and can outbid us on the open market...
• OPEC weighing ever more heavily towards dropping the dollar...
• US dollar index in steady decline...
• Exporting countries outside OPEC in net production declines...
• OPEC exports are probably past peak and headed toward declines...
• But here is my big question: How much time do we have??

       Yet, economist ex-U.S. Senator Phil Graham says we are "a nation of whinners" in this wonderful YouTube video, and that nothing is really wrong. Well, consider the stock market crash of 2008 and lets see if nothing is really wrong.

       Visit PickensPlan and see what one man wants to do. T. Boone Pickens, a wealthy Texas oil man wants to move into wind power and run cars on natural gas rather than petroleum. Considering U.S. energy politics, I believe that the Republicans want to expand oil production and keep driving Hummers and Suburbans to maintain our luxurious standard of living and postpone the inevitable oil crunch, while the Democrats want to greatly reduce oil consumption and migrate to more sustainable alternatives thus forestalling the oil crunch. What would I do? First, I would outlaw Republicans. I would then expand oil production and migrate to sustainable alternatives. Migration will not be that difficult for the U.S. I too think we are at a "strategic inflection point" wherein the impetus to migrate to electric cars is now seen to be the only way out. All that is necessary is to convert to all electric cars using the existing electric power grid to recharge their batteries at night. Night-time recharging would be ideal since wind generation of power is greater at night, and there is little other demand for that power at this time, thus it is currently being lost. Think this is far away? Well, Ford developed an all electric car years ago, but sold it to a Norwegian firm, who will begin marketing it in the United States in 2009. The Th!nk City Electric car and others like it will greatly reduce gasoline consumption and eventually eliminate it. Here are thirty all electric cars that are available in small numbers today. Have you seen the Zap all electic vehicles (cars, scooters)? Apparently converting cars and pickups to electricity is not hard, here is a story of a 16-year old that did it in a highschool shop class. The problem is in lithium ion battery design, and the Chevrolet Volt seems to be leading the path to a 10-year battery. This is probably the most important technological revolution in 100 years.

"It hardly matters who becomes the next President of the United States. The approaching calamities have already been set in motion: Economic collapse, disastrous health care, skyrocketing energy prices and failed wars. The upcoming election is merely about who will be blamed for it all." - Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, July 2008. However, I vote for paris Hilton for Vice President, as she has her own energy plan and it will work. See here energy plan video here.

       Or, maybe the Russians and Brazilians have figured out how to find oil through extremely deep (mantle deep) oil wells. Who knows, maybe Peak Oil is nothing but a scam. There appears to be an unlimited supply of oil if we drill much deeper and clean out our existing wells. In fact, Russia may have overtaken Saudi Arabia as the world's biggest oil producer. This is based upon the idea that oil is not from fossils, but is of an "abiogenic" (non biological) origin as deep carbon deposits, perhaps dating to the formation of the Earth. The ubiquity of hydrocarbons in the solar system is taken as evidence that there may be a great deal more petroleum on Earth than commonly thought, and that petroleum originates from carbon-bearing fluids which migrate upward from the mantle. If you want to learn more about this, examine this article. Here is a google search for "'deep drilling' oil" and there are 145,000 articles. Looks like the Russians are right; we, just like the Vietnamese, Russians and Brazilians, have to drill much, much deeper. Of course, deep drilling is more expensive and will result in more expensive oil and the development of gas pumps that will read up to $99.99 per gallon. Thus, only the wealthy, very well armed and armored will be able to drive. Thus we will be seeing wealthy Republicans drive tiny Democratic cars that get over one hundred miles per gallon, at least until some asshole shoots the driver and steals his car, mainly for its $100 per gallon fuel.

       Sound wonderful? Looks to me that the End Times are for "cheap" oil, but not oil. BUT! If really deep wells save the world and our economy, then such bliss will be dampened by global warming with the eventual melting of the Greenland and Antarctica icecaps, a general warming of the climate world-wide and a rise in sea level by about 30 inches if we don't divorce ourselves from oil and migrate to electric cars... Talk with Al Gore about this matter.

       On the other hand: Just remember that each 100,000 year period of global warming is immediately followed by a very sudden ice age. Did you know that we are 500 to 3,000 years overdue for the start of the next ice age? Did man's activities postpone the onset of the next ice age? Is Global Dimming from increases in particulate matter in the air from combusting oil cooling the planet beneficial or adverse? Right now it appears beneficial, and doubling it could eliminate Global Warming, but the air would be dirtier, and cancer deaths would likely greatly increase. Maybe this is why China has dirty air? Population control by cancer? Isn't this a sensitive system? Did you know that we could be in an ice age within just a few years if certain conditions "flip"? Learn more at these sites: NASA Weather Changes, Sea Level Changes, Our Next Ice Age and Climate Change Global Impact.

       Eye-ball examination of the above figure (and the supporting scientific data) show that carbon dioxide peaks occurred about 800 years after peaks in temperature. Does this mean that global warming causes increases in carbon dioxide? Or should we interpret the data in the manner of Al Gore, that increases in carbon dioxide cause global warming? I assure you that on really hot days, Texas experiences many more days of grass fires and emissions of carbon dioxide. On cold days, grass fires don't occur. Perhaps it is best to ignore this bit of Texas common sense, and stick with what the politicians want us to believe, since we are running out of oil and global warming fear-mongering is an excellent "cover" for oil depletion, and the changes in our economy that must occur if we are to survive oil depletion. For vastly more details on why global warming due to our carbon release is a myth, see this page.

       Conservative Bret Hume on Fox News recently reported on global cooling. "Now there is word that all four major global temperature tracking outlets have released data showing that temperatures have dropped significantly over the last year (2007-2008). California meteorologist Anthony Watts says the amount of cooling ranges from 65-hundredths of a degree Centigrade to 75-hundreds of a degree. Watts says that is a value large enough to erase nearly all the global warming recorded over the past 100 years. Watts says it is the single fastest temperature change ever recorded — up or down. Some scientists contend the cooling is the result of reduced solar activity — which they say is a larger driver of climate change than man-made greenhouse gases." Interestingly, solar activity, which usually runs in 11-year cycles, has been so sluggish of late that space weathermen are worried we might be entering a mini-ice age. How many years of global cooling are required to produce a new ice age? About ten?

       A quick quiz (from the above links): Which nations will be most adversely affected by Global Warming? What part of the United States has cooled and which part has warmed due to Global Dimming? Which hemisphere will be least affected by these changes? Which nation is most likely to be least impacted by weather change? How long is: "just a few years if certain conditions "flip"?" Who first said, "Don't mess with mother Nature"?

        What about conservation to slow these changes? I think this is likely to happen if the Democrats get their way, since the End Times of "Cheap Oil" are definitely here. The days of the Republican's Hummers, SUVs, cross country trucking, cross oceanic shipping of manufactured goods (other than petroleum) should come to a rapid end, not because of a lack of oil, but because of its expense. Interestingly, U.S. purchases of Chinese goods is likely to go down due to the declining value of the dollar, due in part to the energy crunch. Thus, China's energy expenses would likely fall too. Fuel mileage is both a moral and an economic issue. How long will thoughtful Democratic people put up with the arrogant and wasteful Republican Hummer, pick up truck and SUV driver? When will these wasteful policies and vehicles become recognized as truly evil? When will we recognize that driving these vehicles should be terribly embarrassing? I believe that we should never drive anything less fuel efficient than a Toyota Prius (46 mpg) or Volkswagen TDI Jetta (45 mpg) and even better the new Volkswagen Polo with its 70 miles per gallon fuel mileage. We need 100 mpg plug-in cars as well as the current 100 mpg motor scooters Or better yet, how about Volkswagen's 235 mile per gallon one liter single-seater car shown in this photograph with story here? Better yet, we need to ride more bicycles and learn how to walk to work and to the grocery store and use electric cars. Do you appreciate how badly our cities are designed for walking? Go solar! Go wind power! Go SkySails! Go electric cars!

       Not to forget water availability, what will increasing temperatures do to water supplies? The total planetary water supply will remain constant, with absolutely no change. However, the glaciers are melting faster now, and run off from them has increased globally moving larger amounts of water into the oceans where it is poluted with salt making it undrinkable and useless for most agriculture without processing. Rivers and creeks may be fuller from glacier melt, but other creeks and rivers are not in such good shape. The millions of water wells over the continents have severely drawn down water levels that had taken millions of years to achieve. Many places in the world do not have fresh drinking water, and in others wells are drying up reguirning deeper wells. Fresh water is a natural resource that is being depleted and contaminated by people at an unprecedented rate. Water experts argue with oil experts as to which is the worst crisis. Since most clean water is used for agriculture and drinking water, what will happen if farmers can no longer irrigate their fields? What will happen if there is no more drinking water? Clearly, for billions of people in less developed areas of the world, the answer is bleak, and starvation will be preceeded mainly by dying of thirst. More on water crisis here. Concerning industrialized nations, Perth in Western Australia could become the world’s first ghost metropolis, an abandoned city with no more water to sustain its population unless it makes drastic changes soon perhaps involving reverse osmosis treatment of seawater.

       Who will win? People? Or the Planet? Since I am an optimist on this matter, I am betting on the Russian's deep drilling discovery, natural gas, wind power and electric cars. Couple these ideas with the distinct possibility that our global warming period is over and that we are headed for a new ice age. However, we must deal with expensive oil, global warming and a pending ice age, therefore I can't see how we can avoid conserving oil, especially by migrating to electric cars. I think that balancing Global Warming with Global Dimming will preserve our atmosphere, but it will be dirtier unless we conserve and migrate to electric cars.

       Ah Heck, maybe none of the above problems will do in the world, maybe it will be something else, either man-made, natural or political.

       An example of a man-made catastrophe would be the instantaneous destruction of the Earth and possibly the entire solar system by a man made black hole. How on Earth? Is this possible? Maybe. According to this news report, some scientists think a giant particle accelerator that will begin smashing protons together outside Geneva this summer might produce a black hole or something else that will spell the end of the Earth — and maybe the universe. Physicists have spent many years and billions of dollars building the Large Hadron Collider, in which colliding protons will recreate energies and conditions last seen a trillionth of a second after the Big Bang. However, Walter L. Wagner and Luis Sancho contend that scientists at the European Center for Nuclear Research, or CERN, have played down the chances that the collider could produce, among other horrors, a tiny black hole, which, they say, could eat the Earth. Or it could spit out something called a "strangelet" that would convert our planet to a shrunken dense dead lump of something called "strange matter." Their suit also says CERN has failed to provide an environmental impact statement as required under the National Environmental Policy Act. Well? The end of the world may come this summer! Stay tuned! You will never know what happened if they are right, since you will no longer exist. The power has yet to be turned up to full power, so hang on!

       An example of a natural catastrophe involves our beloved Yellowstone National Park. What has only been realized recently is that the park is a massive volcano, over a hundred times larger than other volcanoes and similar only to two other super volcanoes, one in California and the other in New Zealand. It may one day awake and lay waste to much of the western United States. The super volcano at Yellowstone, and its kin are a credible threat to mankind and all living things. Even the United States Geological Survey, usually conservative about such matters, admits that should a major eruption occur the results would have "global consequences that are beyond human experience and impossible to anticipate fully." For complete information on this super volcano, visit this United States Geological Service site.

       Another example of a natural disaster is the possible impact of Asteroid 2002 NT7 with the Earth on February 1, 2019. If this asteroid hits the Earth, we only have 11 more years to enjoy the planet Earth. If you are brave enough, read more about our potential future demise by this monster here.

       Obviously, full-scale nuclear war could end life on the planet Earth. How could we become so stupid as to end all life by war? In the Cold War between the United States and The USSR, eventually the concept of "mutually assured destruction" (MAD) became evident, and the USSR also became bankrupt and finally backed down, leaving the US as the sole remaining "superpower". Both countries knew that each could deliver knock-out blows to the other in a way that neither could stop once war started. Worse, even if the USSR never hit the US, and most/all of the US's weapons hit their targets, a nuclear winter (the instant start of the next ice age) would very likely have descended over the planet, and all life would have been extinguished. One would think that the risk of a new ice age from war in the 21st century would now be absent. Consider that Russia has vast petroleum resources, and appears to have a better energy future, therefore a more sustainable future, than the US. The US's energy future remains to be determined, and any major energy disruption could cause a war, since the US may well feel that without the use of force, its future would be threatened. These would be limited wars, without much, if any, consequence to the planet. On the other hand, suppose a terrorist group, perhaps a Middle Eastern terrorist group, nuked a major U.S. city, especially Washington DC, what would happen to the planet? The loss of a single U.S. city would be tragic, but it would not be a fatal blow to the US or humanity, except for Washington DC. In this case control over the US nuclear weapons would likely be lost by civilian control (the President of the US) in Washington DC, and field generals and admirals across the US, in foreign US command centers and in nuclear submarines world-wide would take control. Thus, command previously centered in one person, would then be in the hands of hundred to thousands of pissed-off generals and admirals. In their unrestrained anger and rage, they may well adopt the Cold-War idea of "use them, or lose them", thus launching everything in their control unleashing a nuclear attack that would be so intense that a nuclear winter would result. The next ice age would likely start immediately and all life planet-wide would likely be lost. Not even the cockroaches would likely survive, since their food would likely have died too. We would likely starve to death in the dark and cold, even though no weapon detonated in the American continent. This document is the current US (Bush) nuclear weapons use policy. Preserving Washington DC from major attack should be the main goal of every US friend and adversary. If President Barack Obama disarms America as he has described in this YouTube video, the likelihood of the United States responding to aggression with nuclear weapons is increased since other means of effectively responding will have been eliminated. This point is particularly accentuated since his political party, the Democratic Party of the United States of America, is the only political party in the entire world to have ever used nuclear weapons in anger.

       Consider the possibility of a social/political/economic disaster. How long do We have? Some insight can be found from history. About the time the original thirteen states of the United States of America adopted their new constitution in 1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, in England, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years earlier: "A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government." He went on to point out that, "A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury." "From that moment on, the majority always vote for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship." Specifically, he noted that, "The average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years", "During those 200 years, those nations always progressed through the following sequence:

1. from bondage to spiritual faith,
2. from spiritual faith to great courage,
3. from courage to liberty,
4. from liberty to abundance,
5. from abundance to complacency,
6. from complacency to apathy,
7. from apathy to dependence, and
8. from dependence back into bondage"

       Professor Joseph Olson of Hemline University School of Law, St. Paul, Minnesota, pointed out some interesting facts concerning the 2000 Presidential election:

1. Number of States won by: Democrats: 19 Republicans: 29
2. Square miles of land won by: Democrats: 580,000 Republicans: 2,427,000
3. Population of counties won by: Democrats: 127 million Republicans: 143 million
4. Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by: Democrats: 13.2 Republicans: 2.1

       Professor Olson added: "In aggregate, the map of the territory Republican won was mostly the land owned by the taxpaying citizens of this great United States of America. Democrat territory mostly encompassed those citizens living in government owned tenements and living off various forms of government welfare..."

       Olson believed the United States is now somewhere between the "complacency and apathy" phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy, with some forty percent of the nation's population already having reached the"governmental dependency" phase. If Congress grants amnesty and citizenship to twenty million criminal invaders called illegals and they vote, then we can say goodbye to the USA in fewer than five years. Add the prospects of marshal law (Patriot Act derived) due to the coming energy crunch, and the Figure at the top of this page again shows that we have until about 2012 to enjoy this great country. After that, many poor Democrats will likely live in bondage, perhaps to turn giant wheels on a treadmill to produce electrical power for the rich.

       Remember that the United States of America is the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave! A look into the future predicts many possibilities that are worrisome, but the brave people of the United States of America have conquered formidable foes in the past and there is no reason to believe that they can't continue. Does the quality of our future depends on how rapidly we move into bondage? Patriot act anyone?