When was the last time you took off your shoes and socks and walked barefoot on the earth?

There exists in our society an astounding yet subtle irony. We live in a world where the availability and convenience of our tools of communication and connectivity far surpasses any we have ever known. We are instantly and constantly in touch with each other and our institutions. And yet, we have become profoundly disconnected – disconnected from the very planet on which we live.

We awaken, get out of bed and move about on the floors of our homes. We ready ourselves for the day’s activities and leave our homes walking on the concrete or asphalt of the garage, carport or sidewalk and get into our car or board a bus in which we travel to work or shop. Upon arriving at our destination we exit the car and step onto the concrete of the parkade or exit the bus onto the concrete sidewalk. We travel to the office or store on concrete/asphalt and then return the same way at the end of our task. Never once for days, weeks, perhaps months on end do we actually come into direct contact with the earth.

In our busy lives we can easily fail to notice such a disconnect. We are much accustomed to traveling artificial surfaces and the hectic pace of our lives keeps us moving ahead without being much aware of the mode of travel.

This lack of connection to the actual earth is a metaphor for our lack of connection to the environment, to our world in total. It is incumbent on us to explore such a disconnect in light of what it means for our health, and ultimately, the health of the planet.

More to come.

Neil Boyd, professor of criminology and Associate Director of the Criminology Program at Simon Fraser University has spoken out about the Harper government’s latest criminal code changes.

In an article in The Vancover Sun July 5, he questions both the motives and the rationality of the proposed changes.

“In these days of public sector restraint, there is one realm of waste that is often neglected -the planned and pointless expenditure of billions of tax dollars on new provincial and federal prisons, the consequence of a series of Conservative crime bills.

Never mind that Canada already is a global leader in rates of incarceration, far ahead of almost all of the nation states of Western Europe -and, perhaps paradoxically, Canada typically has higher rates of crime.

The more interesting and relevant finding from recent research is that rates of imprisonment and rates of crime are not related in any systematic way, from one nation state to the next.

What is significant, however, is the relationship between confidence in the political and justice systems of a country and rates of imprisonment. Polls consistently demonstrate that nation states with the lowest rates of imprisonment also have citizens who have the highest levels of confidence in their political systems and their justice systems.”

He goes on to question the Conservative government’s rather obvious disregard for scientific research into the roots and remedies of crime.

“As one contemplates the lack of science in virtually every crime bill dutifully trotted out in Parliament by the Harper Conservatives, one is tempted to either laugh or cry.

It’s easy to dismiss them as ideologically driven fools (and there is certainly a wealth of evidence in support of such a proposition), but I think we have a deeper problem -a fundamental lack of belief in the tenets of science.

Consider the recent legislative initiative regarding mandatory minimum sentences for any person who grows more than six marijuana plants.

Does it make sense to spend billions of our tax dollars putting the producers of a relatively benign mind-active drug in jail, at the same time that the executives of tobacco and alcohol companies are regarded as contributing corporate citizens?”

Does it, indeed?

Here’s a video that will tear you up unless you’re made of stone: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVjXufO_zkU
Tell your friends!

All of those heart-warming photo ops of volunteers scrubbing oiled pelicans are just that. Photo ops. According to Silvia Gaus, a German biologist who has studied oil spill rescue results, the post-rehabilitation survival rate for these birds is less than 1%.

BP, of course, loves to see such pictures on the front pages of our newspapers. It is a huge PR plus for them that helps massively to mitigate their monstrous crime in the eyes of the public. Don’t be deceived.

The U.S. Minerals Management Service stated in a 2002 report: “Studies are indicating that rescue and cleaning of oiled birds makes no effective contribution to conservation.”

In quoting the 1 per cent figure, Gaus was likely referring to the work of ornithologist Brian Sharp, who produced a 1995 study showing extremely low survival rates for certain types of oiled sea birds between 1969 and 1994. Oil companies’ support for rehabilitation, Sharp wrote, “should be considered a public relations effort.”

Some have experienced organ damage; some suffer from anemia; some are forever traumatized by the cleaning process; some return to their tarnished habitats and get oiled again, said Gaus.

(IBRRC photo)

Photo - Paul Hanna, Reuters

Each one of us who continues to accept an oil fueled economy and deny the idiocy of that course shares the responsibility for the oilmageddon we are about to witness.

Well, as I sit here and listen to the news report from the Gulf of Mexico informing me that the latest effort by BP to slow the leaking has failed,  the echo of Palin’s inane rant accompanies images of pristine wetlands fouled, perhaps forever, by her precious oil.

I’m also cognizant of all of the places around the globe where the shut-off valves are slowly rusting amid the assurances of Big Oil that everything is okay.

Yesterday I sat beside a marsh with my camera patiently waiting for a Yellowthroat Warbler to burst into song.  Big Oil was on my mind then.

How many marsh warblers and how many marshes will have to die before we wake up?

What will the new world without cheap oil to manufacture cheap goods bring?  Well, it will most certainly bring much less of the material everything we have today.  This could  be perceived as a negative outcome if we were to evaluate the situation using the material yardsticks to which we are accustomed.  But what if we try an objective analysis of a world lacking material goods:

The missing cheap electronics will mean we might have to find ways of entertaining ourselves that do not require  electronic storage.  We might be tempted to attempt to learn how to play a musical instrument, or how to use the musical instrument of the human voice.

Without our cheap theater equipment we might become bored enough to venture out into the real world to discover what is there.

Without the gas to run automobiles we might have to walk from place to place using muscles and lungs that become healthier when used frequently.

Without cheap cameras and computers we might find a way to explore recording images manually in some way.  We might decide to try capturing images on canvas with paint or pencil.

In essence, we might find that the missing things in our lives bring about changes that enrich our lives.

Now here’s an interesting book by a man who was the chief economist at CIBC World Markets for twenty years.  Rubin talks about standing in the new terminal at Pearson International Airport and wondering what it could be used for once it becomes obsolete due to  $200-a-barrel-oil killing air travel.  If we think gasoline would be expensive, just imagine the price of jet fuel.  Rubin predicts not just the demise of air travel but the globalized economy as well.  Those myriad cheap goods from China won’t get here on ships fueled with $200 oil.  He suggests we might need to revisit our cheap-oil enabled lifestyle.  The changes he talks about would most certainly turn our comfy little material western world upside down.  This book is food for thought.  More later…

Well recent events have certainly changed the  Peak Oil timeframe.  At today’s price of $46.80 it is at it’s lowest since May of 2005.  So we’re back to cheap oil.  For now.  As I write this I am watching the SUVs cruising past my store on Fourth Avenue.  The same SUVs Detroit will continue to crank out if only the government will give them about $34Billion as an incentive.

Now, let me get this straight.  Detroit builds machines that use huge amounts of gasoline and oil but has been unable for years now to make a decent profit from the sales of said machines.  They wish to continue building these machines  for which they cannot seem to make any money and require the government to pay them to do so.                                                                                                                                                                                             Ah, what a long strange trip it’s been.

I have been in business for 30 years now and have never once  even dreamed of such a self-serving scheme.

But then, I don’t employ thousands.

Perhaps we need to rethink the internal combustion engine idea in total.  Perhaps this economic downturn is a golden opportunity to revisit  our support of an industry gone hopelessly wrong.

If the automakers cannot make a profit selling their oil-devouring monsters maybe that is a sign that the automobile as we have known it is obsolete.  Maybe it’s a sign that we need to find other ways of getting around.  Maybe it’s a sign that autoworkers, parts manufacturers and suppliers and all of the other detroit hangers- on need to find other ways of making a living.  And maybe it’s a sign that we need to revisit all of our oil-fuelled and wasteful lifestyle.

We in North America are in the process of exiting the most prosperous, luxurious, and self-indulgent period in history.  We are the spoiled generation, living off the non-renewable stored  wealth of oil and natural gas energy.  We have spent our wealth foolishly, and continue to do so.  Now this period is ending.  The current price of oil at $117 is about 5X the price of 8 years ago.  And nobody knows how much higher it might go, although there are some predictions of $300 in the next decade.  And nobody is predicting a reduction.  Hang onto your hats because everything, absolutely everything that you do is dependent on oil; oil at $30 a barrel!

So when you awaken in the morning and look over at the clock,  the cost of the electricity it runs on is going up due to the cost of lubricating the generators at the hydro dam, plus all of the other equipment for maintenance of the dam and the thousands of miles of transmission lines that bring the power to your clock.  And your house is crammed full of electrical appliances, as is your office/store/warehouse. Your breakfast, even without the power to run your fridge/stove/microwave/coffeemaker, is dependent on oil to make the fertilizer that grows the food and to power the trucks to transport it to your store.  And then your car needs it to pick up the food.  And you haven’t even left the house yet…