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BRYANT URSTADT-Imagine there's no oil:
Scenes from a liberal apocalypse |
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Contributed by Bryant Urstadt
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On a Friday last fall, I headed to Yellow Springs, Ohio, to learn more about oil depletion and the imminent collapse of industrial civilization. I was on my way to the Second U.S. Conference on "Peak Oil" and Community Solutions, and the organizers had picked an ideal weekend for the affair. The skies were smeared an oily gray, and 4,300-horsepower military jets roared like horsemen of the apocalypse over the withered cornfields. Hurricane Rita was poised to rip into Texas and Louisiana the very next morning, and both NPR and the Christian radio stations were anticipating her landfall with rapture, speculating on the fate of the Gulf refineries, reporting that the ATMs were out of cash and the pumps were dry, describing Revelation-scale traffic. When the hurricane watch was occasionally interrupted, it was to report on the day's news from Iraq, which was not good. I myself was traveling without possessions, my bags having failed to appear when I arrived at the Columbus airport that afternoon. I did not imagine I would see them again: the airline had just declared bankruptcy, partially due to a spike in fuel costs, and I felt that I would be lucky just to get home. . . .
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