Peak Oil - A Perfect Storm : Melbourne Indymedia

In the interest of public debate during this rather absurd and largely content free election campaign I would like to put forward a possible worst case prognosis for our nation's future:

Energy depletion leading to economic collapse and total war in the context of global warming means extinction.

The more we release the gaseous byproducts of our exponentially growing energy consumption into our world's atmosphere the more we brew perfect storms where the increased solar energy trapped by the Greenhouse effect leads to ever more energetic extremes. Where these chaotic extremes coincide and reinforce one another a perfect storm forms marshaling all the destructive forces available to nature. And by the way, the poles are melting along with huge expanses of what used to be permafrost at the same time as Australia's rainfall is rapidly declining. Perth in Western Australia has experienced a two thirds drop in its rainfall since the mid 70's and the decline has been accelerating since the late 90's. The good people of this city are now considered to be the early warning canary in the global warming coal mine as this climatic drought is spreading eastwards throughout the entire continent. According to Dr Tim Flannery their city may become a 'ghost metropolis' within the next 50 years as our dry sunburnt continent becomes even drier in climatic conditions 'not seen in 40 million years'.

Climatic change of course isn't merely an Australian problem, it's a human problem. Our post WW2 industrial globalisation has led to a massive restructuring in the way of life of a large section of the global population and an exponential growth in the total number of humans taking advantage of every resource this world has to offer. There are now over 6.4 billion of us, 4 people are born every second, 2 people die, the population as a whole is growing by 200 000 people every day, and that growth is exponentially increasing by 1.3% per year. Even though that rate is steadily declining from its peak of 2.2% in the 60's, by 2050 there will still be 9 billion of us and we will be amongst the oldest of them.

There are, however, growing scientific concerns that the available natural resources of this earth that supports today's massive global population may be reaching their natural limits, from food production to water supplies, and most especially the super abundance of cheap hydrocarbon energy that fuels our constant economic growth and globalisation as a whole. We are consuming the earth at an exponential rate and are the principal cause of deforestation, desertification, the collapse of fisheries, massive worldwide pollution and an increasing species extinction rate rivaling the late Cretaceous extinction event that wiped out the dinosaurs. Australia, perhaps the most biologically diverse and ecologically fragile land mass on this earth, is at the forefront of this world wide problem with our modern industrialised land management practices destroying native species and habitats at a world record pace. We are the Thorpedoes of modernity and according to Flannery we are also "one of the most physically vulnerable people on the Earth", at the head of the pack leading humanity on towards a global warming catastrophe in the next 50 years and beyond. No doubt we will consume ourselves out of the problem, just as Perth will burn coal and gas to generate electricity for a proposed desalination plant in order to offset the growing water demands of its constantly growing population and the fall in water catchment runoff due to our industrial way of life and its global warming.

So at the moment we have exponentially growing overpopulation fueling accelerating biosphere destruction and global warming, and these seem to be an artefact of our growth based economic/political order founded on the constant growth in our consumption of energy with seemingly no end in sight to everyday business as usual even though that means a deferred death wish for today's children and their children. For those of you who agree that the human situation at the beginning of the 21st century is becoming seriously unsustainable you would perhaps also agree that we need to approach these problems rationally, guided by the science and cooperating at the international level to help developing nations implement sustainable economies while we radically reduce our own industrial greenhouse emissions and change our way of life at the federal, state and local community levels. The Kyoto protocol was a first attempt at such internationalism and Australia is once again one of the world leaders in its ongoing failure.

Australia under Howard has actively worked to undermine any long term international approach to the problem of biosphere destruction while Australia under Bush is following the US into a brave new world where all increasingly urgent environmental concerns are secondary to keeping our globalised growth economies growing. Without constant growth the global economy would collapse as it is fed by inflating debt bubbles that can only be serviced by the production of more wealth, primarily paper wealth. Australian total debt is now over one trillion dollars and growing, US total debt is 37 trillion dollars, our middle classes are being buried under heavy mortgage debts that finance consumer spending with a lot of consumers resorting to credit for their weekly purchases. The engine driving our globalised economy is a gigantic debt bubble. According to recent economic warnings any serious rise in interest rates could destabilise our economy, burst the housing bubble and lead to a recession the size of the one that occurred in WW2. Our current consumer economy is poised on the edge of a precipice and increasingly vulnerable to external threats to the status quo. It's not likely we will see heavy investment of our national wealth in changing our way of life any time soon unless something rather radical happens. There seems to be no current economic solution to the extinction threat of climate change other than to ignore it.

However, at the same time as global warming is starting to make an impact on that way of life there are growing concerns that the hydrocarbon energy reserves that have fueled the globalisation that leads to all these problems may also be reaching a limit in growth. Independent geological predictions of the imminent peak in global oil and gas production are for 2005-2008 with a terminal decline self-evident by 2010. More optimistic oil industry estimates put the peak at 2020, just 15 years from now. For a previous Indymedia discussion on this topic see Peak Oil is Here but in summary, the possible consequences of peak oil are gigantic and involve nothing less than a forced, massive, radical and sustained change in our way of life as we transition to alternative energy sources and the economic/political order they support. Our current oil fed, growth based, globalised industrial civilisation will not survive the transition, something new must take its place.

If peak oil occurs within the next 4 years we will see a series of recessions as oil prices fluctuate wildly and trend upwards. Any increase in oil prices flows through to all our economic activity resulting in stagflation where economic growth slows and inflation sets in. To control inflation as our dollar devalues the federal reserve can only lift interest rates that will put pressure on our middle class debt bubble resulting in further economic chaos and a possible global stock market and banking crash. Some time after 2010 a global great depression will set in as economies shrink along with the terminal decline in oil supply and the middle classes are bankrupted, welfare collapses, food, housing and commodity prices keep rising and long term unemployment becomes systemic and widespread.

This pressure is starting now with the beginnings of a rollover in demand and supply of oil. OPEC is apparently pumping at full capacity and world supply at around 82 million barrels a day is only just keeping up with growing demand as the Chinese and Indian economies are coming on line. Even without a global peak in oil production demand rollover will inevitably push the price of oil up. If this price rise fails to stimulate further oil discoveries, and new oil finds peaked in the 60's and have been falling ever since, then peak is inevitable as we draw down on our globe's finite oil reserves. US Vice President Dick Cheney recognised this coming crisis in 1999 as chairman of Halliburton. President Bush was warned about it during his 2000 election campaign. Industry experts in Australia and Britain have been testifying to parliamentary commissions on the problem since the late 90's. Our current leaders are fully aware of the situation and are going to extremes to prepare us for this energy transition.

Unfortunately for our economically and environmentally vulnerable nation this preparation does not generally involve any sort of public recognition of an emerging, historically unprecedented energy crisis nor any international agreement for cooperation on a more orderly global transition, if such is possible, to alternative and sustainable forms of energy. The Europeans, apart from Britain, seem to be further ahead in terms of their political response to energy and climate concerns. There is also generally a much more open public debate in the media, and the European Parliaments are entering that debate. Here in Australia we have one of the most heavily monopolised mass media industries in the entire OECD and peak oil is barely mentioned although the ABC and SBS are starting to respond to the message. While the federal parliamentary debate is almost entirely silent the Deputy Prime Minister John Anderson has acknowledged the problem in passing, the Greens have also made some comments and WA State Minister for Planning and Infrastructure Alanah MacTiernan fully recognises the emerging energy problem with the state government spending billions to address it. In hindsight, Western Australia has a 30 year head start on dealing with global warming and its associated problems, it is currently the most vulnerable community of the most vulnerable peoples on earth.

As a nation however we have gone in the entirely opposite direction. There is no chance the current federal government will support an international depletion protocol such as Upsalla, it refuses to even acknowledge a problem and has decided instead to embark on the antithesis of internationalism by participating in an illegal war of conquest in the Middle East. According to former Liberal Party president John Valder our current Prime Minister John Howard should be tried as a war criminal. Technically speaking the Iraq war does seem to be a supreme crime of aggression, the same crime that led to the executions of what was left of the Nazi hierarchy and to the founding of the UN charter. It's the supreme crime because it includes all other crimes committed by states that illegally invade sovereign nations including in the case of Iraq: The mass murder of over 10 000 innocents, violations of the Geneva conventions, the destruction of infrastructure like sewerage and electricity which leads to more civilian deaths, primarily children, and non-military detainees subjected to torture that has included the rape of children.

Australian troops have been largely kept out of the insurgency so far but are there in a support role. We are a leading member of the Coalition of the Willing, our SAS may even have preempted the Bush ultimatum and initiated the war. As a nation we are complicit in everything that has happened in Iraq from the moment the war started through to the Fallujah assault, the Abu Ghraib atrocities and the assault on the holy city of Najaf, in every death and torment suffered by Iraqi's under an illegal occupation. Legally speaking that is, at least potentially if it ever got a hearing under international law. But that's one of the main consequences of the conquest of Iraq, the US National Security Strategy or 'Bush Doctrine' has redefined international law by usurping it and the UN. We are already operating under nationalist law defined by the most powerful nation on earth where the notion of preemptive or rather 'preventive' war means that wars of conquest are now 'justified' by those with the power to do so. It's a new world order and a new definition of justice that is essentially the same as the order Hitler enforced on Poland leading to Britain's declaration of WW2.

The advocates of this neoconservative new world order are openly lobbying for a religious crusade or clash of civilisations in the Middle East. These totalitarian extremists at the highest levels of the Bush administration are highly educated, philosophically informed ideologues who see war as human nature, the US as a 'warrior society', and power as the highest value and truth. They are now openly advocating a war with Iran following the doctrine of 'creative destruction' which calls for a Middle East conflagration fed by a military draft and the total mobilisation of the US peoples in an open ended global total war on 'terror' that will not end in our lifetimes. The 911 attacks were apparently a marvelous opportunity, a 'new Pearl Harbor' predicted in advance, allowing for a new order with the Patriot Act setting up an extreme version of Nixon's police state and opening the door to a totalitarian takeover on the domestic front as well as the conquest of the Persian Gulf.

Their principal enemy seems to be China as it represents the greatest long term economic threat to US hegemony and they openly debate the problems of sustaining an Imperial US dominance of the world in both economic and military terms over the next 100 years. Central to that concern is securing the Middle Eastern oil fields before the coming energy crisis deflates the US dollar and their domestic economy collapses taking the global stock markets and banking with it. If you take the neocon extremists at their word the end game for the current US administration would more or less be the securing of the entire Persian Gulf oil supply through a bloody military occupation lasting decades. A wider energy war beyond the Middle East is most probably inevitable, it's just a matter of when. With peak oil imminent, demand rollover starting and the global economy on a knife edge there seems to be no hope whatsoever for an internationalist approach to either the pending collapse of our current civilisation or catastrophic global warming so long as Bush and his neoconservative extremists, and their coalition of willing quislings, remain in power.

In the coming energy/wealth decline there will be increasing pressure to concentrate the remaining wealth in the industrial and military sectors that need it most, at the expense of everyone else and their democratic and human rights. The US already seems to be going this way as the presidency isolates itself even further from congressional oversight and Bush starts to rule by decree. At the same time there is a gigantic flight of US federal funds into the corporate and military sectors and an even larger tax break for the wealthy. Following a global economic collapse this plutocratic rule will probably turn into a free for all, the worst case scenario being a form of globalised capitalist totalitarian feudalism some time after 2010. With the rise of totalitarianism there follows the total mobilisation of a nation's human and material resources in a total war of annihilation against all competitors. That is the logic of modernity and its great power games, our historical precedent is the rise of Nazism and the slaughter of WW2. The coming world war, however, will be fought with tactical nuclear weapons against non-nuclear or weak nuclear opponents, and one might hope that this limited nuclear warfare would not trigger a much more dangerous nuclear showdown between any number of major nuclear powers. Once unleashed, nuclear escalation may take on a life of its own as that is the very nature of total war, its proponents are ultimately driven to take total chances resulting in either total success or annihilation.

Now while a decline in the consumption of oil will certainly help lessen the impact of global warming, the ongoing and future energy wars along with the collapse of our international institutions will do nothing to ameliorate the suffering of those of us exposed to the ravages of poverty, war, famine and pestilence now and in the decades ahead. Even worse, the intense short term competition for resources to feed any military and industrial war effort will most probably lead to the unrestrained use of coal for the generation of electricity and liquid fuels with no thought given to the long term consequences for climate change. Peak oil could quite possibly unleash a perfect economic and military storm leading to the extinction of the human species through either a nuclear apocalypse or runaway global warming. The latter possibility could result in a mass extinction event, within the next 100 years, as large as the late Permian extinction some 250 million years ago that wiped out 90-95% of all species on earth. How we respond to peak oil now may well decide the course of planetary evolution.

There is no political solution as such that can maintain our current growth based oil civilisation through the coming energy decline but politics will still play its part with federal, state and local reactions to that energy decline as it happens. The localisation of our food production, travel, work and manufacturing as vehicle use declines will also mean a localisation of our politics, and at its most fundamental level 'politics' means making peace with your immediate neighbours and joining together as a local community to share resources and skills in a barter economy. Its most basic unit is one's own extended family which is how pre-conquest Australian Aboriginal societies operated. We will need to relearn how to live with one another rather than have our political order instituted from above, and only a popular grass roots movement can change our nation's current suicidal course away from unilateral war towards international cooperation.

We need to stop our involvement in the oil war in Iraq and start publicly discussing some of the gigantic problems facing us starting with the imminent energy depletion, amidst global warming and a mass extinction, that is driving the lone US super power into blundering around like a dry drunk terrorizing Arabs. In the best of all possible worlds the US would turn towards true internationalism and lead the nations of the world by example in supporting a UN ban on all war and putting into action an agreement on an international depletion protocol integrated with a revised Kyoto protocol that addresses population growth. Unfortunately, as a plague species we are not in control of the biosphere, we are not in control of our technology, nor are we in control of our social and economic systems, our political processes, and we are most definitely not in control of our selves. Technological modernity is a historical juggernaut and our leaders are driving us all at full speed into the brick wall of energy depletion with their eyes wide open. Today, genocidal world war appears to be the dominant political solution being put forward by our leadership to address these myriad interrelated problems.

For those of you who plan to vote Liberal in the upcoming federal election I would hope you think twice before casting your lot with someone implicated in a supreme crime of aggression and the mass murder of thousands of innocents. For the others, if Labor wins all that will happen is that an alleged war criminal leaves office and his successor steps up ready to kiss the US President's ring or face his wrath. For those of you who choose not to vote you will effectively be voting for Howard the "arse licker", which is of course a perfectly reasonable use of your democratic right to not vote, and what real difference would it make anyway?

Whatever happens in the political realm, evolution is tenacious, life on this planet is incredibly adaptive and one of its most tenacious species is Homo sapiens. Never underestimate the capacity of the human animal to adapt to change and learn from its history, nor should we underestimate our capacity for stupidity and ignorance, the future is as always an open question.

I couldn't agree with you more. I was saying a similar thing months ago but stopped posting on here after receiving torrents of verbal abuse by people saying I was duped by corporate propaganda. The funny thing is it's the corporations who are keeping the oil peak a secret. At the last Global Oil Peak conference in Berlin, this year there were only two Americans there. Even Exxon Mobile's website has one sentence which says "We maybe facing a few challenges by 2010". Translation, an oil peak.

Funny that. Sites like http://www.oil.com are constantly full of badly written and conspiratorial sounding letters and articles supporting Peak Oil and putting down sustainable energy.

BTW... You don't happen to know anything about Leons dissapearance by any chance now do you? Hmmm?

In the pathetic tradition of internet cranks with fetishes for densely worded nonsense such as Joseph Weintraub, come on down "Strangelove". This article is an equally pathetic collection of quips, half truths, piss poor research stirred vigorously in the deluded imagination of a scared adolescent, with gaps of logic big enough to drive a B- double through. Permian style extinctions?!?! What a load of unscientific anecdotal bullshit. The world is nigh and you heard it first on melb indy on a Sunday evening. Let the pointless squabble commence - up the arse

What about them fuckin titanium & ceramic solar cell jobbies? They separate the hydrogen and oxygen components in water. From one litre of water they generate a hydrogen energy equivalent to 500 litres of petrol. By-products of hydrogen combustion process are hydrogen and oxygen and that = what ???? H2fuckin0 mate. Only problem is that you need 10% efficiency for economic viability but then prototype models are already gettin 15%. With existing technology one litre of water can already produce the energy equivalent of 75 litres of petrol. "What the fuck does that mean?" I hear you say, well think of a house with all the mod cons being run for three months with nothing but the sun and a litre of water as a source of power and nothing but water as a waste product. Oil is already redundant. Bring on the peak I say. Now that the price of oil is burning a hole in peoples dates all that "uneconomic" technology like this solar hydrogen cell that was patented in '72 is gettin pulled off the shelf and gettin a bit of a dustin off by the boffins.

The V8 is back you fuckin pooftahs. Metaphorically speaking.

From a cultural perspective I'm looking forward to the peak. Back in the early 70's, people in the UK were cold and bored due to OPEC restrictions.

The young folk, now bored shitless of being hippys, then started entertaining themselves by dressing up and dancing around in jumpsuits, platform booties and sequins.

GLAM was born. Then later on events got even more fucked up and PUNK was born. Fuck Idol, bring it on!!!!

"This article is an equally pathetic collection of quips, half truths, piss poor research stirred vigorously in the deluded imagination of a scared adolescent, with gaps of logic big enough to drive a B- double through".

If anyone can manage any well reasoned criticism of any point I have brought up in the above article it would be appreciated, I think we need to discuss these problems openly and without troll bait or adolescent insults.

"Permian style extinctions?!?! What a load of unscientific anecdotal bullshit".

One possible mechanism for the late Permian mass extinction is a release of methane from ocean floor clathrates due to global warming. It is also considered possible that if we trigger runaway global warming something similar could happen.

"What about them fuckin titanium & ceramic solar cell jobbies?"

Yes, the process sounds interesting doesn't it? I imagine humanity's technological prowess will come up with some very novel approaches to the problem of energy decline and the sooner our national wealth is diverted into developing sustainable and renewable energy sources the better. The trouble is that the scale of this transition is global and historically unprecedented in its urgency.

Once energy decline sets in our national wealth will decline with it. If what's left is diverted into war then how do we initiate an international transition towards sustainable energies across all economic activities that would dwarf the Manhattan Project many times over? Having prototypes available or on the drawing board is one thing, implementing them is another. Peak oil is a wake up call for us to stop warring and start moving towards sustainable economies around the globe. Some peak estimates put it between 2005-2008 and I think nothing will be done until the SHTF.

"From a cultural perspective I'm looking forward to the peak".

Same here, if it happens it happens and there's not much I can do about it and if I'm to live in interesting times then so be it. Historical disruptions like the one that seems to be emerging are usually a creative time for artists. If your favourite pastime is being a fat couch potato on the other hand you might not like it too much at all.

So you think 'sustainable energy' will save the day. Which one? Which is NOT made with oil/coal/gas?

There's not ONE solar panel, not ONE wind turbine, not ONE hydro dam that wasn't built without 100% fossil fuel input.

And if you think hydrogen and ethanol will save us, you'd better think again as NEITHER are energy sources, but rather energy carriers (I'd argue ethano is an energy SINK).

It takes the energy equivalent of 1.7 litres of petrol to make 1 litre of ethanol.

It also takes more energy to create hydrogen than is in the hydrogen. There are no hydrogen wells/mines.

Imagine how far cave men would have got if before discovering fire they had to make their own wood.......

So four very 'anti' posts all within one hour on a sunday night, under 4 diff non de plumes - i smell troll.

Wake up folks, oil depletion is real and no techno wet dream is going to make it all okay. There is obvious potential in many alternative energy sources (concur that hydrogen isn't an energy source, possibly neither are ethanol & biodiesel). But we haven't got the latitude to just go 'yeah, invest in them all', we've got to work out which ones actually provide +ve net energy, more energy than they cost. Science might be boring, but if you want to save your arse, better learn some.

That the stupid will die first will be a small consolation for the end of push-button civilisation.
I'm gonna miss plastics the most.. what'll you miss?

I like the light relief from Guido: "From one litre of water they generate a hydrogen energy equivalent to 500 litres of petrol." ha ha ha, ha ha ha, ha ha h ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. And a free Landcruiser to boot!! ha ha ha ha

So you want to know how far off the pace you peak oil scaremongers and paranoiacs are? You think I was joking about the energy equivalent of 500 litres of petrol in a litre of water Liam?

Joke's on you suckers. Still don't believe me?

Take it up with Professor Chris Sorrell, University of New South Wales' Centre for Materials and Energy Conversion.

http://www.unsw.edu.au/news/adv/articles/2004/aug/Solar_hydrogen.html

But don't let me get in your way Chicken Littles. Panic freely.

Like everyone in Oz, Guido, i saw the blanket news coverage of the UNSW research promising 'jam tomorrow', but your amazing reading skills see what ain't even there.

Can you direct me to WHERE in the press release it sez they get "equivalent of 500L petrol from 1L h2o"?

It doesn't say that cos it is physically impossible. "Hydrogen stores approximately 2.6 times the energy per unit mass as gasoline, but needs about 4 times the volume. "
http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/hydrogen.html
Thats a ratio of 4L petrol equivalent to 1L h2o Guido, so you're only out by a factor of 125. Have a nice day.

Pr's Nowotny & Sorrell haven't even published on this breakthru yet, and estimate they 'can deliver a new material within seven years'. Thats not even 7 yrs till retail, thats 7 yrs till they actually make the stuff on any reasonable scale.

I'm sure they've done lots of great work, but they're not magicians, nor do they claim to be. Shame Guido and other pollyannas are misrepresenting their research, but then fear makes ppl do ugly things.

my shame, completely screwed remedial calc above.. Guido still way out, but..

I quoted: " "Hydrogen stores approximately 2.6 times the energy per unit mass as gasoline, but needs about 4 times the volume. "
http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/hydrogen.html

Since litre a volume measurement, thats 1 litre H2 = 2.6/4 = 0.65L petrol equivalent.

So Guido, you're even further out (factor of 769).
Perils of making it up, eh?

lj,

guess in your hurried calculations you also failed to spot this important snippet:

"Rooftop panels placed on 1.6 million houses, for example, could supply Australia's entire energy needs."

This internet connection is one of the few true luxury this household has. No lardy arse counch potatoes here.

Nor are we gun packing survivalists or doomsayers or anti child or anti car. We are people who realise the the vast majority of modern life is tat.

The hysterically funny fact is that techno nerds heralding Peak Oil won't survive whats coming. Society will self destruct in ways we haven't seen for decades possibly centuries. Doomsayers such as yourself will be first up against the wall when frightened people go looking for scapegoats.

Witch trials anyone?

You peak oilers should not hide yr light under a bushell and sign yr articles. At least Liam J is fearless enough to admit being a fissured ceramic on this burning issue of the day :)

I like this line ..."...highly educated, philosophically informed ideologues..."

That might give you the impression they are clever but and maybe the sum is greater than the parts but what parts exactly?

The pretzeldent, Alfred E Neumann?

Lon Cheney- the wolfman from Wyoming who has been wrong on most important issues over the last 40 years.

Wolfowitz - the brains of the outfit in the Pentagon turns out to be a bigger conspiracist nut job with Saddams terrorists than even Al Haig with the Soviet terrorists.

Rumsfeld orders Abu Graib and the Ilegal invasion of Iraq and many and varied war crimes. An idiot and a criminal.

People like Feith, Ledeen, Perle all criminal idiots and openly fascist.

Condi Rice - a Xtian nutcase who cant open her mouth without lying through her teeth.

Colin Powell- a ' house nigger' for window dressing like Condi. A Whore's mouth and slaves body for team bush.

The whole right wing echo chamber- the moronic inferno.

This is the philosphy of the big lie, full blown fascism and ' end times' biblical theory. Faith based fascism.

It aint highly educated at all - its all highly ideological.

Much like this waste of time ' article'

Sign yr crap or sign off please all you anonymous peak moon loons.

" When yr a sect your a sect all the way from yr first eschatological theory to yr last dying day prediction..."

Winds of Change:

Troubled Waters Ahead For the Neo Cons

by
Wayne Madsen

[The Bush-Cheney campaign is racing toward November. But it isn't only running toward the raw power it loves. It's running away from the punishment it fears. In this late-breaking story, FTW's Wayne Madsen maps out the lines of force in the current Plame and Chalabi scandals, showing them to be nodes of interpersonal influence and compromise that may soon crack the administration in half. The neocons' dark alliance with the right wing of Israeli politics has brought them enormous power. But it's unstable power, vulnerable to legal sanction and due process at the right pressure points. As Watergate proved decades ago, even a dying legal infrastructure can still throw a few jabs once in a while - if the CIA wants it to. --JAH]

August 11, 2004 0800 PDT (FTW) - The winds that have favored the neo-cons and their political and financial masters since George W. Bush's ascension to power may now be turning against them at gale force strength. There is a reason why Richard Perle and his American Enterprise Institute (AEI) friends, including "Second Lady" Lynne Cheney and former Reagan National Security Council staffer Michael Ledeen, were uncomfortable when Iraq con man and Iraqi Governing Council member Ahmed Chalabi's offices in Baghdad were raided this past May by Iraqi police, FBI and CIA officers. The Baghdad money trail may soon lead to Washington, DC. The sinewy links between the neo-cons, Ariel Sharon's Likud government, and the Chalabis should be a definite cause for concern by some Bush administration officials, and particularly troubling for Mrs. Cheney, who reportedly sits upon a $125,000 AEI fellowship funded by Likud Party interests.

The Chalabi files recovered by U.S. intelligence and law enforcement provided enough information for the FBI to begin a criminal investigation of a Baghdad-Jerusalem-Washington syndicate that is profiteering from America's misguided invasion and occupation of Iraq. The investigation led to shadowy Israeli-owned firms registered in Delaware and Panama that were fraudulently obtaining contracts and sub-contracts to provide everything from cellular phones and VIP security to the interrogation of Iraqi prisoners using seconded members of Israel's feared Unit 1391 "special techniques" interrogation center. Not only were these firms operating in Iraq with the concurrence of the neo-cons in the Pentagon but some U.S. government officials were personally benefiting from the contracts.

Peeling apart the Chalabi files demonstrated that the neo-con agenda for Iraq extended far beyond political ideology, into a realm where law enforcement can be most effective: fraud.

According to Pentagon and Justice Department sources, U.S. investigators discovered that Ahmad Chalabi and his business partners were involved in fraudulently obtaining cellular phone licenses in Iraq. The Pentagon's Undersecretary of Defense for International Technology Security John (Jack) Shaw smelled a neo-con rat when the Iraqi Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), in late 2003, awarded cellular phone contracts to three companies - Orascom, Atheer, and Asia-Cell - with ties to Ahmed Chalabi. As with all those who challenge the impropriety and illegal activities of the neo-cons, Shaw was, in turn, charged with improperly steering Iraq cell phone contracts to Qualcomm and Lucent. However, it is Shaw, reported by his longtime colleagues to be a solid and trustworthy public servant, who has the confidence of law enforcement, Pentagon investigators, and the military brass. Anything with Ahmed Chalabi's fingerprints on it also bears the fingerprints of his nephew Salem Chalabi. Salem, named as the chief prosecutor in Saddam Hussein's trial, is a law partner of L. Marc Zell, a Jerusalem-based attorney who was the law partner of Douglas Feith - the head of the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans that concocted phony intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and ties to Al Qaeda with the assistance of Likud operatives seconded by Ariel Sharon's government.

The law firm of Feith & Zell, in concert with Perle, was instrumental in funneling hundreds of millions of dollars from Arab and Muslim countries to the Bosnian government during that nation's civil war. While that effort was ostensibly designed to assist the Bosnians to purchase weapons, officials familiar with its actual operation reported that some of the arms and money "spilled over" to Al Qaeda and Iranian Pasdaran forces in the Balkans.

The neo-con attack on Shaw was predictable considering their previous attacks on Ambassador Joe Wilson, his wife Valerie Plame, former U.S. Central Command chief General Anthony Zinni, former counter-terrorism coordinator Richard Clarke, former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, CIA counter-terrorism agent Michael Scheuer (the "anonymous" author of Imperial Hubris who has recently been gagged by the Bush administration), fired FBI translator Sibel Edmonds (who likely discovered a penetration by Israeli and other intelligence assets using the false flag of the Turkish American Council and who also has been gagged by the Bush administration), and all those who took on the global domination cabal. But Shaw showed incredible moxie. When he decided to investigate Pentagon Inspector General Reports that firms tied to Perle and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz were benefiting from windfall profit contracts in Iraq, Shaw decided to go to Iraq himself to find out what was going on. When Shaw was denied entry into Iraq by U.S. military officers (yes, a top level official of the Defense Department was denied access to Iraq by U.S. military personnel!), he decided to sneak into the country disguised as a Halliburton contractor. Using the cover of Cheney's old company to get the goods on Cheney's friends' illegal activities was yet another masterful stroke of genius by Shaw. But it also earned him the wrath of the neo-cons. They soon leaked a story to the Los Angeles Times claiming that Shaw actually snuck into Iraq to ensure that Qualcomm (on whose board sat a friend of Shaw's) was awarded a lucrative cell network contract.

But nothing could be further from the truth. Shaw, who worked for Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, represented the Old Guard Republican entity that in August 2003 set up shop in the Pentagon right under the noses of Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Feith to investigate the neo-con cabal and their illegal contract deals. The entity, known as the International Armament and Technology Trade Directorate, was soon shut down as a result of neo-con pressure. Not to be deterred, Shaw continued his investigation of the neo-cons. Although the neo-cons told the Los Angeles Times that the FBI was investigating Shaw, the reverse was the case: the FBI was investigating the neo-cons, particularly Perle and Wolfowitz, for fraudulent activities involving Iraqi contracts. And in worse news for the neo-cons: Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was giving the Inspector General's and Shaw's investigations a "wink and a nod" of approval.

The financial stakes for the Pentagon are high - the Iraqi CPA's Inspector General recently revealed that over $1 billion of Iraqi money was missing from the audit books on Iraqi contracts. For Shaw and the FBI, it was a matter of what they suspected for many years - that Perle, Wolfowitz, and their comrades were running entities that ensured favorable treatment for Israeli activities - whether they were business opportunities in a U.S.-occupied Arab country or protecting Israeli spies operating within the U.S. defense and intelligence establishments.

Shaw certainly must have recalled how, during the Reagan administration, an Israeli spy named Jonathan Pollard was able to steal massive amounts of sensitive U.S. intelligence over a long period of time and hand it over to his Israeli control officer, a dangerous and deadly agent provocateur named Rafael "Rafi" Eitan. That had disastrous effects on U.S. intelligence operations throughout the world because some of the documents were handed by the Israelis to the Soviets in return for letting more Soviet Jews emigrate to Israel.

Shaw must have also recalled that when a young National Security Council staffer named Douglas Feith was suspected of being an Israeli agent of influence, he was stripped of his job and security clearance by then- National Security Adviser Bill Clark but soon managed to find another job (and another top level clearance) under then Deputy Defense Secretary Richard Perle.

And it was certainly known that during Pollard's subsequent appeal of his life sentence for spying for Israel, one of his attorneys was none other than right-wing stalwart and neo-con friend, Ted Olsen, the former Solicitor General of the United States under Ashcroft and the person in charge of all U.S. attorneys. It was from Olsen's cadre of U.S. Attorneys that special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald was selected to investigate the Valerie Plame / Brewster, Jennings White House leak to the media and perhaps other high crimes by neo-con officials of the Bush administration.

Fitzgerald continues to expand his case against the leakers of Plame's identity. But he may be getting more than he originally bargained for. As his investigation expanded into the bowels of the Pentagon, he was bound to discover that the treachery of the neo-cons was not merely confined to the leaking of the name of a covert CIA officer - disastrous in itself - but coupled with other activities that call into question the loyalties and financial dealings of those who swore an oath to the U.S. Constitution.

With Ashcroft's deputy, James Comey, the person who appointed Fitzgerald, finding himself increasingly frozen out of Ashcroft's inner sanctum deliberations, it is clear that the neo-cons are worried about what Fitzgerald is discovering and how far his investigation will go. Also unusual was the fact that as Fitzgerald's case began to gain steam - with George W. Bush and Dick Cheney both retaining criminal defense attorneys - FBI Director Robert Mueller suddenly transferred the lead FBI agent on the Plame case, John C. Eckenrode, a well-seasoned 29-year veteran of the bureau, to head up the FBI's Philadelphia office. An FBI spokesman in Philadelphia said that such sudden transfers, in the middle of major investigations, sometimes, just "happen."

Make no mistake about it: the violation of the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982 by the disclosure of Plame's identity and that of her non-official cover corporate umbrella organization (Brewster, Jennings & Associates) along with its official counterpart, the CIA's Nonproliferation Center - had a disastrous impact on the ability of the United States to track the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction around the world. At least one anonymous star (representing a covert U.S. agent killed while working abroad) placed on the CIA's Wall of Honor during the past year was reportedly a direct result of the disastrous disclosures from Cheney's office. The political vendettas of the neo-cons in exposing Plame's dangerous work and retaliating against Wilson's revelations about Bush's use of bogus intelligence regarding a fanciful Iraqi uranium shopping spree in Niger ensured that America's military-intelligence complex was going to seek a final accounting with the neo-cons. And a final accounting they are getting, in spades.

Adding insult to injury, neither the CIA nor FBI were happy that Israeli spies operating under the cover of Israeli "art students' and moving van operators, and who were picked up by federal agents and local "first responder" law enforcement officers before and after 911, were quickly deported by immigration officers before they could be fully interrogated. The penetration of FBI and other federal law enforcement data networks and databases by Israeli software and telecommunications companies working under U.S. government contracts has also left a bitter taste in the mouths of federal law enforcement and intelligence personnel.

So now, it is payback time. The recent arrest warrants issued by the Iraqi government for Ahmed and Salem Chalabi (Ahmed's for counterfeiting Iraqi dinars and Salem's for murdering an Iraqi Finance Ministry official) indicates that Shaw's instincts about the fraud engaged in by them and their neo-con friends in the Pentagon were right on the money. Let us ponder that news again: the lead prosecutor against Saddam Hussein murders an official of the Iraqi Finance Ministry - an individual that just may have known something about what happened to $1 billion in missing Iraqi revenues. The accused is a partner of an Israeli-U.S. lawyer who is a close colleague of leading neo-cons in the Pentagon (some of whom are also dual U.S.-Israeli citizens) and the nephew of a man who was supported bureaucratically by a former CIA Director (James Woolsey), financially by hundreds of millions of dollars from the budget of the Defense Intelligence Agency, and politically by a think tank (AEI) that includes the wife of the Vice President of the United States. Uncle Ahmed was also a personal guest of George W. and Laura Bush in the VIP box at the 2004 State of the Union address. The President and First Lady welcomed a person who now is now an accused criminal to America's State of the Union address, a person whose nephew is now an accused murderer! John Le Carre could not have come up with a better international thriller scenario. ETC...

http://sydney.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=46001&group=webcast

The problem with jumping off conclusions Liam is that you can never be quite sure how far you will fall. The figure I quoted is straight from the Professors mouth not the media release. I heard him in an interview on Bush Telegraph (Radio National 30-8-04). Unfortunately the interview is not available on transcript but if you wish to argue the figures and physics equation I quoted take it up with the good Prof (not to confused with the deranged one round here). They already have prototypes, what they are looking for is financial backing and partnerships to further develop, refine and mass produce the cells which could be widely available in 7 years.

This process allows hydrogen to be produced anywhere. No need for dramatic infrastructure like the oil industry. The change-over to clean energy is coming so there's no need to panic about oil running out. Do you really believe the world has over looked the possibility of our primary energy source running out? Alternative energy sources have always been available, the determining factors on transition were always about cost efficiency and vested interest.

http://www.cea.fr/gb/publications/Clefs44/an-clefs44/clefs4414a.html

http://www.hydrogen.co.uk/h2/offshore_windpower.htm

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/04/14/whyd14.xml&sSheet=/news/2002/04/14/ixworld.html

http://www.parliament.uk/post/pn186.pdf

http://www.monito.com/wankel/hydrogen.html

http://www.hydrogenhighway.ca.gov/facts/faq/faq.htm

The Chicken Little Peak Oil camp are free to indulge in their cargo cult but some of us have real world problems to resolve.

So young Liam, climb back on your recumbant bike or into your silly little 2 cylinder toy car and head for the hills brother. The Raelians will embrace you with open arms.

Australians love big cars. All of our top selling cars are in the large Family class of cars such as as The Holden Commodore and the Ford Falcon.
We are also starting to adopt the American SUV mentality with the incredible popularity of vehicles such as the Australian built Ford Territory and the popular imported Nissan X-trail.

These vehicles continue to sell well despite $0.95+ per litre petrol prices and their dreadful fuel economy of approx 12Litres per 100km's highway driving.

This large car mentality is unsubstainable. As deputy Prime Minister John Anderson said recently, we should be buying cars that suit our needs and not buying cars to impress our neighbours.

That means buying small fuel economic cars for commuting. I drive 40 kilometers to work everyday (I would like to catch public transport but it is not convient, (sad but true)). I drive a new small two door 1.4 litre four cylinder car that produces 66kw of power. The car was under $15,000 is well tuned and I use 5Litres per 100kms.

Everyday I drive beside people who drive large $40,000 cars at the same speed and the driver being the single occupant. Economically these people would be better off purchasing a small commuter car like mine and hiring a rental car five times a year when they would actually need all the extra room capacity they provide.

But they wont.

So what will happen? Car makers will react to increased fuel costs and start manufacturing hybrid drivetrains to power cars. A mixture of electric and petrol fuel (such as used in the Toyota Prius). They will put them in the large cars such as the Falcon, the Territory and the Commodore. This will give the fuel economy of a four cylinder car but still maintain size and power.
Small four cylinder cars like mine of the future will also adopt the same technology and they will be super economical. A brave state Government will adopt stringent anti polution laws amongst a raft of other anti old technology laws. Conventional 4WDs will have to pay a levy if they are registered within 50kms of the CBD, rebates will be given to cars owners who purchase new fuel vehicles such as hydrogen powered cars or hybrids using natural gas and electricity.

Sure a lot of work has to be done especially the obsession we as a society have with vehicles as a status symbol rather than as a means of transport. I mean we have dvd players in cars now god help us.

Just today we had a bus launched in Perth that runs on Hydrogen.
http://www.dpi.wa.gov.au/fuelcells/index.html
However what I couldn't find just now was the article I read saying that the bus would use 18kgs of Hydrogen per 100km. Hydrogen costs $21 per kg. But shit my first mobile phone which was contained in a briefcase cost me over $2,000 in 1992 and calls cost over $2.00 per minute.

"The Chicken Little Peak Oil camp are free to indulge in their cargo cult but some of us have real world problems to resolve."

I don't think anyone is disputing that we need alternative and truly sustainable energy sources and that science has been working on the problem for some time. The problem is one of funding priorities at the moment which is partly why these projects are being marketed in the mass media now, the possibility of an emerging energy problem is opening up a window of opportunity for such funding. The WA government for instance is already planning on experimenting with hydrogen fuel cell tech in public bus transport. Unfortunately at the same time the Howard government has shifted its focus onto oil exploration at the expense of alternatives.

Once your real world problems include paying $3 or more per litre to fill your petrol tank, a cost which flows on to public transport, airfares and transported goods, then perhaps you might become one of those 'peak oil cargo cultists'. Peak oil is a possibility worth considering now if for no other reason than that it helps to support the hydrogen alternatives you yourself seem to support. If this possibility comes to pass in the next 4 years then all the better if we prepare for it now. If peak is still 15 years off then we still need to start the massive infrastructure transition it will force on us anyway, and if we start now we will be even better prepared.

With all this reactionary angst against even mentioning it in public on an apparently 'alternative' public forum like Indymedia I very much doubt anything of real consequence will be done in the mainstream society until the major oil shocks begin. The economic and military shocks that are likely to follow will only make the problem worse of course.

"Rooftop panels placed on 1.6 million houses, for example, could supply Australia's entire energy needs."

This is an excellent proposition although it remains simply a proposition. I don't see how anyone could be against it either, peak oil or not, but the majority of Australia's energy needs are currently fed by oil, gas and coal, and their industry backers are extremely resistant to change. If this titanium ceramic hydrogen tech proves to be viable and energy efficient across its entire production then we may indeed see a massive transition towards it sometime in the future but that transition will be very expensive and most probably be forced on us at a time of economic and geopolitical chaos.

"So you think 'sustainable energy' will save the day. Which one? Which is NOT made with oil/coal/gas?"

And this is our problem. Our globalised economy runs on these hydrocarbon fuels, any transition away from them will require the investment of large amounts of hydrocarbons in the industries that will set the new infrastructure in place. Part of the urgency of peak oil is the simple fact that as we enter an energy decline our national wealth and industrial capacity declines with it, wealth that will be needed to invest in the new alternative industries. If peak oil doesn't occur for another 15 years we still need to transition to these alternatives as soon as possible to avoid catastrophic global warming by mid century but as Kyoto shows, all these longer term problems get buried under the politics of consumerism. If peak occurs next year, which is possible, at least the shock of it will make some impact just as it did in the early 80's. If enough people understand its implications, that we will not return to cheap oil but are entering a plateau followed by a terminal decline in supply, then perhaps an informed public debate might force our politicians to actually do something sane for once.

"The hysterically funny fact is that techno nerds heralding Peak Oil won't survive whats coming. Society will self destruct in ways we haven't seen for decades possibly centuries. Doomsayers such as yourself will be first up against the wall when frightened people go looking for scapegoats."

So you are not then a doomsaying peak oil nerd predicting the self destruction of society? You seem to be contradicting yourself but I certainly didn't mean to suggest you're a couch potato, I agree the cultural disruption will be interesting and perhaps we can share a last cigarette when they line us both up against the wall.

"I like this line ...'...highly educated, philosophically informed ideologues...' That might give you the impression they are clever ... It aint highly educated at all - its all highly ideological".

No, actually the neocons have a lot of doctorates amongst them and they are influenced by philosophers like Leo Strauss whose own influences include the Nazi philosopher Heidegger as well as Nietzsche. I agree that education does not necessarily equate with 'cleverness' but I would say the neocons are definitely cunning and their ideology is based on a philosophy of power. But you seem to be agreeing with me here anyways so what's your problem?

"Sign yr crap or sign off please all you anonymous peak moon loons."

As far as I'm aware Indymedia was set up by good people like the late Predator as an anonymous platform for anti-globalisation activists. Most sites don't even record the IP addresses to maintain the anonymity of posts in order to avoid police scrutiny. Recently a US Indymedia was ordered to provide these logs which they fortunately didn't keep. So why are you insisting on knowing peoples identities here 'pr'? Perhaps you would like to either provide your full name, address and phone number or sign off yourself?

>>>...But you seem to be agreeing with me here anyways so what's your problem? ...<<<

My problem with single issue articles like this is that they're off putting in at least two ways. Your talking down to us , patronizing us and then some of your blanket assertions ring really hollow. To clever by half and much more like a sermon than any meaningful essay.
( I'm spoiled a bit, I must admit, growing up with Orwell's collected essays.)

You want to retain anonymity while condescending to us as some sort of 'expert' know it all on this single issue that is supposed to over ride all others somehow?

Well your welcome to try and push any line you want here anyway you want but you don't impress me mate.

All this could be cut and pasted from Lyndon la Rouche for all we know.

And why am I insisting on knowing peoples identities?

>>>...Perhaps you would like to either provide your full name, address and phone number or sign off yourself?

I asked you first sport, not insisted which is not something I am capable of, not being like pre-crime police officer Nic Conte.

My details ( proffr@fuckmicrosoft.com )have been published online so I stand behind my words while you hide behind some ridiculous pseudonym publishing the least controversial blancmange imaginable. Your a waste of time and space and thats all I want to tell you to yr face.

You smug supercillious spammers make me sick and ...

'... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, predicting the end of the world has not been found agreeable to experience."

-- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

Better luck with yr next effort - PEAK SPERM?

Apparently pr feels that:

"your talking down to us, patronizing us ... condescending to us as some sort of 'expert'"

How does 'us' feel about this? Do they feel inferior for some reason and why should they? I would like to assure 'us' that my reports are offered, as I said, as a possibility for thinking and debate and are absolutely not intended in any sense whatsoever to be taken as some sort of objective truth. There is a proposition, that peak oil could trigger a gigantic military and economic tempest leading to extinction, followed by my interpretation of that. You can take it or leave it, I don't care either way, and I don't expect pr or anyone to simply accept this at face value. I am offering this interpretation for public debate in order to see what people think and to get some useful feedback.

Pr's critique of my proposition:

"blanket assertions ring really hollow ... the least controversial blancmange imaginable ... a waste of time and space ... smug supercillious spammers make me sick".

There are no substantive arguments here about anything other than troll bait. Why do you bother?

"My details ( proffr@fuckmicrosoft.com ) have been published online"

Heh, yep. You're not going to try any of your assassination thought experiments on me are you Matthew S. Taylor? Is that why you want a handle on my ID?

But whatever, way to go Matt, you seem to have pissed a whole bunch of stiffs off and copped a huge crapload of payback. Who the hell is the La Raza Defense Committee anyway? But after all this crap laid on you, and the IMC in question didn't pin it on you either did they, why on earth are you going on about anonymity on Indymedia? It's a platform set up for anonymous posting of anti-globalisation news and editorials.

"You smug supercillious spammers make me sick"

I have no beef with your previous activism apart from that I wouldn't personally advocate assassinating anyone, I leave that up to the criminal states that support extrajudicial murder like the US and Israel. But you 'smug supercilious' trolls bore me. You have nothing substantive to say about the issues in this thread and all you are doing is trying to pathetically hijack it with flame baits. The trolls on this Indymedia are suffocating debate, you personally are not adding anything to this discussion about the possible imminent collapse of globalisation apart from your own angst and inferiority complex.

Do you have anything to actually say?

thanks Dr for another excellent article and comments. I republished to EnergyBulletin.net

Some notes:

"A wider energy war beyond the Middle East is most probably inevitable, it's just a matter of when"

The US is already setting up new bases in strategic energy areas around the world. Much has been said about the role of oil in the intervention in Sudan

pr - for the record LaRouche is quite opposed to the resource limits arguments, he even wrote a book in 1983 called There Are No Limits to Growth
http://www.larouchepub.com/resume.html

Hip hip hooray, civilization is about to go down as all my GA and prim friends suggested years ago. Whoopty doo!

I'm in a good mood...

Good news for the adult industry. Mike Allen is done, finished, outta here and won't be putting any more innocent people behind bars as he attempted with video store owner Elyse Metcalf and did so with website proprietor Jennifer Dute.

Cincinnati- Three weeks ago, Hamilton County Prosecutor Mike Allen was a rising star among Ohio Republicans, earning a reputation as a tough prosecutor in a populous county.

With his name recognition and political clout, he was seen as a potential candidate for Ohio lieutenant governor in 2006.

Then Allen's former mistress -- assistant prosecutor Rebecca Collins -- handed her boss a complaint, accusing him of sexually harassing her, claims she threatened to make public unless he paid her $3 million to make sure the charges never became public. When he rejected that ultimatum, she filed suit against him in federal court.

Now, with his political career in shambles, Allen won't even be re-elected prosecutor, after he instructed the Board of Elections Monday to take his name off the Nov. 2 ballot. It was a move orchestrated by the upper echelons of the Republican Party, in Hamilton County and at the state level, to force Allen out and clear the way for Ohio Treasurer Joe Deters to move from the controversy of a criminal investigation in which he was ultimately cleared back to the job he once held.

"I love the office," Deters said Monday as he filed as a write-in candidate with four others.

Allen's removal from the ballot meant that only write-in candidates are left.

"(Allen's sex scandal) was beginning to show signs of driving a strong turnout for Democrats," Deters said.

As Deters was at the Board of Elections filling out the necessary paperwork to become a qualified write-in candidate, Allen was holding a press conference to confirm he was asking his name be removed from the ballot.

It was the first time Allen has held a press conference since Aug. 25, when he beat Collins to the punch and announced he had an almost four-year extramarital affair with his female subordinate, which began in December 1999 when she was an intern.

Allen on Monday walked into the room and smiled, seeming relieved after the three-week firestorm of controversy, to announce that he would fulfill the four-year term to which he was elected in 2000, but would not continue after that term expires Jan. 2.

Allen thanked the prosecutor's 200 employees, many of whom were completely and frustratingly aware of Allen's affair with Collins but powerless to do anything about it.

"I must also thank the citizens of Hamilton County, who stood with me through some tough and controversial decisions. Then, as now, my goal was to make the best decision for the good of the entire community.

"(T)his is a most difficult decision, but it is one I feel obligated to make now, in the best interests of Hamilton County and its citizens."

The bigger picture for Deters, though, also helped him decide to literally move back Monday to Hamilton County, to step down as Ohio Treasurer if he wins the election and help Republicans and President George Bush try to seize Ohio, a crucial state in a tight presidential campaign.

"There is a genuine consensus amongst people smarter than I that this could impact the presidential race," Deters said of Allen's sex scandal.

Hamilton County Republican Party sources said that Allen's resignation wasn't the gracious move the prosecutor suggested.

Allen only resigned, two GOP sources said, after high-ranking Ohio Republican Party officials insisted he step aside for fear his scandal would damage Bush's chances. Allen, who was chairman of the Bush-Cheney campaign for southwest Ohio, a position he vacated after his adulterous admissions and Collins' suit, stepped down after telephone conversations with Ohio GOP chair Bob Bennett over the weekend.

MORE ON...

http://www.adultfyi.com/read.aspx?ID=5888

On the question of anonymity, I do support this for those whistleblowers with something substantive and fresh to say. I would have thought that it would be obvious even to a total idiot that most intelligent readers here automatically discount anything said by a pseudo.

99% of pseudonyms are trolling spamming morons.

Your the exception that proves the rule so have a nice rest of yr life. ( wanker )

Dr. Strangelove,
I'd like to site your article in a paper I am writing; however, your credability as well as the potentiol publishing of my papers credability is destroyed without your real name and preferrably your qualifications. Please post them on this site as a reply, or, at minimum e-mail me at Jason@wayne.edu

Thank you.