This point came across vividly in a video recently released by the usually level-headed David McAlvaney titled “The Fuse Is Lit Part 3 – an American Reckoning.” In it, the smooth and articulate McAlvaney is shown behind the wheel of his SUV tooling across the picturesque small town in Colorado where he lives inveighing against the public that elects politicians who deliver the voters cash benefits. This dynamic is surely deadly, and implies Democracy’s tragic self-limiting nature. But McAlvaney suggests if we could come to grips with the fiscal quandary of “entitlement” spending, American life would just rock on.

     This is plainly not so, but it also reveals the tragic shortsightedness of even thoughtful conservatives – and there are some out there, indeed we need them, indeed one of the political tragedies of recent American history is the surrender of conservatism to religious hysterics, professional ignoramuses, military chauvinists, and flat-earthers. A true conservative would recognize the land development pattern of the millennial USA as a consequence of tragic collective choices, a living arrangement with no future, a trap every bit as lethal as Medicare and social security.

     The catch is, we’re not going to unbuild suburbia and all its accessories. There’s no way to legislate it away. We’re stuck with it. The suburban entitlement will fail even more dramatically than the social entitlements that conservatives grouse about because there’s no way to “print” cheap oil or well-paid livelihoods the way you can monetize public debt to support social spending. You can “print” mortgages, of course, for people with little chance of paying them down, but that only leads to the financial hostage racket called too-big-to-fail banking, and we know where that’s gotten us.

      Around the Internet, in the vale of financial podcasting, you can hear voices cheerleading the “return” of the house-building industry. Is it a good thing that real estate speculators are banging up yet more housing subdivisions in the hills around San Diego? I can tell you why they are doing it: because that is the only way they know how to build anything in California. They’re stuck in the habits and practices of the 20th century, building more car dependent stuff for a society that is already dying a slow death from living that way.

     In the collapse of all these rackets, bad habits, and brain-dead behaviors that it sure to come, historians will have a hard time sorting out what exactly brought down the empire. The big element that will not be so visible is the poverty of imagination that set the tone for it – especially among public figures and spokespeople who should have seen and articulated these relationships, and extra-especially among self-proclaimed conservatives.

     This happens to be the day when the articulator-in-chief gets his official new lease in office. Genial figure that he is, I don’t think President Obama has a clue where all this is heading. I suppose he’ll argue for stricter gun laws today, but that horse is already so far out of the barn it’s in the next county. We don’t seem to realize that America is now fully armed. Additional firearms are just superfluous at this point. And to some degree the people armed themselves in direct consequence as their government tinkered with due process, and sent drone aircraft into the American skies, and commenced computer hacking operations over every business transaction in the system, and voided the rule-of-law against criminal uber-bankers who creamed off the nation’s wealth while holding the economy hostage. Since the armed public is not ready to mount an insurrection against this impudence, the dangerous tension is expressed in morbid and tragic episodes of mass shootings by maniacs against the innocent. What I want to know: where is the lone swindled rancher who waits to bushwhack Jon Corzine of MF Global in the parking lots of Easthampton, since the law won’t touch him?

     I suppose we’ll hear about immigration reform today. It will surely be some cockamamie proposal to legitimize the “undocumented” by shanghaiing them into the military (think: mercenaries), and otherwise keeping the welcome mat down for more newcomers waiting politely at the front door. This is insane, of course. The USA needs to reduce its population consistent with the tremendous economic contraction underway world-wide. There are too many people for the world to support and shifting them into this country from regions more rapidly affected by contraction is just dumb — but we have our cultural myths to defend… and voting blocs to appease.

     It seems obvious to me that in the, say, four years ahead (one presidential term), we will not come to grips with any of the forces of reality bearing down on us. We will lose control of the money system; we’ll go broke trying to keep up our oil supplies; the American public will get more economically desperate and angry; and pretty soon the practical matters of daily life will become rather harsh. And at that point faith in the system finally evaporates and people fight over the table scraps of a failed polity.

     Many of us around the country are hoping for a better outcome in the successful downscaling and re-localizing of American life, but those questions are just not in the arena. Hence, the arena itself will probably have to topple and crash before life is reorganized outside of where it used to stand.

15 Comments on "Kunstler: Commitments and Obligations"

BillT on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 3:09 pm 



Bravo! The last sentence says it all. My thoughts exactly. It will take a total collapse and then a reset to a much lower and changed reality.

BillT on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 3:41 pm 



Off topic but part of the oil problem:
“… All in all, 25 Navy commanding officers were relieved in 2012, two more than the year 2011 …” (Naval accidents)

“US 7th Fleet commander regrets damage to Tubbataha Reef”
http://ph.news.yahoo.com/us-7th-fleet-commander-regrets-damage-tubbataha-reef-010621229.html

“…Related story: USS Guardian ‘ignored’ warnings it was nearing reef—Tubbataha Management Office…”

We really have a crack(up) Navy…lol.

Cloud9 on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 3:57 pm 



The new currency may in part become center fire rifle ammunition. It is now a dollar a round that is if you can find some to buy.

SOS on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 4:18 pm 



Lots of crazies out there that aren’t well informed but certainly angry, emotional and ill-informed.

This author is wrong on most every point he makes. This is an opinion piece not to be confused with a serious, factual presentation.

Cloud9 on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 4:37 pm 



Tis true but it does tend to describe the trend I am seeing on the ground.

rollin on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 5:00 pm 



More victorian whining about the way things were and how things are going to change. This idealistic vision of how people should live is doing nothing to solve any problem.

The only thing a revolution would do in this country would be to put us under full dictatorship.

GregT on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 5:08 pm 



“Lots of crazies out there that aren’t well informed but certainly angry, emotional and ill-informed.”

Tell that to the Pentagon, the Secretary of Defence and the US Military. Hell, tell that to the American public. 65% understand that the purpose of the Second Amendment is to make sure that people are able to protect themselves from a tyrannical government. These people are angry, and they are most certainly well informed.

And I’m sure that all of the killing in the middle east has everything to do with “Brutal Dictators”, “Weapons of Mass Destruction”, “Al Qaeda”, and “Equality for Women”.

Keep drinking the kool-aid, there’s plenty to go around.

christian phillip on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 8:33 pm 



hey, SOS, you ready for canibalism?…cause i am ready for you…there is no life after life ceases and you yoyo’s know it all for sure…this is why you are so full of hope…what kunstler doesnt get is that it is just too late already…we are on a slippery slope and it is only a matter of time before full extinction…of course it may take longer than i think, and i hope so…but sometimes i feel like i wanna see it in my lifetime, but no hurry please…and yet ,the fun of seeing all riches helpless, nothing can beat that…can it?…

christian phillip on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 8:50 pm 



..on another note, Kunstler is still my master and the only guru i ever listen to…mister intellectual, you need to slow down or some big things may happen in the near future…like the public starting to hear your prognosis and taking it as real prophecies…do you really wanna see people in the streets chanting your name?…cause i dont…ok, i want ,damn it,but what if them powers come after you after that?..would it be worthy?…me, i dont even dare say i am non religious (dont ever use the a- word) anymore…long live Gaia though !…now you all go the way of the bees…i mean eat all your honey.

Arthur on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 9:40 pm 



“The only thing a revolution would do in this country would be to put us under full dictatorship.”

That depends on the outcome of that revolution. The big advantage the American population has over the people of Russia/1917 is:
1. They are armed to the teeth
2. They have a Constitution to defend where Russians were already used to autocracy
3. The jewish lead bolsheviks took over power from the czar, who had lost the war. Now jewish run Washington has to defend itself against those aspiring 1776 2.0. Washington has to defend a broke carcass of a state and their mission statement is erect a tyranny. The opposite creed, ‘freedom’, will have the moral upperhand in the American psyche.
4. The internet plays into the hands of the revolutionaries, see Arab Spring

J-Gav on Mon, 21st Jan 2013 11:46 pm 



He says four years? Well yeah, that’s what I’ve been saying for ten years in my family/friends/colleagues entourage. 2016. If we haven’t figured it out by then it’s likely game over for this show.
But then what does that mean? A certain downsizing of our over-ambitious plans “A,” fuggedabout plans “B or C” which are hardly on the drawing board – that would go too far beyond any electoral cycle. What we’re up against is far bigger and more threatening than any of our elected officials will ever admit.

If I had grand-children (which I don’t quite have yet), I’d definitely be trying to steer them towards something with a little sanity to it as opposed to the flagrant absurdity of Business as Usual. But then that will already be gone by the time they grow up anyway and will no longer hold sway.

Who the hell are we anyway? I’m not at all sure we’ll find the answer to that question before it’s too late to reverse the course of what we have set in motion.

Arthur on Tue, 22nd Jan 2013 12:32 am 



He wants to run in 2016:

http://youtu.be/EUu_LvYvCqE

BillT on Tue, 22nd Jan 2013 4:45 am 



The future will need practical skills, not basket weaving degrees. Carpenter, plumber, electrician, farmer, mid-wife/nursing, mason, teachers, etc. If your grand kids are smart, they will learn these and then read what books they find interesting for further broadening of their minds.

Arthur on Tue, 22nd Jan 2013 4:55 am 



Talking about revolution, during the insuguration party yesterday, there was a black rapper who sung this and was prompty thrown out for it:

“”I really think the war on terror is a bunch of bullshit, Just a poor excuse for you to use up all your bullets, How much money does it take to really make a full clip, 9/11 building 7 did they really pull it, Uhh, And a bunch of other cover ups, Your childs future was the first to go with budget cuts, If you think that hurts then, wait here comes the uppercut, The school was garbage in the first place, that’s on the up and up. Keep you at the bottom but tease you with the uppercrust, You get it then they move it so you never keeping up enough, If you turn on TV all you see’s a bunch of “what the fucks” Dude is dating so and so blabbering bout such and such, And that ain’t Jersey Shore, homie that’s the news, And these the same people that supposed to be telling us the truth,Limbaugh is a racist, Glenn Beck is a racist, Gaza strip was getting bombed, Obama didn’t say shit.That’s why I ain’t vote for him, next one either, I’ma part of the problem, my problem is I’m peaceful, And I believe in the people.”

http://911blogger.com/news/2013-01-21/lupe-fiasco-thrown-stage-inaugural-concert#comments

This is not going away and 911 truth could still be the seed to bring real change to America. Think Alex Jones, think Jesse Ventura, think Paul Craig Roberts. Together with the gun control issue this could be a lethal cocktail for Washington.

BillT on Tue, 22nd Jan 2013 1:03 pm 



We can only hope, Arthur. It’s difficult to wake up drugged sheeple.