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03/31/2005 Archived Entry: "When left and right agree"

When opposite ends of the political spectrum begin to say the same things, I start to take notice.

A few weeks ago our friends the Millers sent us this item. The author, Michael Ruppert, appears to be of the left/environmentalist persuasion, so I was astonished to see him devote attention to the housing bubble and the U.S. debt crisis, which I usually see raised by Austrians and libertarians. I disagree with Ruppert's dismissal of the effects of higher oil prices on both production and consumption, but he's echoing what I'm reading elsewhere about world resource demands. (I also enjoyed his description of the problems inherent in putting the Pentagon in charge of intelligence gathering.)

Today I followed a recommendation from Gary North on the LewRockwell.com site, to this interesting blog, The Watchful Investor. I suspect that the author, Jim Waddell, is at least influenced by Austrian economics (I base that suspicion on North's referral and Waddell's inclusion of the Mises institute in his links.) So I was intrigued to see him mention the "Peak Oil" theory that Ruppert dwells so heavily upon. Waddell even includes a link to a Peak Oil web page.

I need to read more about "Peak Oil", but other news stories I've read indicate that production is not keeping up with consumption. The upshot: oil and gasoline prices are going up soon. The US dollar is going down, either slowly or abruptly. Ditto housing prices, at least in the "boom" areas of the U.S.

As for me, I'm trying to figure out how to cut our gasoline consumption in half. —brad