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Paul B. Farrell
May 18, 2010, 12:01 a.m. EDT · Recommend (4) · Post:
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By Paul B. Farrell, MarketWatch
ARROYO GRANDE, Calif. (MarketWatch) -- Imagine a secret society, code name "Avatar 2154," based on the date of the "War of 2154" between the "Sec-Ops" armies from "Eaarth," funded by the "Resources Development Corporation," against the "Na'vi" indigenous tribes on the Pandora moon.
The war is over mining rights to Pandora's unobtanium, a powerful new energy source needed back on Eaarth to save our planet, where rapid population growth is exhausting limited natural resources, resulting in a dying civilization. Obviously this is a metaphor for today's global threats.
Chuck Jaffe explains how mutual funds offered more protection than ETFs when market volatility kicked in on May 6.
The goals of Avatar 2154: Maximum security and wealth preservation for future generations of members from the elite of Wall Street, Washington, Corporate America CEOs and the Forbes 400. Avatar 2154 secretly supports climate-change-deniers in think tanks, academic research and politicians who negate the impact of scientific facts. This effort is necessary when high-profile voices like Al Gore and Bill McKibben surface and new propaganda is required to attack their efforts stirring global climate initiatives.
For example, McKibben, an environmental economist, recently published "Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet." Tough? Worse. Earth is dead.
And McKibben's vision for the new Eaarth we created is bleak. No upbeat high-tech hope for a "green revolution" as in Tom Friedman's "Hot, Flat & Crowded." Remember, two decades ago McKibben's "The End of Nature" was one of the first books warning of global warming, climate change, a dying planet. His new Eaarth is a funeral dirge. In Foreign Policy magazine last year, McKibben summarized his relentless message:
"Act now, we're told, if we want to save the planet from a climate catastrophe. Trouble is, it might be too late. The science is settled, and the damage has already begun. The only question now is whether we will stop playing political games and embrace the few imperfect options we have left."
Stop the political games? Never. Remember Kyoto and Copenhagen defeats? Recent coal mine disasters? The BP-Gulf oil catastrophe? And when the long-awaited 1,000-page Kerry-Lieberman climate bill finally surfaced last week, it was quickly blasted as D.O.A., a "gift to polluters." Politicians love games.
The truth is politicians will never stop in time. Consequently, Avatar 2154 members need to be fully aware that "we have waited too long," the planet really is dying, Eaarth is on an irreversible self-destruct path. Washington will not "stop playing political games." They cannot: There are too many "special interests" fighting for their "fair" share of the federal government's $1.7 trillion budget jackpot ... too many stockholders in publicly-traded corporations demanding bull-market returns and perpetual economic growth ... and too many lobbyists who make enormous short-term payoffs by ignoring the long-term warnings of McKibben, Gore and others.
After quoting a 2003 Pentagon report -- "as the planet's carrying capacity shrinks, an ancient pattern of desperate, all-out wars over food, water, and energy supplies would emerge" -- McKibben offers three sane solutions: Cut carbon emissions, reduce our obsession with economic growth and return to sustainable local farming. But while agreeing in his New York Times review, even advocate Paul Greenberg sees little chance of McKibben's ideas changing opinions or reversing the destiny of Eaarth:
"In the absence of some overarching authority, a kind of ecologically minded Lenin," McKibben's solutions "will remain hipster lifestyle choices rather than global game changers." But eventually, says Greenberg, "Eaarth itself will be that ecological Lenin, a harsh environmental dictator that will force us to bend to new rules."
Yes, the new rules will be forced on self-interested politicians ... forced on Wall Street's bonus-obsessed CEOs and short-term high-frequency traders ... forced on Main Street's 95 million investors.
Today "Eaarth" has 6.5 billion people. By 2050 the United Nations estimates growth to 9.1 billion. America's 400 million will be competing for depleting resources. "They" already outnumber "us." Odds are 22:1. Tough odds. Population growth is now the "mother of all bubbles," more dangerous than global warming, poverty, even peak oil. Population growth will trigger multiple catastrophes beyond anything in world history. Here's why.
Remember anthropologist Jared Diamond's warning in "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed:" "One of the disturbing facts of history is that so many civilizations collapse." Many "civilizations share a sharp curve of decline ... a society's demise may begin only a decade or two after it reaches its peak population, wealth and power."
Diamond's 12-part end-game equation is very simple, fitting perfectly with the Pentagon's global warfare scenario: "More people require more food, space, water, energy, and other resources." But remember, of the 12 elements in this "Formula for Collapse," population commands the two biggest triggers in the endgame. Data is from Diamond, McKibben and other sources:
Scientific American calls population "the most overlooked and essential strategy for achieving long-term balance with the environment," the new "third-rail" for politicians. So they ignore it. Warning: If all nations consumed resources at the same rate as America, the world's 6.3 billion people would need 6 Earths to survive, now! Get it? The American dream has become a self-destructive global circular-firing-squad nightmare.
Diamond warns: Optimists "argue that the world could support double its human population." But they "consider only the increase in human numbers and not average increase in per-capita impact." Developed countries "consume 32 times more resources ... and put out 32 times more waste, than do the inhabitants of the Third World." A race is on: "Low-impact people are becoming high-impact people" aspiring "to First World living standards." So check out Diamond's 10 resources variables driving Diamond's "Collapse of Eaarth and End of Civilization" equation ... the final stage for humans, after McKibben's local subsistence farming solution fails.
Paul Farrell writes the column on behavioral economics. He's the author of nine books on personal finance, economics and psychology, including "The Millionaire Code," "The Winning Portfolio," "The Lazy Person's Guide to Investing." Farrell was an investment banker with Morgan Stanley; executive vice president of the Financial News Network; executive vice president of Mercury Entertainment Corp; and associate editor of the Los Angeles Herald Examiner. He has a Juris Doctor and a Doctorate in Psychology.
Make no mistake. The "new" General Motors Co. is strutting its stuff in the final round of a high stakes beauty pageant.
1:05 p.m. May 17, 2010 | Comments: 49
- BearFund | 12:34 a.m. Today12:34 a.m. May 18, 2010
"12 ways to cash in on the 'collapse of Eaarth' http://on.mktw.net/9pLdEs" 11:15 p.m. EDT, May 17, 2010 from MKTWFarrell
"Buffett defends Goldman, joins greed Conspiracy http://on.mktw.net/cz7uf0" 11:37 p.m. EDT, May 10, 2010 from MKTWFarrell
"Goldman Conspiracy must kill bank reform http://on.mktw.net/9JZPjl" 12:45 a.m. EDT, May 4, 2010 from MKTWFarrell
"Six investing rules for a worst-case scenario http://on.mktw.net/bcJ1ct" 11:05 p.m. EDT, April 26, 2010 from MKTWFarrell
"President Obama vs. Goldman's Reaganomics http://on.mktw.net/9dnq88" 11:01 p.m. EDT, April 19, 2010 from MKTWFarrell
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