I’ve been listening to reports from the Middle East and the phrase that keeps coming up is ‘ the genie is out of the bottle’. By the end of this year, we may well see a complete change of order in the Middle East.
Already the tide has rapidly turned against Gaddafi in Libya, one commentator predicting his departure in 24 – 36 hours; the loyalty of the army and security forces is now questionable. At the end of the day, soldiers all have families and friends and they do not want to be the ones firing on their own people.
For us it means the fuel prices are likely to go through the roof. Egypt was a very small producer. But Libya produces in the order of 1.6 million barrels a day when the world’s surplus is less that one million. Bahrain is also a producer. Watch our use of public transport skyrocket.
It’s revealed the anger in these socities and a mix of young populations (Egypt’s median age is 23, Libya 24 and Yemen a staggering 17), lack of jobs (unemployment for under 30s is up around 50% in many societies) and greater technological connectivity through the internet which has meant the young see what could be, rather than what is.
But perhaps the most important ingredient is the lack of fear of repessive authorities. It took a man who set himself alight in Tunisia, a grocer who was beaten to death in Egypt to act as a rallying point. It’s clear that the brutal reaction by dictatorial governments has backfired, incensing and steeling rather than intimidating crowds into silence.
Meanwhile the streets have done what Al Qaida has failed miserably to do despite a decade of heinous acts and vitriol.
So where is Labours plan for the Peak Oil world that we’re now in?
Draco – Labour’s plan is to blame John Key. Their solution will be to make petrol cheap for the poor by increasing the cost for the rich. Their co-alition partner (Winston) will Nationalise all the petrol stations as an election deal breaker.
It is a fascinating piece of history to watch.
Regardless of ones political leaning – we should all be glad to be living in a country like NZ.
Time to invest in Hydrogen development!
Good one David, classic tipping point alright.
@ Chris: We may not just be watching history from afar if the Rebstock report as expected declares virtual war on the most vulnerable kiwis tomorrow. The “Burn Shipley Burn” type demos of the 90s are likely to be back this winter. Where are the jobs Mr Key?
@Draco – Why do you think Labour bought back Kiwirail? Or why they’re pushing for more public transport options like closing the Auckland rail loop? Or was lobbying to maintain rail expertise in NZ by arguing for new rolling stock to built at the Hillside workshop rather than in China?
I’m sure the Greens will be pushing for a more radical energy descent plan, but this sort of thing is mainstream politics these days.
@ Monty
I say we need to berate Labout for buying back Kiwirail ……and offer praise for the Roads of National (Party Campaign Funder) Significance!
i hate to be the one to point this out, but it is the national govt’s plan for “peak oil” that is going to impact on us in the immediate future.. i would have thought questions as to what those plans are would be better directed there..
You do understand that hydrogen has a net energy loss don’t you?
I remember them doing that but I also remember them spending more on roads and private transport than public transport. What we should be seeing from them is a statement that clearly articulates the reality of Peak Oil, major funding into public/mass transport and that they will stop building useless roads. Especially NACTs roads of “National Significance” that, even under BAU, run at a loss.
Gaddafi makes Mubarak look like a Sunday School Teacher handing out fluffy bunny rabbits…
Deleted. Clare
Chris I have deleted the comment you refer to. But I warn you. Clare
Since my comment has been deleted I think I’ll copy a review his history and people can guess what I hoped happens to him:
- Sending hit-squads to assassinate political opponents residing in other countries, nine were killed;
- Sent troops to protect Idi Amin’s dictatorship from Tanzanian troops that were fighting Amin’s attempt to annex part of Tanzania. Gaddafi gave Idi Amin safe haven after he fled Uganda;
- In 1984, a gunman at the Libyan Embassy in London shot and killed policewoman Yvonne Fletcher as he shot at protestors outside the Embassy. Ten other people were hit;
- The Chad-Libyan conflict as Gaddafi sought to annex the Aozou Strip. He failed, but around 8,500 were killed in the war;
- Bombing of UTA Flight 772 in 1989, killing 170 people;
- Bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 in 1988 (Lockerbie), killing 270 people;
- Bombing of a West Berlin discotheque in 1986, killing 3 and injuring 230;
- Supplies of weapons, ammunition and bombs to the IRA in the 1970s and 1980s;
- Weapons and arms training to ETA in the 1970s;
- Weapons and funding for the Moro National Liberation Front (Islamist rebels) in the Philippines in the 1970s;
- Financing for the Black September Movement that murdered 12 at the Munich Olympics in 1972;
- Weapons to Iran after the 1979 revolution saw ties severed with the US and USSR;
- Support for the PLO during its terrorist phase, and subsequent expulsion of 50,000 Palestinians when the PLO started negotiating with Israel;
- 1200 prisoners killed in Abu Salim prison in 1996.
Jeremy where did he get his weapons from
That may be a more pertinent question to ask?
@True Wheel – and I hope someone makes sure Paula Rebstock’s part of the effigy burning, too.
Largely from the Soviet Union and Russia (especially tanks, air force aircraft and navy vessels) but they also have weapons from around the world; French anti-aircraft, Italian ships, Brazilian APCs, they even have some US transport planes they’ve brought second hand and US APCs from before Gaddafi…
It’s easy to buy arms en masse on the open market and if embargoed there are always smugglers – after all there are 600,000,000 firearms (minimum) in the world…
Inregards to peak oil the problem with the peak oil theoreticians is that they take a perfectly reasonable and inarguable premise, that the supply of oil is finite and it will peak, and then take to alarmism. Then when someone criticises their alarmism they are accused of denying the premise. Their alarmism and continually inaccurate and shifting predictions undermines their credibility. In the book ‘Battle for Barrels’ some of these predictions which keep being pushed back are cataloged for instance, Hubbert himself predicted the peak would hit in 1995, Deffeyes once said it would hit in 2001-2003, a paper by in Scientific American in the late nineties said 2004-08 than the same authors later said 2005-10 and then 2010-20. Or take for instance the doyen of peak oil, Matt Simmons, prediction in 2003 that US natural gas reserves would hit a peak in 2005, but since they reserves have increased and increased and now natural gas reserves in the US are at their highest since 1971. We can go back further from the aforementioned book:
So there seems reason enough to be skeptical and not naively accept doomsday predictions.
As far as Gaddafi’s departure is concerned he will definitely take advantage of the previous revolutionary movements in Egypt and Libya which means his money will be transferred into foreign banks very carefully and he himself will depart Libya for another country where he will continue to lead quite a comfortable life.
IMO LAB needs to start talking more about what NZ can do to prosper as an extended community, within a global economic situation where 3%-4% growth p.a. over the next 15 years is a total impossibility.
QtR – we are never going to run out of oil, full stop. We are going to run out of oil that we can afford, oil that has any kind of price stability. It’s not that petrol is going to be $3/L next year which is the problem. It’s that its going to be $2, then $3, then $2, then $4, then $3 again.
Speculators will make money off the increasing variability but for the real economy it will be disastrous.
Lorne: in that case Gaddafi should just go tot he land of pinacoladas and not cause a blood bath en route (which he is doing as we speak).
And here is another thought – cheap oil started running out in the 1970′s. Its become more and more expensive to extract a barrel of oil. And the 1970′s was the end of big industrial money.
From the 1980′s and 1990′s the big money was all in the financial markets. In the 2000′s it was tech stocks and then banking derivatives speculation.
There was little room for real economy growth to be had after the 1970s (the last gasp was finding a low wage labour pool in China and that is going now). I think certain powers-that-be figured it out early and moved into the financialised economy as the place to make big money instead.
NZ and US media seem remarkably bullish about prospects for liberal democracy suddenly taking root in Libya, Egypt and elsewhere in the wake of “people power”. It’s good to be an optimist. I’m all for clearing out corrupt dictators – including the leftist ones like Mugabe and the Chinese communist dictators – but not so sure there is cause for such wild-eyed optimism given the history, economics and culture of Libya and Egypt. Perhaps a little more critical analysis is warranted?
I for starters hope that Qadhafi shall be eradicated in the near future, he has had plenty of time of oppressing their people it is time that people from Libya also know what flexibility is