Monday, December 22, 2008
Top 10 Stories of 2008
2008 was an eventful year, comparable to 1968 and 1991. The reason is that it may be a passage year from the Third Turning to the Fourth Turning. So it is of interest to list the top events of the year. The Associated Press has done this. This is the list it came up with:
1. Obama's Election
2. Financial Crisis
3. Oil Prices/Peak Oil
4. Iraq
5. Beijing Olympics
6. Chinese Earthquake
7. Sarah Palin
8. Mumbai Attacks
9. Hillary Clinton
10. Russia-Georgia War
I see serious problems with the list. First of all, it says that Obama's election was more important than the financial crisis. No, the financial crisis is a huge one, comparable to the trouble of 1929, and it affects the lives of everyone. It is threatening American auto companies, jobs of people everywhere, and housing sales. Nobody's election could top this, not even Obama's.
The rating of the Beijing Olympics as number 5 shows a warped sense of priorities. I look at its description and see that it talks mainly about the sports events and only tangentially about air pollution and China's human rights record. The rating of Sarah Palin, one woman who did not succeed in her endeavor, over a terrorist attack killing 164 people is also a serious warp of priority.
Here is my ranking of the top 10:
1. The Financial Crisis This crisis is probably the start of the Fourth Turning. It is huge, involving trillions of dollars in bailouts and maybe a quadrillion in derivatives. It is affecting everyone, and is global in scope. Stocks plummeted to levels last seen around the premillennium. To me this has got to be the top event of the year, topping even peak oil, although only temporarily; perhaps Peak Oil in some measure caused the crisis.
2. Obama's Election This election was remarkable in that it represented the election of a person with African-American ancestry, as well as one with recent immigrant heritage. This looked like it was going to be the biggest election in a long time, since it determines the next Crisis President. The Lichtman Keys fortold for years that the Democrats would win; 9 keys were down. Despite that, around Labor Day, McCain had a slight lead. McCain blew it in several different ways: he talked all the time about why Obama was bad instead of why he was good; he nominated Sarah Palin, a most unqualified contender whose main talent seems to be shooting moose; and he cancelled his campaign when the financial crisis broke out, when he should have been telling us how he would deal with it. But still, it was a historic election, and Obama has for the most part picked a highly competent Cabinet. We will wait to see what Obama will do for an ailing world.
3. Hurricanes Ike and Gustav These storms were highly significant, since they came close to the worst that could happen to our oil supply. Gustav ruined many oil rigs and a few refineries, and Ike hit the center of the refining industry almost head on, causing much destruction of generating capacity. The effect of this was blunted by the financial crisis, which cut demand. But still it caused a major shortage of gasoline for weeks in the Atlanta-Nashville-Charlotte triangle. This tells us what can happen if oil is shut off and it suggests the worst place to be during Peak Oil days could be this triangle.
4. Oil Prices/Peak Oil
Wow! Oil went all the way up to $147, and Kenneth Deffeyes said that if it got up to $300 a barrel, we would be looking at the ruins of a wrecked economy. However, the economy started to run before this would happen, and oil plummeted to $32, and gasoline from over $4 to about $1.45 a gallon. I think oil is going to go up in the future, however. Sooner or later the economy will recover, and the capacity to produce oil can only decline. Demand will exceed supply, and oil will go up in price again. Peak oil threatens our way of living and it seems we will need to adapt by doing things more locally. To me the oil price antics of 2008 are a warning about what is to come.
5. Tibet protests How can you attend an Olympics in a country which rules by tyranny and oppression? Tibet for a long time has been seeking self rule and the Chinese has been repressing them down. This year, protests went worldwide, and it seemed like it would ruin the Olympics, but the huge earthquake stirred up sympathy for the Chinese and so the protest got ignored.
6. Indian Typhoon Nargis This storm is usually called a cyclone, but since it appears in the same pattern of tropical storms as do the typhoons, I prefer to call it one, prefixing it with "Indian" for the ocean. Protests were occurring in Myanmar before Nargis struck, and the Myanmarian government was repressing them; same story as with China. When the hurricane struck, it left thousands of dead and homeless, and the government would not help, and would not let foreign governments help. This is just plain irresponsible and uncaring. To me these protests help make this otherwise unremarkable Indian typhoon into a major story.
6. Chinese Earthquake
This is the biggest natural disaster of 2008, killing tens of thousands in the middle of China. It was like a punch in the stomach to Chinese, right in the center of the country. However, Chinese and foreigners were quick to help, and things were mostly okay for the Olympics.
7. Iraq. This is becoming less of a news story as time wears on. Every day, attacks occur. They have been less lately, but I am not sure that the surge caused this. We should have never attacked Iraq. It resulted in a quagmire, and there are better ways of dealing with a world in which oil is ever becoming scarcer.
8. Hurricane Hanna. People are ignoring this one. It is a major disaster of 2008. It only caused a big rainstorm in Virginia, where I live. But it killed 500 people in Haiti and made the desperate situation there even worse.
9. Mumbai Attacks. In general, terrorist attacks are a distraction from the world's two main problems of peak oil and finance. But one cannot ignore one that kills 164 people. The Mumbai attacks says there is still a problem with terrorism in the world, and that we can't fully ignore it. The location is significant, as it raises the specter of an India-Pakistan war, which could become nuclear.
10. Russia-Georgia War This tells us that Russia may have to be watched in the future. It isn't Communist, but it could become fascist. Georgia tried to take two breakaway states, and Russia responded with overkill, invading and pushing the Georgians out of the two republics and in addition occupying parts of Georgia. Nothing much has come of this, but there remains the latent threat of Russian action in other places, including the Ukraine.
Here are the stories that AP selected for their list but I didn't. The Beijing Olympics were primarily a sports event, and so isn't news. The biggest news impact of them is their possible effect on oil prices. Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin are people, and people by themselves are rarely news. Hillary represented a chance for a woman to become President and supported the same type of platform as Obama did. Sarah Palin was more of a distraction and a comedy act in my opinion, what with her shooting moose and some of the things she said in TV interviews. Rod Blagojevich is also a comedy act, one with a lot of chutzpah. Get your red hot Senate Seat here!
And let's not forget the shoes that were thrown at Bush. One of the first things that was asked was not the effect on the Iraq war but rather what size they were (10). Now we are going to have people throwing shoes all over the place. It reminds me of Khrushchev banging his shoe and of all those shoes on overhead power lines, and the fact that the Toastmaster of the Day started the most recent member of a Toastmaster club that I belong to by banging her shoe on the lectern.
So that's the stories of the year. And if the other shoe fits, drop it.
1. Obama's Election
2. Financial Crisis
3. Oil Prices/Peak Oil
4. Iraq
5. Beijing Olympics
6. Chinese Earthquake
7. Sarah Palin
8. Mumbai Attacks
9. Hillary Clinton
10. Russia-Georgia War
I see serious problems with the list. First of all, it says that Obama's election was more important than the financial crisis. No, the financial crisis is a huge one, comparable to the trouble of 1929, and it affects the lives of everyone. It is threatening American auto companies, jobs of people everywhere, and housing sales. Nobody's election could top this, not even Obama's.
The rating of the Beijing Olympics as number 5 shows a warped sense of priorities. I look at its description and see that it talks mainly about the sports events and only tangentially about air pollution and China's human rights record. The rating of Sarah Palin, one woman who did not succeed in her endeavor, over a terrorist attack killing 164 people is also a serious warp of priority.
Here is my ranking of the top 10:
1. The Financial Crisis This crisis is probably the start of the Fourth Turning. It is huge, involving trillions of dollars in bailouts and maybe a quadrillion in derivatives. It is affecting everyone, and is global in scope. Stocks plummeted to levels last seen around the premillennium. To me this has got to be the top event of the year, topping even peak oil, although only temporarily; perhaps Peak Oil in some measure caused the crisis.
2. Obama's Election This election was remarkable in that it represented the election of a person with African-American ancestry, as well as one with recent immigrant heritage. This looked like it was going to be the biggest election in a long time, since it determines the next Crisis President. The Lichtman Keys fortold for years that the Democrats would win; 9 keys were down. Despite that, around Labor Day, McCain had a slight lead. McCain blew it in several different ways: he talked all the time about why Obama was bad instead of why he was good; he nominated Sarah Palin, a most unqualified contender whose main talent seems to be shooting moose; and he cancelled his campaign when the financial crisis broke out, when he should have been telling us how he would deal with it. But still, it was a historic election, and Obama has for the most part picked a highly competent Cabinet. We will wait to see what Obama will do for an ailing world.
3. Hurricanes Ike and Gustav These storms were highly significant, since they came close to the worst that could happen to our oil supply. Gustav ruined many oil rigs and a few refineries, and Ike hit the center of the refining industry almost head on, causing much destruction of generating capacity. The effect of this was blunted by the financial crisis, which cut demand. But still it caused a major shortage of gasoline for weeks in the Atlanta-Nashville-Charlotte triangle. This tells us what can happen if oil is shut off and it suggests the worst place to be during Peak Oil days could be this triangle.
4. Oil Prices/Peak Oil
Wow! Oil went all the way up to $147, and Kenneth Deffeyes said that if it got up to $300 a barrel, we would be looking at the ruins of a wrecked economy. However, the economy started to run before this would happen, and oil plummeted to $32, and gasoline from over $4 to about $1.45 a gallon. I think oil is going to go up in the future, however. Sooner or later the economy will recover, and the capacity to produce oil can only decline. Demand will exceed supply, and oil will go up in price again. Peak oil threatens our way of living and it seems we will need to adapt by doing things more locally. To me the oil price antics of 2008 are a warning about what is to come.
5. Tibet protests How can you attend an Olympics in a country which rules by tyranny and oppression? Tibet for a long time has been seeking self rule and the Chinese has been repressing them down. This year, protests went worldwide, and it seemed like it would ruin the Olympics, but the huge earthquake stirred up sympathy for the Chinese and so the protest got ignored.
6. Indian Typhoon Nargis This storm is usually called a cyclone, but since it appears in the same pattern of tropical storms as do the typhoons, I prefer to call it one, prefixing it with "Indian" for the ocean. Protests were occurring in Myanmar before Nargis struck, and the Myanmarian government was repressing them; same story as with China. When the hurricane struck, it left thousands of dead and homeless, and the government would not help, and would not let foreign governments help. This is just plain irresponsible and uncaring. To me these protests help make this otherwise unremarkable Indian typhoon into a major story.
6. Chinese Earthquake
This is the biggest natural disaster of 2008, killing tens of thousands in the middle of China. It was like a punch in the stomach to Chinese, right in the center of the country. However, Chinese and foreigners were quick to help, and things were mostly okay for the Olympics.
7. Iraq. This is becoming less of a news story as time wears on. Every day, attacks occur. They have been less lately, but I am not sure that the surge caused this. We should have never attacked Iraq. It resulted in a quagmire, and there are better ways of dealing with a world in which oil is ever becoming scarcer.
8. Hurricane Hanna. People are ignoring this one. It is a major disaster of 2008. It only caused a big rainstorm in Virginia, where I live. But it killed 500 people in Haiti and made the desperate situation there even worse.
9. Mumbai Attacks. In general, terrorist attacks are a distraction from the world's two main problems of peak oil and finance. But one cannot ignore one that kills 164 people. The Mumbai attacks says there is still a problem with terrorism in the world, and that we can't fully ignore it. The location is significant, as it raises the specter of an India-Pakistan war, which could become nuclear.
10. Russia-Georgia War This tells us that Russia may have to be watched in the future. It isn't Communist, but it could become fascist. Georgia tried to take two breakaway states, and Russia responded with overkill, invading and pushing the Georgians out of the two republics and in addition occupying parts of Georgia. Nothing much has come of this, but there remains the latent threat of Russian action in other places, including the Ukraine.
Here are the stories that AP selected for their list but I didn't. The Beijing Olympics were primarily a sports event, and so isn't news. The biggest news impact of them is their possible effect on oil prices. Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin are people, and people by themselves are rarely news. Hillary represented a chance for a woman to become President and supported the same type of platform as Obama did. Sarah Palin was more of a distraction and a comedy act in my opinion, what with her shooting moose and some of the things she said in TV interviews. Rod Blagojevich is also a comedy act, one with a lot of chutzpah. Get your red hot Senate Seat here!
And let's not forget the shoes that were thrown at Bush. One of the first things that was asked was not the effect on the Iraq war but rather what size they were (10). Now we are going to have people throwing shoes all over the place. It reminds me of Khrushchev banging his shoe and of all those shoes on overhead power lines, and the fact that the Toastmaster of the Day started the most recent member of a Toastmaster club that I belong to by banging her shoe on the lectern.
So that's the stories of the year. And if the other shoe fits, drop it.
