Wednesday, May 15, 2013

THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION DREAMS UP AN ENERGY POLICY



THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION DREAMS UP AN ENERGY POLICY


At last!  Recognizing that the global atmosphere has now reached 400 PPM, the United States under the fearless leadership of the Obama administration has initiated a new dream energy policy.  You heard it here first: the policy is a real dream—made up of smoke, mirrors, and carbon dioxide. And the appointment of a new Secretary of Energy: Ernest Moniz, a close buddy of the fossil fuel industry.


In recent days I have been pondering how to maintain an appropriate relationship with psychopaths.  That includes your government. I have come to the reluctant conclusion that you don’t: you don’t petition them, you don’t negotiate with them, and unless you are as big a psychopath as they are, you don’t get very far with threatening them with a higher level of mayhem than they threaten you.  There is only one appropriate way: Build a parallel network free of their drunken, mayhem terrorholism. 

You can develop an energy policy of your own.  It’s the best (and only) way to resist.  Here are the Ten Easy Commandments of Energy Resistance:

1. Find a light switch near you. Turn it off. Do this obsessively.

2. Walk to all errands within a one-mile radius of your domicile (that’s where you live). You will reduce your energy consumption and your obesity.

3. If you travel to neighboring cities or communities, take public transportation. You get to see how people in the real world look, talk and smell. And you can read during the time it takes—that is if your concentration is iron-clad.

4. Stop buying gasoline.  The way to do this is scrap your car. Wreck it if you must.

5. Take taxis. They’re cheaper and you get to feel like a Park Avenue millionaire. No one will ever know you’re living paycheck to paycheck.

6. Get up with the sun; retire with the sunset. You’ll be happier healthier but not necessarily wiser.

7. Annoy people who sit in their cars listening to their engines idling.  Ask them if they’re getting a kick every time they boil the planet. 

8. Leave Energy Commandments on parked cars. It takes a half hour of your time to circle the block putting these little reminders on every single windshield. Motorists will thank you for it. Pick up the litter they leave behind.

9. Change your banking habits.  Take your money to the nearest credit union.  Banks love to support dirty energy while raking the dirty money in.

10. Fight light pollution. Find public spaces, corridors, lobbies, streets. Disable every other light bulb. You’ll rediscover the moon and the stars.  They have looked pretty good at night for over 4 billion years. 


May 15, 2013
©Cecile Pineda

1 comment:

  1. Thanks for the action recommendations.

    My only reservation is on item 9. I have heard credible reports, and had personal experiences supporting the opinion, that some banks are more enlightened in their support of social justice and environmental protection than are some credit unions. Using a legal category to judge an organization is easy, but unreliable, just as using an ethnic category to judge a natural person is. I prefer to consider each bank, credit union, or other firm on its merits, which is a lot more work but seems more justifiable.

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