The French Connection
Another major goal: Addressing the friction between people who want to keep their car and those who want a more pedestrian-friendly world. Much of the writing here grew out of what was originally a proposal to solve the problem of parking minimums strangling the historic downtown of the small town I was living in.
That quote is from Project SRO. It's one of my websites and it addresses housing issues in the US.
I don't imagine it will be THE solution to housing issues but I like to think it could be one piece of the puzzle.
I also run r/TransitOrientedDesign on Reddit. It's description currently says:
If walkable neighborhoods are going to successfully foster car-free living as a viable option that supports a full life, they have to be paired with transit infrastructure that will let a pedestrian go anywhere in the world. I'm not against cars. I am for more diversity of options. Currently in the US, if you don't own a car or can't drive for any reason, you are de facto a second-class citizen.
A search for why does france use nuclear power results in a copilot answer that starts like this:
France relies on nuclear power for approximately 70% of its electricity generation due to energy security, low carbon emissions, and economic benefits.Historical ContextFrance's commitment to nuclear power began in the 1970s, particularly after the 1973 oil crisis, which highlighted the country's vulnerability due to its limited fossil fuel resources. The French government initiated a large-scale nuclear program to reduce dependence on imported oil and enhance energy security. This led to the construction of numerous nuclear reactors, making France one of the world's leading producers of nuclear energy. 2
The other source it lists is Wikipedia.
Tesla positions itself as a green business solving our environmental issues. This is PR nonsense. It is doing no such thing.Perhaps Elon Musk knows that and perhaps he doesn't.What Tesla really solves is two things:1. We need vehicles that use something other than gasoline because we will eventually run out and while we wait to run out, the cost of oil will go up because the last half of the oil in a deposit is harder to extract than the first half.[2]2. In order to get widespread adoption of electric vehicles, we need charging stations like gasoline powered vehicles have gas stations.
That's from a piece I wrote elsewhere and the footnotes explain Peak Oil.
A search for US interest in the middle east gets me a lengthy multi point PC answer in flowery language and point one is:
Economic Security: Ensuring the free flow of natural resources and maintaining energy security.
Translation: Oil.
And the entire planet knows it. It's common knowledge that the US is an addict and OPEC is our dealer.
We are hands down the single biggest consumer of oil. The US consumes just over a fifth of all oil globally.
1 United StatesPopulation: ~342 millionBarrels Per Day: 19,687,287World Share: 20.27%Yearly Gallons Per Capita: 916.82 ChinaPopulation: ~1.43 billionBarrels Per Day: 12,791,553World Share: 13.17%Yearly Gallons Per Capita: 139.73 IndiaPopulation: ~ 1.41 billionBarrels Per Day: 4,443,000World Share: 4.58%Yearly Gallons Per Capita: 50.7
Most of the above data is from Oil Consumption by Country, plus I googled population for each of the three biggest oil consumers globally. France is listed as number thirteen, in part because its population is substantially smaller and it uses substantially less oil per capita than the US, though more per capita than either China or India.
We historically tried to make Iran our bitch and the Iranians eventually kicked us out. We've waged two "costly interventions" in Iraq and Afghanistan and the US government is apparently feeling somewhat burned by that and not wanting to repeat the experience.
But, in short, the entire world got a preview of what's coming in the 1970s and France decided "We don't want to be anyone's bitch. This is politically unacceptable to be this dependent on a resource we don't control because we can't supply it ourselves from within our borders." and America decided "You my bitch." about oil in the Middle East and we've been fucking with them ever since.
And SOME countries in the Middle East, like Saudi Arabia, are nominally allies because we aren't invading them (yet) and they know who pays their bills and provides their "oil wealth": Those rat bastard Americans mainlining this shit like an addict on skid row who has ruined their life and STILL won't STOP.
I don't hate cars. I do hate it that America is a prisoner of car culture and it is destroying the US and for extra stupidness we've sold our previous high minded ethics to the devil and decided that waging war on the Middle East is a reasonable price to pay for our addiction.
So long as war happens ELSEWHERE and not on our soil, of course. We hunted down and killed Osama bin Laden and acted like he was the worst villain ever for bringing war to our soil as his big offense was destroying the Two Towers.