Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned
(William Butler Yeats, “The Second Coming”)

We may yet discover the “holy grail” of ever-lasting energy, fusion technology, but better to keep a few options open just in case.

Try as we might and counting all the angels on the head-of-a-pin, I believe we’re going to have to live in a world with much less energy and fewer material goods, possibly a lot sooner than even the most pessimistic predictions have forecasted.

Five great extinctions have occurred, the first one 440 million years ago and the last one 65 million years ago, when the dinosaurs and 62% of all species vanished. Some scientists believe we’ve already entered into the beginning of the sixth extinction, set in motion by Homo sapiens.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature recently estimated that some 16,306 species out of the 41,415 that the IUCN studies are threatened. This is expected to intensify as the human population increases.

Growing coastal dead zones, deforestation, water shortages, changing climate patterns (regardless of manmade contribution) are not hypothetical abstractions or unobserved phenomena.

We—meaning us—have been around about 200,000 years. Mammalian species last on average roughly a million years. Homo sapiens have just entered adolescence. Care to hazard a guess on how we’ll do in the next … one hundred years? Wes Jackson of The Land Institute in Salina, Kansas calls us “a species out of context.”

John Robb, futurist and authority on asymmetrical warfare, has referred to Russia as like a “corporation with the trappings of a nation-state.” Russia’s business is now energy and Gazprom is well on its way of becoming the biggest publicly traded corporation.

Whether or not one agrees with Robb’s analogy, I believe that capitalism is at the heart of an unsustainable system, as practiced in Russia, China, the United States and most everywhere else. The “market” is not going to give us a brave, new sustainable world. The bazaar clearly doesn’t know what is always best.

We’re going to have to move toward the “actual” implementation of what has been called natural capital, as has been discussed by an increasing number of people, including individuals like Paul Hawken, Amory and Hunter Lovins, Herman Daly, and Robert Constanza.

The distinction, more than ever, between land and capital is a relic of a world that no longer exists. How we integrate nature’s services into our economic calculations is not something we should consider but something we must do.

But like overthrowing the “divine right of kings” in the 16th and 17th century, it is easier said than done. The nation-state itself may be an anachronism, unable to provide the needed changes in time. Connected resilient communities might turn out to be more adaptable for the required reforms.

Change in many locations could turn out to be violent, not amenable to gradual transformation. Yes, the center may not hold. It is, it seems to me, a race, with far more at stake than recognition by the state or a lucrative sneaker contract.

Observing China, Russia, and the United States this past week has been informative. Could Beijing’s serious air pollution be kept under control, at least long enough for China to take its “place” as a world power?

In Russia, could Putin and gang demonstrate to the world that they had returned to intimidate and frighten their neighbors?

Would the United States extricate itself from its non-policy, probably created by neocon fantasies, regarding a country called Georgia?

Where would China build its next coal-fired power plant after the Olympics, while Russia slowly pressured Western Europe over natural gas this winter, and the U.S. continued the drill-drill fraud?

Another stupid Russian general threatens Poland with nuclear destruction, China suppresses dissent, and John McCain informs us “we’re all Georgians.” Will the good senator grab his sword and lead the charge? No one said it would be easy.

For “one” historical perspective on Georgia/Russia relations go to The Bear is Back. It won't hurt any of us to have some understanding of the region, especially in an election year, where outright falsehoods and grade school jingoism could be on display.

For yet another perspective on oil go to Empty Drums. While the author looks at the arcane world of oil speculation and futures contracts, he also addresses what he considers are the real reasons for energy costs.