Thom Hartmann’s stated goal in Restart the American dream It is “bringing back a strong middle class and returning America to stability and prosperity without endangering future generations.” You should know better, and I’m sure you do.

Although he never defines the term, Hartmann’s idea of ​​the American dream seems to come straight out of the post-World War II era, a period of unprecedented production, expansion, and consumerism. Almost anyone with any common sense qualified for a job with benefits and a pension; a house on the outskirts; two cars; a color television, and almost every imaginable gimcrack and quirk of her little heart was persuaded to wish.

That era effectively died around 1973, when US oil production peaked. Although the festival of consumerism has lasted another 40 years, it has been financed with financial shenanigans; booms and busts; absolute looting; non-stop wars; and various other diversions like Monica Lewinsky, 9/11, and NASCAR.

There will be no resurrection.

Peak oil, to put it bluntly, calls into question the entire concept of economic growth as we have known it for some 300 years. Hartmann knows. He wrote The last hours of ancient sunlight, back in 1998, so he hardly knows about the phenomenon of Peak Oil, the world’s maximum oil production. It happened in the United States around 1973 and around the world in 2006, according to the International Energy Agency, so from now on and forever, we will be chasing dwindling supplies of oil with our insatiable demand; and we will have to do it in places that are enormously hostile to us. At an oil price of about $ 80 a barrel, economic growth stops and we are already there.

Ronald Reagan, or at least his advisers, knew peak oil and its ultimate implications for a society based on endless growth, fueled by abundant and cheap oil. So did Presidents Bush, Bush, Clinton, and Cheney. Carter certainly knew it, hence his doctrine that declares the Middle East a theater of strategic importance for the United States. From what we know, Nixon also understood peak oil.

The corporate oligarchy and super-rich kleptocrats behind political parties and the presidency have engaged in an orgy of self-aggrandizement, knowing that the petro-industrial train was headed for a brick wall. America’s transition from self-sufficiency to dependence on oil imports is the single most important reason behind the “economic devastation of the 30 years of Reaganomics.” It’s no big secret, except for our deliberately ignorant fellow citizens.

Yet Hartmann seems desperately oblivious to the more obvious implications of peak oil. It doesn’t even have an index entry. Even if it is desirable, which it is not, we will not “regain the industrial base that we have lost.” An American Dream of outrageous energy consumption per person is no longer possible under any circumstances, despite the 11 Hartmann Steps (12 are being taken).

If there was a shred of honesty in the political arena, which there isn’t, they’d tell us to dig in, plant Victory Gardens, relocate as many facets of production (crafts, cottage, and manufacturing) as possible, and virtualize everything. the rest. Hartmann does not convey this message either.

But it is not that their ideas are, per se, bad. Hartmann is a serial entrepreneur, progressive author, and radio host. It has created businesses, it has put people to work, it has created value where there was none. He would like to see an America like the post-WWII he grew up in, made in America by Americans for Americans. He wants to reverse “the ‘free trade / flat earth’ idiocy” of the last 40 years. What Hartmann is not saying is that globalization is already a dinosaur. The 7,000-mile WalMart Pipeline and 3,000-mile Salad are artifacts of an era that is rapidly passing.

The steps suggested by Hartmann are worth taking. But even if they are implemented, there is no chance in Hades of succeeding in restoring the American Dream. I suspect Hartmann agrees.

The nation needs to be saved from the corporate oligarchs … absolutely. We need to educate ourselves and reward initiative and get basic health care for all and abolish the corporate personality (see Hartmann’s excellent book, Uneven protection). But we can’t count on the federal government for any of that. For better or for worse, that bloated and totally intrusive Washington welfare state bureaucracy is another artifact from the bright side of Hubbert’s Peak, where we could always do more of everything because we had the energetic capacity to do it.

No more. We have to do it ourselves.

Do you want to bring jobs home? Stop buying anything made outside of the United States. Period. Buy local; do it yourself or go without it. If you must have an item that is only made overseas, buy a used one so the money stays here. Stop exporting your dollars.

Do you want a healthier society? Stop eating junk and do some physical work. The vast majority of medical problems are related to diet and lifestyle, and the very companies that make you sick benefit from treating the disease.

Want to level the playing field with corporations? Working to amend the Constitution, as Hartmann suggests, and nullify at the state level all unconstitutional acts of the federal government … now there is fertile ground.

Fortunately, we still have the Constitution of the United States, written during and for a time from small, self-sufficient communities and individuals, deeply distrustful of selfish power, whether in the form of the state or the corporation. The Constitution empowers us to regain control of our lives and remain a nation, strong where it matters.

Hartmann wants to do good things, but they won’t get us closer to where he thinks they will; And you want to do it on a scale that is more part of the problem than part of the solution; and I don’t think he relies on the language and vision of the Constitution, or the power of an awakened citizenry, to see us through the dark forest to which we are headed. Too.

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