chapotraphouse

Back in 2003 when I was waiting tables during university studies, my Physics II professor gave us the equation to determine wattage from solar irradiance based on photovoltaic conversion rates. At the time, it was something like 30% efficiency. I did some napkin math, and figured out that it would take around $1.2 trillion to buy enough PV cells from a retail supplier to build a 90 mile by 90 mile square PV farm deployed somewhere like New Mexico which could generate enough electricity to power every economic sector in the US -- residential, commercial, industrial. Then, in 2008 during the mortgage and credit default swap financial crisis, Obama gave $800 billion of taxpayer funds directly to the banks to make them solvent, and directed the Fed to begin the disastrous QE policy, dumping $24+ trillion into the economy over the next decade and a half.

When Obama did that, that is when I realized that this country (America) and maybe even human beings at large are simply too stupid, too short-sighted, too selfish and primitive to do what is necessary to make our civilization a sustainable one.