Michael Anton gets waaaay down deep into the nitty-gritty of what’s beginning to look like The Issue That Just Wouldn’t Die, and continues to live up to his usual lofty standard for excellence. Be forewarned, though, this is a VERY long article, covering a heckuva lot of ground, so the following excerpt will of necessity be lengthy as well. I ain’t gonna bother apologizing for that this time out, I think everyone here will agree with me that the infringement on fair use is more than justified by the quality of the piece.
It really all comes down to two questions - who keeps the lights on? And where does the energy to keep them on come from? Useful electricity does not appear like a bolt out of the blue, it is *produced* - and it isn't produced where Malcolm Bluestar lives, nor anywhere close to his back yard. It, and the materials needed to produce it, come from Mr Redmon's areas. Same case for petroleum distillates like gasoline and diesel, and synthetic rubber for tires, and asphalt for the roads. And the petroleum and natural gas comes from Mr Redmon's bailiwick as well. Without a constant 24/7/365.25 supply of clean 60 Hz sinusoidal AC current, his Twitbook goes away and so does his AI. Very few of his class are mechanically inclined - and it will show. He has no idea how dependent he is on Mr Redmon's people - if he were to find out - an object lesson of two weeks or a month's duration might educate him - he might change his tune... maybe.
"since we don’t have the power to rule you and wouldn’t want to even if we did." Actually, they *do* have the power, if you think about it a bit. No coal, no gas, no oil, no electricity, no food. In the Civil War, an ounce of gold would buy a loaf of bread, because you can't eat gold. And digital curreny is entirely dependent on a constant supply of electricity... The one thing required to rule is the means and ability to project force. That takes energy, usually fossil fuel energy, and that sort of energy is easily converted into flames and smoke. No aviation gas means no F-15s, no diesel or motor gas means no tanks. As for nuclear weapons, their effects are by no means local - see https://oism.org/nwss/nwss.pdf
It really all comes down to two questions - who keeps the lights on? And where does the energy to keep them on come from? Useful electricity does not appear like a bolt out of the blue, it is *produced* - and it isn't produced where Malcolm Bluestar lives, nor anywhere close to his back yard. It, and the materials needed to produce it, come from Mr Redmon's areas. Same case for petroleum distillates like gasoline and diesel, and synthetic rubber for tires, and asphalt for the roads. And the petroleum and natural gas comes from Mr Redmon's bailiwick as well. Without a constant 24/7/365.25 supply of clean 60 Hz sinusoidal AC current, his Twitbook goes away and so does his AI. Very few of his class are mechanically inclined - and it will show. He has no idea how dependent he is on Mr Redmon's people - if he were to find out - an object lesson of two weeks or a month's duration might educate him - he might change his tune... maybe.
"since we don’t have the power to rule you and wouldn’t want to even if we did." Actually, they *do* have the power, if you think about it a bit. No coal, no gas, no oil, no electricity, no food. In the Civil War, an ounce of gold would buy a loaf of bread, because you can't eat gold. And digital curreny is entirely dependent on a constant supply of electricity... The one thing required to rule is the means and ability to project force. That takes energy, usually fossil fuel energy, and that sort of energy is easily converted into flames and smoke. No aviation gas means no F-15s, no diesel or motor gas means no tanks. As for nuclear weapons, their effects are by no means local - see https://oism.org/nwss/nwss.pdf