KunstlerCast - Conversations: Converging Catastrophes of the 21st Century

JHK interviews Eric Zency, author of The Other Road to Serfdom and the Path to Sustainable Development. He is deeply knowledgable about the issues that the KunstlerCast is concerned with: the problems of an 'infinite growth' economy, the relationship between energy and money, and the fate of the planet. Eric teaches at the University of Vermont and Washington University in St. Louis. The KunstlerCast music is “Adam and Ali’s Waltz” from the recording Waiting to Fly by Mike and Ali Vass.

JHK chats with tugboat fleet owner Rob Goldman about the revival and future of shipping on America's inland waterways. Rob's company, NYS Marine Highway runs tugboats that push cargo barges through the Erie Canal system and the Great Lakes, as well as along the Atlantic Coast. Rob graduated from Rensslaer Polytechnic as an Architect, got into the pleasure boat marina business, and eventually started his shipping company. It's not your great-great-grandfather's Erie Canal anymore.

JHK interviews Michael Klare, author or The Race For What's Left: The Global Scramble for the World's Last Resources. Michael is also the author of Resource Wars, and Blood and Oil. He runs the Department of Peace and Security Studies at Hampshire College, a program that also serves the Five Colleges organization which includes, Smith, Mt Holyoke, U. Mass, and Amherst. The KunstlerCast music is “Adam and Ali’s Waltz” from the recording Waiting to Fly by Mike and Ali Vass.

#243 -- Summer Break Special -- JHK and his friend Richie drop in on the Washington County (NY) fair for an extravaganza of cows, oxen, weird fried food, scary rides, and chats with farmers, tractor collectors, teenagers, and other civilians.  The KunstlerCast music is “Adam and Ali’s Waltz” from the recording Waiting to Fly by Mike and Ali Vass.

#242 --JHK talks with John Norquist, director of the Congress for the New Urbanism and four-term mayor of Milwaukee Wisconsin, about the state of the American city, the future of the Great Lakes Region, and the difficulty in overcoming decades of bad choices concerning how we inhabit the landscape of our country. The KunstlerCast music is “Adam and Ali’s Waltz” from the recording Waiting to Fly by Mike and Ali Vass.

#240 -- JHK yaks with Richard Heinberg about his new book, Snake Oil: How Fracking's False Promises of Plenty Imperils Our Future. Richard is also the author of the great peak oil primer, The Party's Over, and many other books about the converging dilemma's of our time, including Peak Everything and The End of Growth. He's a founder and senior fellow of the Post Carbon Institute. The KunstlerCast music is called “Adam and Ali’s Waltz” from the recording Waiting to Fly by Mike and Ali Vass.

# 240 -- JHK interviews David Orr, the Paul Sears Distinguished Professor of Environmental Science and Politics at Oberlin College, in Oberlin, Ohio. David is the author of Down to the Wire: Confronting Climate Collapse (Oxford Press, 2009) and many other books. He articulates the multiple predicaments of our time in clear, plain terms, and he runs the Oberlin Project, an exemplary effort for the rehabilitation of local economies and the towns at the center of them. The new KunstlerCast music is called “Adam and Ali’s Waltz” from the new recording Waiting to Fly by Mike and Ali Vass.

#239-- JHK shoots the breeze with Charlie Hall, distinguished professor emeritus at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry at Syracuse, NY -- just retired last month and founder of the Association for Biophysical Economics. We yak about reality-based economics and the relationship of energy to money. The new KunstlerCast music is called “Adam and Ali’s Waltz” from the new recording Waiting to Fly by Mike and Ali Vass.

# 238 -- JHK yaks solo this week following another surgical adventure -- neck bones this time -- with spotlight on the George Zimmerman verdict, the rumors of Larry Summers as next Federal Reserve Chair, $106 oil, Elliot Spitzer re-entering politics, and the questioning the dumb ideas of "urban issues" professor Ed Glaeser of Harvard. Back next week with a guest.   The new KunstlerCast music is called “Adam and Ali’s Waltz” from the new recording Waiting to Fly by Mike and Ali Vass.

JHK talks with Brian Czech, founder of The Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy and author of the new book Supply Shock: Economic Growth at the Crossroads and the Steady State Economy, published by the New Society Press.   The new KunstlerCast music is called “Adam and Ali’s Waltz” from the new recording Waiting to Fly by Mike and Ali Vass.