Global Collapse

and...it's gone.

https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2022/11/23/how-crypto-goes-to-zero

How crypto goes to zero

RE

The sooner, the better!

Here's the graphic I posted back in 2018 that got the Capitalism worshipping 💵🎩 Dentist rather upset.


I doubt if he has learned his lesson, since he wanted to get into Bitcoin when it was at around $5,000. If he got in then, he is still ahead, but I agree with you that it will go to NADA very, very soon. GOOD!

Not a good time to be living in a 3rd World country.

https://jacobin.com/2022/12/central-bank-capitalism-imf-world-bank-inflation-global-south

Central Bank Capitalism Is Forcing the Global South Into a Debt Crisis

RE

True, but Central Bank Capitalism has been forcing Americans Retired on Social Security into a Debt Crisis since 1983!




📢 Even with the low-balled COLA numbers, $32,000 1983 dollars EQUALS $95,155.34 in 2022 dollars! And THAT is just the unfair taxation part! The LOSS of buying power massively above and beyond the COLA "increase adjustments" since 1983 (i.e. 197.4%) add Government sponsored THEFT to the  Government sponsored unfair taxation. HOW? There are many, many goods and services we all require to live. They are NOT "luxuries". They are NOT "optional". THAT is what the Cost Of LIVING formula is supposed to be all about, but after Greenspan and his pals in the Federal Reserve corrupted the formula, is a Wall Streetpleasing shadow of REALITY BASED COLA prior to 1980.

REALLY? HOW can that be? For the eye opening details on how we-the-people have been steadily defrauded, year after year , just check out the Chapwood Index and/or Shadow Stats.

In this post I will only point to one cost that affects everybody, whether they own a home or not. That cost is the Median Sales Price for New Houses Sold in the United States. If you don't own, you have to rent. The more houses are valued at, the more you will end up paying for rent. Yes, food, water, clothing, transportation, etc. are all costs we cannot avoid, but the Chapwood Index will show you everything you need to know about that sine qua non basket of goods and services to evidence the FACT that BLS COLA numbers are ridiculously low-balled. I bring up housing cost, because THOSE are even MORE DELIBERATELY (see below) low-balled than those items I just listed.

February  1983:  $  73,800
July         2022:  $439,400

Do the REALITY BASED inflation math:
$439,400 - $73,800 = $365,600

$365,600 = [(365,600/73,800) x 100] = % increase of $73,800 = 495.4% INCREASE

197.4% BLS CPI Published  minus 495.4% PRESENT  = 298% LESS than REAL INFLATION

The REAL INFLATION in the USA is Two Hundred and Ninety Eight percent MORE than the BLS published inflation. What that means for a person on Social Security is that they have been ROBBED of the 298% INCREASE they were entitled to had the BLS not Greenspan gamed the CPI "Owners Equivalent Rent" numbers to provide a "wealth effect" ILLUSION.

Yes, it is hard to believe, but for a Social Security pension of $1,000 a month in 1983 to have kept up with REAL inflation, it would now have to be $4,954 a month. YET, that $1,000 a month 1983 pension is at $1,974 a month. 🥺

For anyone that is getting cross eyed with the math, my point is that this example (which applies to ALL Social Security pensioners, more or less, but usually MORE SO) means that pension of $1,974 is getting SHORT CHANGED by $2,980❗

Now I hope you see why all Social Security pensions need to be DOUBLED, at MINIMUM, AND not subject to taxes below, at MINIMUM (i.e. using the BLS published 197.4% increase from 1983 to 2022 COLA numbers), any amount less than $95,168.

As to funding Social Security, a Tobin Tax on 🎩 Wall Street will take care of that. It is HIGH TIME that 🦅 Social Security 🗽 was funded without the ridiculous 😈 "pay go" hurdle that should be applied to the 🦍 Pentagon budget instead.
 

Well, I won't be here for it.

https://www.newsmax.com/briggenblaineholt/barges-grain-putin/2022/11/01/id/1094347/

When Diesel Is Gone Famine Will Flourish

RE

Lack of  Diesel fuel causing Famine?

The fossil fuelers never tire of peddling their three decade old, "we are all gonna die without hydrocarbon fuels" FUD PROPAGANDA. 

Those of us in the reality based world know that POTABLE WATER is quite a bit higher on the "sine qua non for life" list than diesel. 🦖 Hydrocarbon Hellspawn CAUSED POLLUTED 🦕💧☠️ DRINKING WATER will do ALL of us in from DISEASE LONG BEFORE fuel is an "issue".

It is nice to see the good people of Dimock in rural northwestern Pennsylvania get some justice, for a change. 



December 1, 2022 By Mike Ludwig , TRUTHOUT


SNIPPET:

After years of legal wrangling, the company formerly known as Cabot Oil & Gas agreed to plead no contest to 15 criminal violations of state environmental laws and pay nearly $16.3 million for the construction of a new public water supply for Dimock. Activists say some Dimock residents went years without access to clean tap water, and Coterra Energy, the company that bought Cabot, will pay their water bills for 75 years under a plea deal with Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro. It remains unclear whether Coterra would be permitted to frack the area in the future, but production was halted years ago as the scandal unfolded.

Located in rural northwestern Pennsylvania, Dimock became ground zero for the debate over fracking on January 1, 2009, when a resident’s water well exploded after filling with methane. Residents had already suffered from strange rashes and headaches for several months, and at least one family was evacuated from their home, according to the environmental group Food and Water Watch. Residents would later learn that a fracking rig run by a Cabot subsidiary had ruptured a “methane pocket” but kept drilling despite a leak.

“Finally, some justice,” said Ray Kemble, a Dimock resident whose water was contaminated, in a statement. “This case proves once and for all that drilling and fracking contaminated our drinking water.”

Back in 2009, fracking was a relatively new technology allowing producers to drill or “frack” horizontally in vast underground shale formations that were rich in oil and gas but largely inaccessible to conventional drilling. The 🦕 Obama administration embraced fracked natural gas as a “bridge fuel” that would allow the U.S. to reduce coal consumption and meet climate goals, and the 🦖 industry was engaged in an intense campaign to  win over lawmakers and assure the public that fracking is “safe 😇” .

“People across the country remember what 🦕💧☠️ happened here in Dimock, and now, they will know the rule of law won the day,” Shapiro said.

Full article:
https://truthout.org/articles/fracking-firm-agrees-to-pay-a-small-towns-water-bills-for-75-years/

RE (and all the rest of you collapsenicks too!), Enjoy this Virtual Donute I made on Blender. 

Quote from: AGelbert on September 19, 2022, 03:04:34 pm

[
Time will tell, of course.

This is a little complex, but will blow your minds, much like learning how banks don't loan out their own money but invent your debt from ether.  Varoufakis talks for 25 minutes, and then again if you skip to 50.00 minutes for another ten. You need both parts. The ninnies in between don't add anything worthwhile, so can skip them speaking.

Europe is being bent over. Their bills doubling and tripling are nothing but financial shenanigans.

https://youtu.be/NicE0-N9ux0

About the electric grid, your point is getting into the apples versus doomer peaches distraction. NOBODY is going to eliminate electric grids accross ANYWHERE in the world that already has one. The fact that nukes and coal power a lot of them is 100% irrelevant to the discussion of Renewables, though it has always been a chore to get you to see that 🤦‍♂️. That is why I no longer hang around doomers. They are right about a lot of the doom, but totally wrong about the causes and consequences.

Varoufakis gets it about debt, funny money and so on. That said, Fractional Reserve (i.e. State Sponsored Counterfeiting for the benefit of the 1%) is old hat. Greenspan and his fellow crooks and liars in the Fed just went ALL OUT on the funny money from 2008 to the present. 

See below for some details on why the Fed CRIMINALS are now between a rock and a hard place:

Wolf Street

Sep 16, 2022 by Wolf Richter • Sep 16, 2022 • 179 Comments


The purpose of MBS purchases was to repress mortgage rates and inflate home prices. That process has already started to reverse.
SNIPPET:

The last time the Fed did QT Nov 2017 – Feb 2020.

During the last episode of QT, the Fed shed MBS from November 2017 through February 2020. The chart below shows this phase of the MBS reduction. During the phase-in, it took about three months before the first declines became recognizable. QT back then was much slower, and the phase in was much longer, than in the current era of QT.

Full article:
https://wolfstreet.com/2022/09/16/the-fed-stopped-buying-mbs-today

Reality Based Comments:

Thunder Sep 16, 2022 at 2:36 am
“The purpose of MBS purchases was to repress mortgage rates and inflate home prices. That process has already started to reverse.”

That last sentence sent a shiver down my spine because I never looked at it like that and it will punish the FOMO “real-estate always goes up” crowd.
Debt can be a two edge sword.

WA
I find it sick that despite promising tightening, 🎩 Fed was still buying MBS to maintain the balance sheet against pass through payments.

A class action lawsuit against US fed should be in order. Here is the probable text:

1. Fed MBS purchases artificially raises house prices and consequently raises rent expectations.

2. These higher rents resulted in Tillions of dollars worth of cumulative financial losses to 45% of all American households that rent over the last decade.

3. These artificially higher asset prices also resulted in higher property taxes for home owners causing them to lose billions of dollar cumulatively. The asset price gains that they received were reversed by QT.

4. To hold the Fed accountable for losses to a majority of Americans, we the people will like to Sue the US Federal reserve to recover our losses.

5. We would like the US courts to decide the matter and uphold the rule of law.

What do you guys think about this?

AGelbert > WA
Your logic is sound but the problem for home owners, very difficult to overcome in the courts, is their John Handcock on the mortgage contracts.

😈 Greenspan began pushing this "wealth effect" SCAM 40 years ago. I am glad that reality is finally asserting itself because, throughout all that period, people who did not own homes were defrauded by Fed caused inflation (consistently low-balled by the BLS). Thus, while home owners were enjoying the ride, they, and EVERYONE ELSE,  simultaneously got the inflation shaft (i.e. loss of buying power) on just about everything else people need to buy just to live, never mind optional and luxury goods and services.

The Government computed cost of living was correctly computed before Greenspan began gaming it during the Reagan Administration. He kept 'improving' that game to steal from pensioners and COLA linked wage earners all the way to late 1990's.
Shadow Stats still provides the pre-Greenspan COLA numbers, which are always at least 10% higher than BLS published numbers. If you want more detail on how we-the-people, particularly those who do not own homes, have been massively defrauded by the Fed gaming of the COLA formula for over 40 years, check out the Chapwood Index.
https://wolfstreet.com/2022/09/16/the-fed-stopped-buying-mbs-today/#comment-466034


 Agelbert NOTE: Wolf Richter, who usually gets the big picture, disappointed me, replying to the above comment I made, by mocking Shadow Stats as a "joke". If Shadow Stats REALITY BASED inflation numbers are a joke to Wolf, then he has a rather strange sense of humor. Wolf wants to believe the Greenspan massaged BLS COLA "math". That is a textbook example of "investment (also called "Endowment") bias" caused ERROR in judgement. Wolf is cognitively invested in those numbers, so he rationalizes that the numbers are "correct" .

YET, it is Wolf that has OFTEN made clear how the "weighting" of "Owners Equivalent Rent" in the CPI (which is used in the basket of items to use for the COLA calculation) makes a mockery of the TRUE increases in housing costs AND Rent. Despite that IRREFUTABLE VIDENCE that inflation is, 🎩😈 with malice aforethought, being  deliberately and methodically low-balled, Wolf just doesn't want to admit we-the-people have been defrauded for at least 40 years by 😈 Greenspan's "Wealth Effect" SCAM. 🤦‍♂️

Wolf Richter needs a reality check. Inflation is a MAJOR problem CAUSED by the Fed, which, BY 🎩 FED 😈 DESIGN, MOSTLY hits the poor and middle class. Wolf doesn't want to go there. If he doesn't GET REAL, then he will pay a painful price for believing the la-la land BLS COLA numbers with hard experiences.
None so blind as those who refuse to see.
The following article provides more evidence that the REAL INFLATION RATE is closer to Shadow Stats numbers than the BLS low-balled COLA pension and wage eroding Greenspan gamed formula.

SATURDAY, SEP 17, 2022


As inflation remains at the highest level in more than 40 years, millions of Americans are facing financial hardship due to rising consumer prices.

Statista's Felix Richter reports that, according to a survey conducted by Gallup in August, the majority of U.S. adults now say that price increases are causing financial hardship for their household, with 12 percent describing their hardship as severe, meaning it might affect their ability to maintain their current standard of living. Another 44 percent of households face moderate hardship, meaning that price increases affect them but don’t threaten their standard of living.

Unsurprisingly, inflation woes affect lower income groups disproportionately. While it’s relatively easy to shrug off price increases when it only reduces the amount of money left at the end of the month, it is much harder for people who struggled to make ends meet even before prices started surging.

Infographic: Inflation Causing Hardship for Majority of U.S. Households | Statista

You will find more infographics at Statista

As the chart above shows, inflation pressure has even caught up with high-income households, though, as 40 percent of those with household income above $90,000 now say they're facing financial hardship in face of inflation, up from just 29 percent in November 2021. The share remains much higher for low-income households, however, where 74 percent now was severe or moderate hardship due to rising prices.
https://www.zerohedge.com/personal-finance/inflation-causing-hardship-majority-us-households

Getting back to EVs and mass adoption of them, if they are "no threat" to the pollution spewing gas guzzler status quo, as you presently believe, why do suppose the Hydrocarbon Hellspawn spend so much money demonizing them? If EVs were NOT competition for the Fossil Fuel CRAP out there, the Fossil Fuelers would ignore them. The fact that they take every opportunity to make up baloney negative stories about EVs is irrefutable evidence tha the hydrocarbon Hellspawn are using FUD against EVs because they know mass adoption of EVs is DOABLE. MASS ADOPTION OF EVs, if not tharted by FUD and some skullduggery, will destroy demand for gasoline and kerosene. SO, they LIE 24/7 about EVs, claiming  EVs "aren't doable". It is really easy to figure this out:

See below for the latest exposure of the 🦖 FUD cheap sophistry targeting EVs:

 Make Nexus Hot News part of your morning: click here to subscribe.


September 20, 2022



In May of this year, when Koch-y disinfo spreaders were fearmongering about the government supposedly mandating a "kill switch" in new cars, we noticed that one was using a new phrase, "freedom of movement." Appropriated from the real world where the phrase describes the right to enter or exit a country, Koch-sponsored, University of Kansas assistant teaching professor Levi Russell used it as a political tool to attack President Biden and the general need for electric vehicles by suggesting that they're really a conspiracy to enable DC elite to control your driving.

Despite the total debunking of the "kill switch" lie, premised on technology to save lives from drunk drivers, Russell stuck with the approach. In late August he published another RealClearEnergy piece attacking electric vehicles and then reiterating his propaganda that "the ultimate goal of the so-called 'transition' to EVs is to eliminate our freedom of movement."

Similarly, in response to the California decision to move towards electric vehicles and eventually stop selling new gasoline-powered cars, Fox's Laura Ingraham called it an attack on "the freedom of the open road, our freedom to travel as far as we want, whenever we want… a clear assault on its residents' basic freedom of movement."

Pretty ironic, coming from rabidly anti-immigrant, "Build The Wall" Fox News — especially in light of the GOP's efforts to aid states trying to criminalize interstate travel for medical care — , to be suddenly championing the right of people "to travel as far as we want, whenever we want!"

And then there was Katie Pavlich's oped in The Hill, where, like Russell, she ran through the litany of bad faith criticisms of EVs before concluding the "push for electric vehicles isn’t about saving or cleaning up the environment for future generations, it’s about controlling how people travel and their freedom of movement."

But without the "kill switch" concept, these pieces are really stretching to fearmonger about Democratic dreams of somehow controlling everyone's cars like playing Hot Wheels.

EVs — the argument goes — are simultaneously not going to be powerful enough for long trips, despite significant public and private investments in charging stations, but also vulnerable to a faceless government bureaucrat surveilling your movement (which your phone does already anyway) and shutting down your road trip even though you wouldn't be able to charge up anyway, because a renewable-powered and fossil-free grid won't be able to supply enough electricity.

Or something.

And this is the problem 🦖conspiracists run into. EVs are supposedly both somehow advanced secret surveillance tools of the Democratic deep state, and not advanced enough to actually work , meaning people will continue to use old 🦖 gas-powered cars anyway 😈 instead of buying new EVs, rendering the monitoring scheme ineffective.  

But hey, as long as you have a whole pseudo-media ecosystem to broadcast your EV disinfo, from RealClear to Fox News, it doesn't matter how stupid it is, your propaganda will have plenty of "freedom of movement."

Agelbert NOTE: I will be busy for a month or so. Adios, amigo.

Robert Reich 371K subscribers

The Citizens United disaster, in a nutshell:

In 2008, before the ruling, billionaires contributed $31 million to federal campaigns.

In 2020, billionaires contributed $1.2 billion.

That’s almost a 40-fold increase.

It never had to be like this.

AGelbert NOTE: It's the Social Darwinism, stupid! And, yeah, our government was already thoroughly Fascist corrupted by 2008.

March of 2008 Howard Zinn: “The election frenzy…seizes the country every four years because we have all been brought up to believe that voting is crucial in determining our destiny, that the most important act a citizen can engage in is to go to the polls and choose one of the two mediocrities who have already been chosen for us [by the ruling class – P.S.]. It is a multiple-choice test so narrow, so specious, that no self-respecting teacher would give it to students.”


I live in the real world. I understand that human society, government, business or even a single individual that embraces unethical behavior as the CORE of their modus vivendi/operandi  (i.e. integral, indispensable, routinely required by their ideology  👉 SEE: "Apex" predators in general and SOCIAL DARWINISM in particular) will always behave in a socially destructive manner.

The reason these bought and paid fors out there don't see a problem with that is that they honestly believe the Social Darwinist HYPE that altruism is "for the weak" and wanton predation, as long as it makes money, no matter how polluting and/or murderously destructive, is the "OBLIGATION of a SUCCESSFUL" person.

Regardless of the religious FRONT by those you see below, they are ALL SOCIAL DARWINISTS to the CORE. Their god is Mammon. They are the "Christo-Fascists" that are the exact opposite of what a true Christian actually is.


However, the greedball scum you see above represent only a TINY percentage of the Social Darwinists destroying our biosphere for short term profit. Making the above cretins the whipping boys is missing the mark. The above are covert camp followers of the Social Darwinist cultural POISON afflicting EVERY ASPECT of human interactions in the USA today. They are a symptom, not the THREAT itself.

Social Darwinist Ideology is the greatest material threat humanity has EVER faced. You CANNOT reason with a person that actually believes that "it's all good" if we-the-apex-predators end up causing the demise of 90% of our species (and an even higher percentage of other mammalian vertebrate species to the point of inevitable numerous extinctions). It's just, uh, "NATURAL SELECTION", dontcha know? It's, uh, "SCIENCE". There "is no good and there is no bad; there is just success or failure". If the tardigrades replace us, it's "all good"; survival of the fittest evolution and all that. We Apex Predators just DO what we DO. Ethics? Are you a "weak = unfit" life form? We are not going to let no silly ethics keep us from makin' 💰🎩 real money...
   
REALLY?? How far can these extinction causing true believers go with their pseudo-scientific magical thinking?   

These Social Darwinist true believers KNOW EXACTLY what they are doing. Yes, they are wrong, but their ideology cannot be easily countered because it is a RELIGION to them. You will get nowhere with them using reason and scientific cause and effect logic, simply because they have swallowed the "we can do WHATEVER WE WANT" (SEE: "might equals Predators 'R' US Right") Social Darwinist HYPE.
 
The INSTANT that a social Darwinist becomes convinced that ETHICAL BEHAVIOR is NOT optional and must be the cornerstone of human  behavior towards other humans, other life forms and the environment we all depend on, he is no longer a Social Darwinist. THEN, and ONLY then, can you talk some sense into them.

 For we-the-humans to climb out of this Social Darwinist constructed grave we are in, people of good will, whether they be atheists or not, must clearly communicate with and convince most everybody around them that all human behaviors MUST be based on solid ethics, NOT sliding scale '"situational ethics" UNETHICAL-dial-a-behavior-for-convenience'.

Until we expose the THREAT of Social Darwinism and stop it, things will continue to get worse.

Yeah, I know this isn't the right topic thread for fnancial stuff, but you can move it to a more approrpriate place whenever you want:

You Earned It, You Keep It Act (HR 8717)
My Federal Retirement

September 15, 2022


Representative Angie Craig 🗽 (D-MN) introduced last month legislation that would repeal federal taxes on Social Security benefits for retirees.

If passed, the You Earned It, You Keep It Act (HR 8717) would repeal all of the federal taxation on Social Security retirement benefits beginning in 2023.

Craig claims the tax repeal would be fully paid by implementing an extension of the payroll tax wage cap to over $250,000 a year. Under current law, wages over $147,000 are exempt from the Social Security payroll tax.

“Social Security 🗽 is a promise we have made to the American people – if you work hard and play by the rules, the dignity of a secure retirement will be within your reach,” said Craig 🗽.

“But taxing the very benefits American workers have earned after decades on the job diminishes our promise and threatens to undermine the financial security of retirees already struggling with rising prices, “Craig said. “Eliminating this tax will help Social Security benefits go further and ensure that American retirees have all the resources they need after a lifetime of hard work.”

Craig said that according to non-partisan analysis the proposed legislation would also improve the long-term solvency of Social Security compared to current law.

To read the full text of the bill, go here.

AGelbert NOTE: Below, if you are good at reality based interpretations of the Congressional 'how it works' for New Bills,  such as the "You Earned It, You Keep It Act (HR 8717)" Bill submitted August 16, 2022 by Representative Angie Craig 🗽 (D-MN), you will learn 👀 how 😈 Pelosi, aided and abetted by her Chief of Staff, 👿 Primus (a neoliberal, Wall Street worshipping sworn enemy of ANY improvement of Social Security and/or Medicare - which is why Pelosi made him Chief of Staff), will do all these two 😈👿 enemies of we-the-people can to keep HR 8717 from EVER coming to the House Floor for a vote. A Floor Vote would expose the FACT that Pelosi, and too many other so-called "Democrats", are AGAINST improving Social Security. They don't want most Americans to learn that they are FRAUDS. So, Primus and Pelosi, on behalf of the 1% American Oligarchy Social Darwinist GREEDBALLS, will 'play' with the Scheduling Calendar to kill the HR 8717. 🤦‍♂️😡

However, if more than 226 Reps push for a floor vote, the corrupt Scheduling 'fun and  games' will be thwarted and we MIGHT get some justice, for a welcome change. May God Hear the 🙏🏼 prayers of all the humble Social Security pensioners and force Pelosi to bring HR 8717 to a floor vote 🕊️ THIS MONTH.



Library of Congress 257K subscribers

Congress.gov Legislative Process videos were produced by the Library of Congress (LOC).  In service to Congress, analysts in the LOC Congressional Research Service (CRS) authored (Valerie Heitshusen) and narrated (Walter J. Oleszek) the videos for Congress.gov.  Video also available here.

This too will interest you:

CleanTechnica

September 14, 2022 By Carolyn Fortuna (Bear graphic by Agelbert)



At a tech conference in San Francisco this week, Tesla executive Martin Viecha revealed the automaker’s plans for the next 5 years, including how a lower price model might work its way into production.
https://cleantechnica.com/2022/09/14/does-it-cost-too-much-to-purchase-a-tesla/

AGelbert COMMENT: Whether a Tesla is "too expensive" or not depends on some mistaken assumptions TOO MANY readers here have because they view "reality" exclusively through their "well to do" economic lense.

In the next paragraph, I will GET REAL. I'm sure some arrogant poster will try to counter my post with snark, disdain or some other bit of cheap, self justifying sophistry. I will not respond. Those with a conscience will read my words and consider them seriously. Thus, I will have achieved my purpose. Those without a conscience are beyond rational discourse, so their knee-jerk sniping is less than relevant.

Income above Official Poverty Level in the US is the correct standard to use to determine if a vehicle is too expensive or not. WHY? Because the stats on vehicle ownership in the US evidence that the overwhelming majority of people who purchase a vehicle in the US are above the Official Poverty Level.

The stats on EV ownership apply also, but not equally. WHY? Because the overwhelming majority of people who purchase an EV in the US are the extreme minority in the overall vehicle purchasing cohort. WHY IS THAT? Because the overwhelming majority of people who purchase a vehicle in the US CANNOT AFFORD to buy an EV. WHY? Because of their income level. Water is wet. Two MINUS 2 = Can't BUY, PERIOD.

The income level of the average EV purchaser in the US is MUCH higher than that of the overwhelming majority of people who purchase a vehicle in the US. Thus, a logical person who hasn't forgotten to add, AND SUBTRACT, comes to the conclusion that, at present, EVs ARE too expensive. Tesla EVs, because they are even MORE EXPENSIVE than the average non-Tesla EV available in the US, are MASSIVELY so.

So, Teslas aren't just  too expensive; Teslas ARE WAY TOO EXPENSIVE!

Back in 2015 I wrote several comments to Officials from the State of Vermont in regard to the State of Vermont's Comprehensive Energy Plan (CEP). Here is a tiny snippet (it was  📢 LONG 🌞) of what I continue to assert MUST BE DONE to facilite mass EV ownership, if you don't want a massive backlash from we-the-low-and-middle class-MAJORITY against EVs:
"The four years since the completion of the 2011 CEP have seen significant progress in advancing the recommendations and goals established in that plan."

Sure. But that is because the goals were too limited. This is a circular argument used by lawyers and/or politicians, whether they are lawyers or not. They create a set of goals that are "realistic" within the confines of political expediency, while ignoring the urgency of addressing the pressing need to eliminate dirty energy in order to ameliorate the effects climate change. ... ...

Ladies and gentlemen, there is only one way to measure "Progress". And that is because there is only one real goal. That goal is taking our parts per million of carbon dioxide back to 290. I am not surprised that goal is not ever stated in these types of programs. Even the 350 PPM CO2 goal of Bill McKibben would be more realistic.

I realize that Vermont is just a state and the problem is global but the effects are local. So, while percentages of this, that and the other carbon footprint reductions are good metrics, our progress can only be realistically measured by how we preserve the biosphere for future generations. The only proxy Vermont has available for reducing the ppm of CO2 is renewable energy percentage. As long we are not at 100%, we are making things worse. ... ...

Had Vermont given a 50% or more discount on sales tax for electric vehicles, some real progres on reducing transportation emissions would have been made. Even now, the state is mute about that (2022 UPDATE: Here is the Vermont 2022 Comprehensive Energy Plan. There is some improvement, but it is still woefully short of what needs to be done. 🥺). ... ...

Where are the carbon taxes on homes larger than 500 square feet per occupant? Where are the incentives for people to heat and cool smaller spaces (AND OWN only one home)? And yes, people that heat and cool less than that should be paid for their frugality and contribution to a low carbon economy 📢 in rebates, not tax credits (the poor would not benefit from tax credits because they pay low taxes - a tax credit, like the $7,500 tax credit on EVs, helps mostly the well to do who pay at least that much in taxes - that's unfair). The needs of the poor, more impacted by climate change than the well to do, are unfairly ignored 🥺. ... ...

I recommend Vermont Convert all Federal Income Tax credits on EV purchases to rebates for Vermonters who pay less than the Federal Tax Credit on their Federal income taxes.

I recommend Vermont expand the Charging station network in Vermont to level two chargers for at least 50% of the all vehicles over a ten year period. Reduce sales tax on EVs by 50 to 100% until 75% of all vehicles in Vermont are EVs or ten years, whichever comes first.

Why aren't people who drive internal combustion powered cars rewarded for low annual mileage and why aren't people carbon taxed above 5,000 miles a year unless they drive an EV? ... ...

The conflict between the economy and the environment is artificial. It is imperative that, in discussing goals, the enormous pressure on our government exerted by polluting corporate 🦖 interests is considered as in defining the action needed to achieve those goals. Every advance in the percentage of Renewable Energy used by Vermonters equals less profits for the  fossil fuel industry. Hydrocarbon 🦖 fuels Industry deliberate corruption of our government energy policies for the purpose of continuing to 🦖 privatize profits and socialize the costs is endangering the welfare of future generations. Their product is a liability, not an asset. It's high time that the State of Vermont admitted that. If you do not, at the outset, state that 🦖 fossil fuels are damaging our environment and, contrary to the propaganda, hurting the economy too, then you have not properly framed your guiding goals.

Of course you need to maintain revenue for the government. But not at an intolerable cost to the environment. And continuing to provide tax benefits for fossil fuels, be they gasoline, heating oil, kerosene or natural gas is counterproductive in two ways:

👉 1. It perpetuates the myth that we can continue business as usual with 🦖 fossil fuels as long as the state gets it's cut from the user.

👉 2. It defends a 🦖 dirty energy 😈 status quo condemning future Vermonters to the "externalized " costs the fossil fuel industry happily socializes on all of us.

The state of Vermont needs 🦖 fossil fuels like a hole in the head. There are a plethora of revenue streams from renewable energy sources that can more than replace every regressive tax now in place for the user of fossil fuels.

I do not advocate increasing taxes on gasoline simply because the poor are the most impacted by regressive taxes. What I do advocate is incentives in the form of rebates for people that reduce their fossil fuel use. The lowered health care costs for the state resulting from a cleaner environment will not show up on a balance sheet right away. So there will be people claiming this is "voodoo" economics. But it's not. Within a couple of decades, the benefits will clearly justify the costs.

This is what leadership is supposed to be about. Policies should look at the big picture, not engage in hand wringing over how much loss for state revenues incentives for cutting gasoline, heating oil and gas (no matter what Vermont Gas says) use would represent. ... ...

I find it absolutely irrational for people to complain about aesthetics when fossil fuels are quite literally endangering the welfare of future generations. Where do some people get the idea that it's okay to drive a gas guzzler but it's not okay to see a wind turbine on a mountain top? They think wind turbines are too noisy but roads full of gas guzzlers aren't⁉️ Ask anyone that drives an EV what it's like to have to listen to internal combustion engines all around you in traffic. ... ...

Financing is one of the subjects that leaves far more out than it puts in. The Federal Reserve can influence every Vermonter that buys a home but somehow, those low interest rates never make it to Renewable Energy infrastructure. 😠

We can have a cash for clunkers program but somehow, we can't have a EV for gas guzzlers program. 😠

We can have pension funds investing in 🦖 fossil fuel industry stocks but we can't have pension funds investing in gigawatt level State Funded Renewable Energy infrastructure. 😠 ... ...

If you REALLY want a clean environment, which sine qua non includes EVERYONE driving an EV, the irrational EV high price justifying game you comfortably wealthy people are playing with the rest of us HAS TO STOP NOW.

Quote from: Phil Potts on August 13, 2022, 02:37:26 pm

One of my post has disappeared. I again raised the question of how long I'm going to hell CO2 stays hot and at what temp and in what concentration in air. This obviously matters.

So now you want to discuss general thermodynamics? I'll bet K-Dog can do that far better than I, I would do what most anyone would, google it up and dive in. The internet is great for stuff, you can get textbooks to read and explanations of particulars on things and all sorts of stuff on heat transfer and whatnot. I know that heat/energy moves from hotter/more energetic stuff to cooler stuff when given a chance. Is this in dispute somewhere?

Farmgirl, What you said is logical but let me hazard some tips about the CO2 "controversy" that will shut anybody's mouth (though deniers are always looking for ways around it) who has the unscientific temerity to claim that CO2 "doesn't heat the atmosphere".

Getting into the weeds of the tri-atomic gas molecules and their IR absorbing frequencies is valid, but too many people don't want to go there and start hemming and hawing with baloney based distractions pretending to be "debate". When I am faced with such irrational intransigence, I just point out that there is an instrument out there that anybody can buy. It's called a CO2 meter/smoke detector. It's used, as you know, to warn you that their might be a fire in your house. The way it works is just plain tri-atomic CO2 Infrared (i.e. HEAT ) absobing Frequencies SCIENCE. Anyone that wants to argue that is making a fool of themselves.

Also, deniers hate pictures of reality; it ruins their whole day.

Quote from: AGelbert on March 15, 2022, 01:58:39 pm

Quote from: RE on August 25, 2021, 11:42:22 am

Well I took backups of course. Exactly where they are now I am not sure. I lost track of that in the move. If I were to restart it probably the best way would be to reactivate the site take a new backup and then transfer it. But I am not all together sure I really want to do this. It's a lot of work and right now my internet connection sucks.

RE

Where to read old Doomstead Diner posts mostly by Surly:

963 Posts 6 Topics

https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/doomstead-diner-daily/doomstead-diner-daily/765/

Hi AGB

🌞 Hi Phil. Pleased to meet you. Nice kitty. I love kitties and use kitty graphics quite a bit at my forum. RE was always on my case for "overdoing it" with emojies and other graphics. I am incorrigible in that area.

Since you are obviously fond of kitties, as am I, here's a sample of my kitty based graphics that you may use with or without attribution: