By Alan Saldanha
Australians have been directed to stagger the domestic consumption of electricity for two hours at night to make up for the drop in coal-fired generating plants that the country is heavily dependent on. Australia's winter is milder than winters in Europe and North America. Even so, turning down the heating is soliciting self-restraint for a society that is not used to making sacrifices. Minor contingencies like these are a result of unrealistic projections in lowering carbon emissions. Such projections are more applicable to countries like China and India that indulge in padding figures for carbon ceilings for three to five decades hence. That in itself is an exercise in futility.
Elsewhere in North America the Biden administration is making conciliatory gestures to Saudi Arabia to increase crude oil output. That may well be an easy task for a country that is ever ready to soften its image by splashing around petrodollars as is being done in the LIV Golf tournament. The U.S. still has oil reserves to last for another hundred years and perhaps the solution at hand is to open up the oil spigots. That is a much more viable short-term solution. Besides, it does not entail contradicting earlier reactions that argue we need to have a moral compass.
The human race is dependent on fossil fuels. Crude oil and natural gas can conveniently tip the balance of power. It can give countries that have an abundance of black gold an upper hand in dealing with nations that are bereft of it or lacking in oil deposits. Oil and natural gas facilitate the financing of war machines. We would not have known this so aptly if it had not been for the conflict that has driven a wedge into our wallets.
People worldwide are hurting. Following the current pathway we will soon see hunger and starvation in some North African countries like Sudan, Eritrea and Somalia, as well as Afghanistan and their neighbors. If the purpose of the exercise was to sow turmoil and catastrophic devastation then the goal is being achieved. Right now, that world is urgently in need of wheat to make flour and bread. Hunger can result in refugees and migration. No one among us will be spared. Diverting asylum seekers to Rwanda may seem an "appalling" step in terms of a violation of liberties, though it may serve to put food on the table for many families. Whereas all this may sound like a knell of doom, we have to ready ourselves for eventualities that are painful.
From the limited options we have to counter this predicament, we have tried everything. We have tried starving the war machine with little or no success. There are far too many players in Europe that are dependent on the main source of oil and natural gas. If not that then it might be that Hungary does not see eye to eye with the others. And in the event that there is an accord on affirmative action to allow new members to enter NATO, it might be that Turkey throws a spanner in the works.
To stay resigned to our fate and stay detached is not the solution. The human race is known for its ingenuity in the direst situations. Somewhere out there is a proposal that might be a workable solution. It may involve calling a bluff. For that we need proficient poker players. It seems a scary prospect to be threatened by nuclear holocaust and cower down. But that may not happen. An empty threat of that magnitude may lack in substance.
Alan Saldanha (daywatchnewspaper@gmail.com) is publisher of Daywatch newspaper in Surrey, British Columbia.
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Elsewhere in North America the Biden administration is making conciliatory gestures to Saudi Arabia to increase crude oil output. That may well be an easy task for a country that is ever ready to soften its image by splashing around petrodollars as is being done in the LIV Golf tournament. The U.S. still has oil reserves to last for another hundred years and perhaps the solution at hand is to open up the oil spigots. That is a much more viable short-term solution. Besides, it does not entail contradicting earlier reactions that argue we need to have a moral compass.
The human race is dependent on fossil fuels. Crude oil and natural gas can conveniently tip the balance of power. It can give countries that have an abundance of black gold an upper hand in dealing with nations that are bereft of it or lacking in oil deposits. Oil and natural gas facilitate the financing of war machines. We would not have known this so aptly if it had not been for the conflict that has driven a wedge into our wallets.
People worldwide are hurting. Following the current pathway we will soon see hunger and starvation in some North African countries like Sudan, Eritrea and Somalia, as well as Afghanistan and their neighbors. If the purpose of the exercise was to sow turmoil and catastrophic devastation then the goal is being achieved. Right now, that world is urgently in need of wheat to make flour and bread. Hunger can result in refugees and migration. No one among us will be spared. Diverting asylum seekers to Rwanda may seem an "appalling" step in terms of a violation of liberties, though it may serve to put food on the table for many families. Whereas all this may sound like a knell of doom, we have to ready ourselves for eventualities that are painful.
From the limited options we have to counter this predicament, we have tried everything. We have tried starving the war machine with little or no success. There are far too many players in Europe that are dependent on the main source of oil and natural gas. If not that then it might be that Hungary does not see eye to eye with the others. And in the event that there is an accord on affirmative action to allow new members to enter NATO, it might be that Turkey throws a spanner in the works.
To stay resigned to our fate and stay detached is not the solution. The human race is known for its ingenuity in the direst situations. Somewhere out there is a proposal that might be a workable solution. It may involve calling a bluff. For that we need proficient poker players. It seems a scary prospect to be threatened by nuclear holocaust and cower down. But that may not happen. An empty threat of that magnitude may lack in substance.
Alan Saldanha (daywatchnewspaper@gmail.com) is publisher of Daywatch newspaper in Surrey, British Columbia.
