Out of the Blue:

Space Drones, Black Programs, the Unveiling of U.S. Military Offensives in Weather as a Weapon, and the Coming Permanent State of Emergency.

keith harmon snow

Index (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9) (10) (11) (12) (13) (14) (15) (16) (17) (18) (afterword) (reference)

17. On The Threshold.

Humanity is on the threshold. [287] In biocentric, rather than anthropocentric, terms, life as we know it is on the threshold. The environmental system, in particular the earth’s climate, used to be regarded as relatively stable in the face of human insults. But now it is widely believed to have multiple local equilibria that are not highly stable. [288]

Human-induced environmental degradation – or scientific and military arrogance in tampering with atmospheric systems or nuclear devices -- may provoke nonlinear or threshold effects in the atmospheric and hydrological systems that could produce sudden shifts in the climate to a new – and potentially very undesirable – equilibrium. An oft-cited example is the potential to alter the direction of major ocean currents such as the Gulf Stream. [289] An abrupt shift of deep ocean currents could cut off the northward flow of warm water in the Atlantic so that, within a decade, the climate of much of Europe could go into a deep freeze. [290]

Imminent and far-reaching actions are essential, not to reverse the most severe ecological damage we have already done, but only to slow those effects and prevent greater catastrophe. Feedback mechanisms will continue to exert pressures on the environmental system long after we have ceased or modified our human actions. Nonlinear processes involve instabilities and forces of unpredictable magnitude, duration and frequency. [291]

We are now facing multiple resource scarcities that exhibit powerful interactive, feedback and threshold effects. The multiple impacts of severe storms, agricultural decline, ozone depletion, pollution and human population have created an indeterminate and unpredictable mix. People are committed to patterns of resource consumption, the momentum is staggering, and even many of the people who are already aware of the need for alternative energies and lifestyles are reluctant, unable or unwilling to change.

Humankind will face multiple resource shortages that are interacting and unpredictable, that grow to crises proportions rapidly, and that will be hard to address because of powerful commitments to certain consumption patterns. Growing population, consumption and environmental factors will increase social friction.“The resulting economic decline may corrode confidence in national purpose, weaken the tax base, and undermine financial, legal and political institutions.” [292]

To transition from the preceding analysis into a discussion about economic impacts -- in the United States, for example -- is obscene. However much people in the United States and Canada consider themselves to be sufficiently divorced from the seas of human misery, their future lies in helping – not abandoning – the developing world. To drive this home we now address the financial and economic costs, in the United States, of the current course we are on.

Study after study – not funded by the oil and coal industry – has shown that every dollar spent on conservation, energy efficiency and renewable energies creates far more jobs than the equivalent amounts spent on fossil fuels. [293]

The National Climatic Data Center reports that “the U.S. has sustained 52 weather-related disasters over the past 22 years in which overall damages and costs reached or exceeded $1 billion. 43 of these disasters occurred during the 1988-2001 period with total damages/costs exceeding $185 billion. Seven occurred during 1998 alone--the most for any year on record, though other years have recorded higher damage totals.” [294]

Nonetheless, popular publications like World Climate Report continue to debunk basic and obvious realities with the most circuitous Orwellian and Kafkaesque arguments. At the same time, when a news article of some substance is printed, these and similar publications blame the media – which they have so successfully courted and influenced -- for publishing articles intent on scaring and deceiving the public.

For example, the Greening Earth Society’s World Climate Report says:

Vocal advocates of acting now to head off the possibility of global warming, having failed to make the case that climate change would cause noticeable economic costs, are attempting to scare the public through allegations that a warmer climate would bring death and disease. [295]

This is certain: the current course our leadership has assumed is tantamount to doom. Indeed, that is scary. We are, in many ways, doomed to suffer that which we have allowed or created or silently accepted. We should be scared. Unless revolutionary changes are instituted at the most basic levels, immediately, the world will increasingly suffer unprecedented cataclysms, resulting in widespread human, plant and animal suffering and death. The United States – even its richest and most powerful citizens -- are not immune. To the glee of the flat earth climate skeptics, and the public deceptions industry, and the corporations behind them however, numerous accountings of the economic costs have been studiously dismissed, denied and buried.

Mechanized forestry combined with resource depletion continues to eliminate human labor even as corporate public relations trumpet (mythical) job creation, as they log and destroy pristine areas. Meanwhile the logging industry blames job losses on environmentalists and conservation programs. In British Columbia it is estimated that in the period from 1981-1992 only 500 of the 24,000 direct forest industry job losses were due to wilderness preservation (In BC, more people work in tourism than in forestry). [296]

The travel and tourism industry will suffer enormous losses as the specter of acute violence, refugee flows, epidemics, and widespread suffering outside the country reaches the awareness of the public and, in turn, drives protectionism, xenophobia and isolation at home. International and domestic tourism will be hard hit as the effects of severe weather conjoin with population, pollution, social strife and resource depletion to eat away at national forests and monuments, wildlife refuges, conservation areas, beaches and marine parks. In July and August of 2002, for example, severe drought plagued the fishing economy of the U.S.: Colorado’s annual $900 million fishing economy was devastated. [297]
 

External groups marginalized by the inequalities of globalization, and some privileged groups of richer countries, will increasingly retaliate against American interests: most vulnerable will be international tourists, backpackers and traveling business people. “And, some form of confrontation between the over-thirty rich and the poor but angry global teenager seems likely,” notes the Air Force, ever scheming to deploy repressive troops and technologies, at home as abroad. [298]

Crime within developed countries will increase as employment shrinks and people of all classes increasingly resort to illegal activities in anger, retaliation and desperation. Crime will be random, committed by individuals, and it will be organized, committed by gangs hardened across ethnic, religious and class cleavages. This will further justify an authoritarian state response, at taxpayer’s expense.

Domestic violence, rape, alcohol, racial and religious scape-goating, and racial profiling will increase and further contribute to violent crime. (Such social costs, not easily calculated, are very significant). Security firms, security equipment and professional thugs will proliferate, at high costs, becoming increasingly unaffordable to the average citizen. Nonetheless, insurance firms will mandate high investments in security equipment for homeowners and businesses.

Health care costs will increase substantially. Drugs will become less effective, more expensive, and, as the social fabric unravels in parallel with greater authoritarian control, and the controls on corporations and oversights on medical regulations are compromised, we can predict a greater propensity for drugs to simultaneously deliver adverse side-effects and unforeseen risks. (This is already happening, and it is called risk-assessment, and it is the calculated statistical expectation of a certain level of mortality.)

Disease will hamper economic productivity. Manufacturing, energy, defense, travel and service industries will suffer as production, human efficiency and attendance are increasingly impacted by mental or physical illness, or the imperatives of mitigating sudden threats or losses to private property. Corporations will exploit these conditions, optimizing productivity and costs by choosing from increasingly desperate pools of labor. This is already happening. 

As the economies of the greater world continue to decline and collapse – which has happened to varying extent in different geographical areas -- or transition into permanent states of war -- as some regions have already done – the emerging markets and the banking systems propped up and manipulated by western capital will further decline and collapse. This will exert tremendous downward pressure on centers of trade, finance and manufacturing in the North.

Disruptions in fresh water systems will continue to degrade and impact human health. Public water and sewage systems’ maintenance and operations costs will sap budgets, and we can expect greater social strife as clean water scarcity drives private sector resource capture [299] -– leading to monopolies and controls on water purification, distribution, accessibility and costs.

Environmental and health disasters will exhaust relief budgets. Taxpayers pay for disaster assistance by the government, and all policyholders pay for insurance losses through higher insurance premiums. Severe storms cause death, homelessness, property damage and psychological damage to victims.

The insurance industry will both capitalize and capitulate on their responsibilities and opportunities in the highly volatile environment characterized by unpredictable weather, severe storms, disasters, and the related losses to life and property. Auditing firms like Arthur Andersen, Price Waterhouse and Coopers & Lybrand will continue to manipulate the financial records, deferring losses and hiding costs, to maximize the profits of insurance (and other) corporations at the public expense. Insurance companies have already imposed caps on how much insurance they will write in certain areas. [300]  

Absent a vibrant state and national government – with individuals accountable to the public trust --- corporations will for some time continue to secure government (taxpayer) subsidies and bailouts, to defer the substantial losses (direct and indirect) related to environmental disruption. Shareholders -- for the most part – will continue to be defrauded even as directors pocket tens of millions of dollars annually in basic salaries, stocks, bonds, insurance benefits and special bonuses. Investment funds, pensions plans, social securities and other financial safety nets will increasingly defraud long-term investors and retirees: for the average middle- and lower-class citizen, most will fail or disappear without warning.

The many social, financial and economic ills that will beset U.S. citizens as environmental disruption proceeds and accelerates will stress and paralyze the legal system. The cases of India and Nigeria provide perfect examples of what can be expected here. State and federal legal institutions will become increasingly costly and unmanageable, as more and more citizens pursue legitimate grievances within the courts. Many citizens will remain marginalized, incapable of defraying the most basic legal costs. The further saturation of the legal field with the recently graduated law students will further bog down an already paralyzed system. Prisons will proliferate, at further taxpayer expense. Special military courts and tribunals will convene and extrajudicially override legitimate legal institutions.

Finally, we have the specter of authoritarianism. Given the social consequences of environmental disruption, in tandem with increasing urbanization, rising population, and declining standards of living, one can easily support the conclusion that there will be significant increases in the size and intrusiveness of federal internal and external security forces.  

Next: The Falsification of Consciousness