Some random notes about things not included in this journal….
I have been right in the middle of mining and drilling country for the better part of 9 days.
Over the past 5 years this has become familiar territory for me on four continents.
If you have never been in such areas, it is almost impossible to conceive of the technology and cultures along dimensions of scale, kindness, community, and globalism.
Scale:
The ability we humans have to move around large parts of the earth is staggering.
The size of personal vehicles is at the larger end of the scale. As I write, big diesel engines surround me. These are the regions that keep Chrysler alive by using so many Dodge RAM trucks.
Kindness:
On average, if you need something in mining country, people will bend over backward to get it for you – if you get past the surface images of ‘hardened’ people. Watching two – intimidated – people from California weave their way through the locals at the fast food joint this morning was interesting. Not sure they had ever seen mud before, and wish I could hear their conversation when they got back into their large diesel pusher motor home. Must have been like swimming with sharks for them. They are really missing out by fearing mud and sweat.
Community:
People tend to cluster and chat. And the bulletin boards are full of cooperative swapping and bartering.
Lots of ‘guys’ hanging out in groups. Very chatty. Cracker barrel and wood stove politics survive here. (And in Canada, they have somehow avoided the absurd ‘red’ – ‘blue’ bifurcation of the US population. People can still discuss issues without bi-polarization.)
This is not unique to mining country – it dominates rural communities everywhere – but it seems accentuated here when contrasted to the industrial strength equipment all around.
Globalism:
I’ll bet mining has always been global. The Klondike heritage of 100 years ago was clearly a global phenomenon. Sort of the ‘dot.com’ of the last industrial era.
Now, this is even more global. I am seeing people at work in ‘remote’ areas driven fundamentally by money from China.
New York and London, despite the ego-trip, are not in charge of this next phase of the global economy. They – and Washington DC – tried extracting too much rent from the global economic flows, and they lost it in an inflated stock market. This morning I’m seeing hard tonnage paid for in hard cash – from the new manufacturing leaders in Asia.
Cap and Trade – and the Future of Kings:
Note: the following is written by someone who desperately does not want drilling in ANWR or Atacama…..
Those working in ‘centers of power’ (some might say ‘environments of self delusion’) have decided that of all the millions of variables in this complex universe, ‘carbon’ has become public enemy number one. (30 years ago it was sulfur, then it was nitrogen – which gave us the emissions laws that biased emissions toward then-safe carbon dioxide.)
Unable to perform real work, they have come up with the world’s largest administrivial jobs program – ‘cap and trade’. It takes no longer than about 10 minutes of reading to see where this one is going. Some self-appointed experts will form small committees (hundreds of people out of 6.5 billion on the planet). These committees will pay ‘consultants’ trillions of dollars to ‘measure’ ‘bad’ things like ‘carbon’. Then these few hundred humans will decide how much ‘carbon’ the entire species can emit, and they will create a tax-and-favors program that allows these few hundred powerful people to support about 100 million administrativial jobs…….minions….supplicants……etc.
And the whole thing will break down under its own weight in about 30 years, just as the – mostly successful – clean air acts have given us large doses of carbon dioxide.
Sitting here here in the mud – watching the demand from 6 billion people reflected in the reality of 4000 kilometers of mining and drilling, the architecture of human power is very, very clear.
6 billion people want the same things we all have. Wiring in houses. Vehicular mobility. Clothing. Fertilizer.
The mining and drilling of the last century was driven by only about 700 million humans.
The demand from the next 2 billion is reflected all around me this morning.
The people I see this morning are not the ‘enemy’. They are extremely nice, dedicated people who are trying to serve what others around the world want.
We passed through periods of monarchy and dictatorship. We may have passed through a phase of nation-states. This morning in the mud – I can see that we are moving into a new era of ruling class – in which minorities who have never been in the mud play chess with the money created from the mud.
Some images of the future…..
