The Age of Bitumen


‘We lived our lives in the age of bitumen Camp. Tar and it’s many derivatives makes the world go around, from asphalt to tires, various forms of refined petrol to plastics and even textile fibres. It’s everywhere and in everything even in the table top and the engineered floors, in the plastic containers and the clothes we wear.’

‘You’re right of course. Even the bible mentions tar pits in the Valley of Siddim, near the Dead Sea, the area where Sodom and Gomorrah went up in flames.

‘From Sodom and Gomorrah to the Alberta tar sands. That’s modern human life in a nutshell. And the world is burning. Almost apocalyptic.’

            ‘The irony isn’t lost on me either. We’re living in a world that’s not just burning from the deliberate scorching of the Amazon jungle and rainforests to the brushfires of the tinder dry prairies in Canada and the steppes in Russia. On the other end of the spectrum, the urban centres from Mumbai to Phoenix, from Kinshasa to Mexico City are overheating., much of it a result of climate change. We’re in for a fiery future, accelerated by the fossil fuels we’re burning, spewing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, from cars to air conditioners to factories and generators;.’

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The World Rearms


We arrived at our watering hole just in time to snag two happy hour beers before the price doubled. It was hazy due to the fire in Squamish, a harbinger of the fire season yet to happen. According to forecasts it will be a bad one. Less rain, less snowpack, more drought and a long hot summer.

‘Have you noticed that every country is arming up; Europe, to reduce dependence on the US, and even Canada which just pledged to meet the NATO’s target of 2 percent of GDP, just before they suggest to up the ante to 5 percent. What gives Camp?’

‘We’re back into a global arms race, from Switzerland to Canada, Russia to China, Poland to Taiwan. And not just countries who are at war like Israel, Ukraine and Russia. Arms manufacturers are also supplying conflict zones that don’t have their own arms manufacturing but also no money but hey, credit for fighter jets or tanks is easily obtained. It keeps the arms industry humming along. India and Pakistan will spend billions more on arms and Israel just attacked Iran.’

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The Power of Money


            It’s been a rainy and cool May here on the coast, unlike in the prairies where 200 wild fires are ravaging communities and thousands of square kilometers of forests and grasslands. To the south, economic storms are being unleashed by a possessed and unhinged president, driven by greed, disinformation, nationalism and hubris. These are challenging times and we’re lucky to live where we are.

            ‘Have you ever heard of Peter Thiel?’ I asked Camp after we settled in our usual corner on the glassed-in veranda on the harbour.

            He professed his ignorance and for a change it was I who got to lecture him.

            ‘He is a German born billionaire but unlike Bezo, Musk and Zuckerberg he is not kowtowing to Trump. He is not the figurehead of a large corporation but he is above all the most dangerous of the tech billionaires. He is the central string-puller behind Trump’s first and second terms. 

‘How come I never hear of this guy if he’s that important?’ Camp said.

            ‘When Trump announced his candidacy in 2015, nobody took him seriously but Thiel immediately donated a million dollars to his campaign. He saw in Trump the best chance for radical change but only a trailblazer and a means to an end. Thiel’s plan is to overcome democracy and he is at the core of all the upheavals in the USA.’

            ‘That’s thirsty talk’, Camp said.

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