Imagine

Let us try to be optimistic today, let us try to imagine a better world. Few people have put it in better words than John Lennon in his Imagine song. He was definitely in favor of change. And his song clearly tells us that we can abolishing slavery and oppressions by abolishing religions, countries and consumerism. He is so right.

Merry ...

On this special day let me wish you A Merry Crisis and a Happy New Fear. Joke aside, this shows you what times we live in. Merry Crisis photos and Merry Crisis videos are here to stay until we have resolved our social imbalance and abuse of nature.

Public Defaults

Will any country go into default? What are the candidates? What are the countries least likely to go into default? Many alternative economists foresee that the US will default on its debt as a country. The US might do it on purpose to maintain its current power while reducing its staggering debt.

But let's leave the US aside for a moment. In the Euro zone, there are several countries that are in danger. There is even an acronym for them: PIIGS or PIGS. One might also add Austria to that list. Have a look a public debt as percentage of GDP. Italy has a debt-to-GDP ratio at over 105%. Greece is around the 91% mark. Portugal around 67%, Germany around 67%. Austria around 60%. Switzerland is around 45%. Spain around 40%. The US is expected to go from 61% to 108%. Source: GDPs, external (public+private) debt, public debt.

How come Spain is in the PIGS list? How come Austria is about to join the PIGS list? Is it because the data is from 2008 and there was a big shift in 2009? I understand that the real-estate bubble burst in Spain in 2009 and that Austria has high risk with its financial deals in Eastern European countries. Still I am not sure. Here I found that Spanish debt is climbing from 40% to 60% in just 2 years (2009 and 2010). That would partially explain Spain being part of PIGS, but why is Germany not part of the PIGS? It has a public debt similar to Spain or Portugal (as percentage of GDP).

Germany is bigger, but does that make it less risky? What am I missing?

Peak Phosphorus

Peak what? Peak Oil. Peak Gold. And now Peak Phosphorus! Or Peak P for those who love shortcuts. It is no joke though. Have a look at these articles on Peak Phosphorus and Monsanto's Phosphorus Theft. Once again Monsanto, and once again we see double-talk. This pesticide-producing mine is called "sustaining, ..., and protecting our environment" by the press. Form your own opinion. This cartoon showing the Monsanto Claus got it right.

Wrong Signal Again

In article "Wrong Signal" I commented on the poor choice made by the Nobel Peace Prize committee electing President Obama. Today another wrong signal was sent. Time magazine elected the Fed chairman Ben Bernanke as Person of the Year 2009 for prevented an economic catastrophe, so they say. The FED is one of the most enslaving organizations on our planet. It uses debt to enslave the regular people while making a few rich bankers even richer. How can the chairman of such an organization, actually a private company, be selected for Person of the Year? And how can one be so short sighted to not see that whatever he has done (create trillions of debt) is going to cause an economic catastrophe in the long run? But main stream media clearly does not care about ethics, transparency, and long term effects. We should not be surprised, last years choice wasn't any better: Obama was Time's Person of the Year 2008.

Visual Images of Good and Bad

If you are a visual person and prefer to view than to read, than look at these images:

• The Bad: Man's Greatest Crimes Against the Earth
• The Good: Man's Greatest Environmental Successes

The Wrong Signal

I could not believe it when my wife told me. Obama was selected for the Nobel Peace Prize. Incredible and a slam in the face of many people working hard on peace. According to the office Nobel site and press release Obama he was awarded the prize for a) strengthening international institutions and b) his vision of reducing nuclear arms.

He is a smooth talker. That is to his credit. He has good speech writers and a good public relations team. That is also evident in his humble acceptance speech. But behind his outstanding rhetoric is little positive action. On the internal politics side it is business as usual, high-risk near fraudulent behavior of the big banks was and is rewarded and supported at the cost of the biggest bailouts funded by public money. Special powers and rights are given to special interest groups run by a few. On the foreign policy side the selfish profit-driven wars continue. Just days before being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize he sent 30,000 new troops to the unfair and unjustified war in Afghanistan.

The international cooperation mentioned is still based on a few organizations like the UN, IMF, the World Bank, etc. where the largest vote is held by the US and hence the US has most of the power to control any decisions and outcomes.

It is hard to understand how any US president can be selected as recipient of a Nobel Peace Prize, even harder one who just ordered more troops to Afghanistan. There are many individuals out there that work hard and unselfishly on peace in their surroundings. Giving the Nobel Peace Prize to Obama is sending the wrong message.

One Step Closer to Democracy

I have doubts on whether democracy is the ideal political system or not. I see good things but also negative things in democracy and one can always create a worst-case scenario that is far from ideal, at least for some. I think it is good to see democracy for what it is and think critical about it. If you need food for thought have a look at the video mentioned here before: The American Form of Government.

While I am not sure if democracy is the ideal political system, I am sure of the fact that what is sold to us as democracy really isn't democracy, but a neo-classical oligarchy where corporations and special interest groups decide everything while making the citizen believe he has a voting right. Did you decide on whether the US goes to war in Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.? Did you decide on torturing war participants in Guantanamo or Iraq? Did you decide on the bailouts and handing trillions to banks that lost in their speculative gamble?

Here is an article that shows us how the system can be moved to a truer democracy as implemented in Switzerland. The article is entitled "Why Switzerland Is Still Free and America Is Not". A friend pointed out that in today's digital online world we could implement this approach to democracy via an open-source electronic voting system that makes it both transparent and easy to bring an issue to vote and to execute the vote if enough votes are collected in the initial round of the petition. This would certainly put the power closer to the people and place the people on top of politicians in a certain way.

Permaculture Video Blog

I had a closer look at this video channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/flashtoons. I found it to be very high quality with lots of interesting short videos on a range of topics related to permaculture. The owner of the channel seems to be working closely with the Australian Permaculture Research Institute (PRI Australia) and EcoFilms.

Libertarianism

This video explains libertarianism in 8 minutes. I heard people argue that libertarianism creates equality, equality on all levels.

I am challenged to see how pure libertarianism without any complements can achieve social equality. I believe in rights feverishly defended by libertarianism: right to life, freedom and property. I also see the implications thereof: taxes are a violation of property rights, etc.

At the same time I am convinced we live in a time and a world where we sustainably can provide food and shelter to all persons on our planet. I see it as a desirable goal to reach this objective for the reasons of a) equality = social justice, b) liberty = freedom from slavery under pressure to work for food and c) life = protecting people from starvation.

I see libertarianism as a methodology, as a tool, as a car if you will. I see my feed-the-world scenario (as an example) as a possible destination, a place we should drive too. My question is now: How do we use our car (libertarianism) to drive to the village Feed-the-World? The challenge I have is to see how to connect these two points.

How can rights to unlimited property and the fact that your life is protected lead to a situation where we protect the life of other people (such as starving people on another continent)? Voluntary donations. Sure. But as we see this is very little, only a drop in the bucket. Are starving millions a price worth paying for liberty?

As you see I have tons of open, unresolved questions in my head.

Isms

Discussing various forms of -isms such as Socialism, Capitalism, Libertarianism, etc. with a friend it was brought to my attention that one key measure for the quality of the system might be the amount of government power and regulation.

Could we define Libertarianism as a system where the government executes only the right to life, freedom and property?

Could we define Socialism as a system where the government executes the right to life, freedom, property, health care and internet access?

Could we define Communism as a system where the government executes the right to life, freedom, property, health care, internet access, work, food and shelter?

A video that explains government power and uses it as a dimension to define political systems is The American Form of Government. The video is not perfect and free from mistakes but it gets a general message across: for any political system ask yourself where the power lies.

Proper Use for Dollar

Dollars are just pieces of paper, worth less every week due to TARP and other government programs. Soon to be worthless. Here is a good way to put use to all this paper: Dollar Origami. Check out these sites: Won Park Origami, Money Origami, Dollar Origami with Instructions. And right now for the Xmas season: a lovely little green Xmas Tree.

Numbers to Think About

According to US Treasure Department data, as of November 2009, JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs, hold 120 trillion dollars worth of derivatives contracts.

US GDP is 14 trillion $.
The whole world's GDP is 65 trillion $.
The worth of everything in the world is 200 trillion $.

How is it possible that just two banks hold derivatives that match 60% of the total wealth of the entire planet? Something is clearly wrong here. Think about it. Watch the Still Report on the Economy and specifically this video.

We have a long way to fall I am afraid to say.

Greenhouse for $50

Well the greenhouse ended up costing $140, but this is not the point. It is great to see how to build a cheap greenhouse yourself without sophisticated tools. Interesting reading for any permaculturist: How to build My 50 Dollar Greenhouse.

Religion and Sustainability

It just dawned on me today that religions play a role in our sustainability thinking. Religions like Christianity believe that their life will end here on earth and that they will go to heaven (or hell) after death. Religions like Hinduism and Buddhism believe in reincarnation or rebirth, whereby one returns to the earth many times over. I'd say anyone who believes that he will return to this earth is more interested in maintaining the planet, than someone who believes that he will leave this earth in a few years and never return thereafter. That would align Hindus and Buddhists more closely with sustainable thinking. While Christians would have less incentive for sustainability.

Could there be a hidden link between religion and sustainability? Just some food for thought.