Monday 5 May 2014

World headlines

From Rice Farmer- 
## Global Ponzi meltdown/House of Cards ##
China is snubbing Japan and India from its initiative to establish a regional bank next year for infrastructure projects in Asia although 15 other Asian nations, including South Korea, are set to participate.

## Airline Death Spiral ##
United Airlines will be cancelling it’s direct flights from Fort McMurray to Denver, less than a year after the company began the service. Jesse Meyer, a Fort McMurray Airport spokesperson, said the company cited poor advanced ticket sales and performance expectations not being met as their reason. The route’s last flight is May 31, 2014.

## Fault lines/flashpoints/powder kegs/military/war drums ##
NATO’s newer eastern members are pushing to have alliance forces stationed permanently in their nations, a move at odds with a 1997 understanding with Russia that limits NATO bases on Russia’s periphery.

## Global unrest/mob rule/angry people/torches and pitchforks ##

## Energy/resources ##
In Germany, wind, solar and other "environmentally friendly" forms of energy production were mandated without regard to cost factors. But it is impossible to long continue to generate energy when the process itself is not efficient. In other words, if the creation of energy is in the long term more expensive than the goods and services being produced, the entire effort is doomed to failure. Rather than being sustainable, the process ITSELF will be unsustainable. And that is the position in which Germany now apparently finds itself.

For all the hoopla about renewables and grid parity, the reality is that, no matter where you look, there is no cheap energy any more. Even if it were possible to sustain industrial society on renewables (which it's not), society could not possibly afford to invest enough energy to build that much renewable-energy infrastructure because it would take away too much energy from that needed for day-to-day economic activities. -- RF

In mid March, Russian oil giant Lukoil celebrated the start up of the West Qurna-

2. The Iraqi oilfield, located near the southern city of Basra at the intersection of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, was quite likely the world’s biggest untapped field, with recoverable oil reserves believed to be in the neighborhood of 20 billion barrels.

## Got food? ##
From adulterated olive oil to counterfeit vodka, the trade in fake food is booming – and for mafia gangs it's less risky than drugs

## Environment/health ##

## Intelligence/propaganda/security/internet/cyberwar ##
In the post-Snowden era, companies are now competing for customers based on their ability to protect private information from the government's spying eyes
Everything that the Times writes about Ukraine is so polluted with propaganda that it requires a very strong filter, along with additives from more independent news sources, to get anything approaching an accurate understanding of events.

## Systemic breakdown/collapse/unsustainability ##
National Research Council report documents severe costs to communities, families, and society
UN-Habitat chief Joan Clos warns segregated housing may breed hostility, and calls for leaders to tackle urban inequality

## Japan ##
I can tell you from first-hand experience that nothing is getting better here ("better" in the sense that most people mean). Prices are higher, but incomes are not. Abenomics, like QE and everything else governments are trying, is just a time-buying device. Governments are trying to revive their moribund economies, but actually they have no idea what to do, so they come up with ways to buy time. Truly, duct tape would do just as well. There's one other thing I want to comment on here. We are told that Japan, like a number of other countries, has a demographics problem. The population is aging. There aren't enough people to work and pay into the pension system. So they should liberalize immigration laws and bring in more working people. Etc., etc. This coming from the great economic minds of our era. But this is drivel. Net energy is declining before our eyes. The solution, we are told, is more investment, more drilling, more tax breaks, more subsidies, more money printing, more incentives. But no matter what we do, energy just keeps costing more. It's because of this that economies are hitting the skids, and moving ever closer to contraction territory. That means fewer jobs, not more. It makes sense to want fewer mouths to feed. So smart governments — those that have a handle on the future — will welcome population decrease, and do everything possible to let their industrial economies decline as gracefully as possible. But let's have no illusions. There aren't many smart governments on the planet. Instead they will try to keep the current system going, which will result in a hard landing (i.e., collapse). Have a nice day! -- RF
Good news for the Earth and Japan, bad news for brain-dead "growth" advocates. -- RF

## China ##
China has formed numerous special teams as part of an emergency plan to deal with the aftermath of a potential collapse of North Korea's political regime, reports the Tokyo-based Kyodo News.

## UK ##
British workers have suffered an “unprecedented” decline in real wages over the past six years, with the average employee £2,000 worse off since the financial crisis hit, according to new research.

## US ##

And finally...


Science students at the University of Leicester have found that Pinocchio could only have told 13 lies before the weight of his nose would have caused his neck to break


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