Keillor: Making a case for simple life in a small town

[Strelnikov_]

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bal-op.keillor07jun07,0,417667.story?coll=bal-oped-headlines

. . .

You look at the Amish and you see the past, but you might also be looking at the future. Our great-grandchildren, faced with facts their ancestors were able to ignore, might have to do without the internal-combustion engine and figure out how to live the subsistence life. Maybe someone will invent a car that runs on hydrogen or horse manure, or maybe people will travel on beams of light like in old radio serials, but the realist in you thinks otherwise.

Fred Thompson, a vanity candidate for president, goes around sneering at the notion of global warming, pointing out that Mars is heating up too, but nobody who has read the scientists' latest report on climate change is in a joking mood: It says that the situation will get a good deal worse before it gets better, if it ever gets better, and nobody knows just what "worse" means in this case.

The matter of greenhouse gases has to be addressed, and it won't be while the country is stuck in the disaster that is Iraq. The way to get unstuck is for some intrepid Republicans to get off the bus and put their shoulders to it and push. It needs to back up. The Current Occupant has driven it into a mudhole and is spinning the tires. Human lives are being tossed away carelessly, a country is bleeding, and the big man behind the desk is dishonest, incoherent and incompetent. He might do well as mayor of this little town, but he might also turn the water department over to his buddy from high school and order the police to search the cars of visitors.

. . .

[DarkTirade]

1. I love how he can just ramble on

and yet come to a succinct point at the same time. :)

[flying rabbit]

2. true dat n/t

[The River]

3. Small Towns Are More Sustainable

and probably the best place to be when things start to fall apart.
But in between our present day consumerism and our "Amish-esque new age agrarian" futures, a lot of people are going to die. We are way too dependant on the "Grid"

From "Back to the Ancient Future"

"Here's the short course: Global die-off of mankind will occur when we run out of energy to support the complex technological grid sustaining modern industrial human civilization. In other words, when the electricity goes out, we are back in the Dark Age, with the Stone Age grunting at us from just around the corner. This will likely happen in 100 years or less, assuming the ecosystem does not collapse first. And you are thinking, "Well ho ho ho! Any other good news Bageant? And how the fock do you know this anyway?"

For those willing to contemplate the subject, there is a scientifically supported model of the timeline of our return to Stone Age tribal units. A roadmap to the day when we will be cutting up dog meat with a sharpened cd rom disc in some toxic future canyon. It is called the Olduvai Theory.

The Olduvai theory* http://dieoff.org/page125.htm was first introduced in a scientific paper by petroleum geologist/engineer/anthropologist Richard C. Duncan titled The Peak Of World Oil Production And The Road To The Olduvai Gorge. <snip>
Dunk says "the Olduvai way of life was and still is a sustainable one -- local, tribal, and solar -- and, for better or worse, our ancestors practiced it for millions of years."

http://www.joebageant.com/joe/2005/04/back_to_the_anc.html

[NMDemDist2]

4. I'm there baby! we left PHX for this small town with water, salt, agriculture

and wild life

AND good neighbors :bounce:

[Odin2005]

6. Unfortunately for the neo-primitists the "Olduvai" hypothesis ain't going to happen.

I predict that by the time I die sometime in the 2070s we will have more CLEAN energy then we could ever dream of using.

Pessimistic, fatalistic BS sucks.

[athebea]

9. I'm old enough to remember...

... those back in the 60's who confidently predicted that humanity would be dead in twenty years.

[dweller]

5. thanks for this

i just sent it along with my wishes to my folks on their 62nd wedding anniversary.

there are some poignant points in that editorial.
dp

[blueworld]

7. I love Keillor

For his clear vision and plain prose. I would love to read his opinions about the "all or nothing at all" debates we have over energy issues. Small-town folks don't address budget deficits by focusing on lottery winnings. They clip coupons, tighten discretionary spending, have a garage sale, maybe take a second job - they solve problems creatively using a variety of time-tested methods.

Why is there such confusion about global warming & energy efficiency, unless the real problem is that the disinformation campaign is heavily funded by those who simply want to sustain the squabbling while they suck up profits?

We can't select a single method to significantly reduce global warming or achieve complete energy independence. But if we evaluate and use a variety of time-tested methods including conservation, solar, wind, geothermal, perhaps biofuels, manual toothbrushes, manual can-openers, higher mileage standards etc. we can surely reduce our dependence on OPEC oil significantly, reduce CO2 emissions significantly & eliminate the need to kill humans in endless resource wars.

[DarkTirade]

8. If and when I ever own a house, I fully intend to put in some kind of solar or wind

power in the place... even if it isn't much. Just a little something to try and make whatever small difference I can.
I even found plans online a while back on how to make a generator big enough for a decent sized windmill. :) I think I forgot to bookmark it though... hmm. Might have to search for it again.

[Demeter]

10. I Can Never Live In a Small Town, And I've Tried (If You Call That Living!)

I grew up in Detroit, when it was nearly 2 million strong: a vibrant big city with lots to offer all ages, and 4 generations of family all living within driving distance. At 14 my whole nuclear family moved to Massachusetts, in search of a good job, good schools, and flight from the in-laws (and 2 years after the riots, flight from the crumbling corpse of a once great city). Ripping themselves from their roots nearly killed my parents--the stresses were phenomenal--especially with 3 teenagers in tow.

The suburbs of Massachusetts were deadly. First, the cultures between Detroit and Mass. were too different to bridge. Second, it was deathly deprived. You could get on the hourly bus, ride for an hour, and end up in Lowell, armpit of the universe, where there still was nothing, then take a bus or train to Boston for another hour if you wanted culture or variety or ANYTHING. No movie theater, little shopping, libraries unstocked since the Depression, NOTHING. Except drugs, and drinking, which were quite common in the student population.

There were good schools, a fleeting result of the tail end of the NASA-Vietnam War boom in technology. As a bedroom community to Rt. 128, our town had education! But it was so white bread, and unstimulating, that one could shut down.

After trying to fit into small towns in several states, I'm back in Michigan. Ann Arbor is only 100,000 or so, but it has all the Big City perks without the crime (mostly). Detroit is a hollow shell of itself...waiting to be reborn.

[formercia]

11. During WWII in France

people adapted cars to run on Carbon Monoxide from a charcoal burner. The burner ran in a Oxygen starved mode which produced CO which was then piped to the caburetor. A bit messy and not condusive to induce one to make a quick run to the 7-11, but it worked.