Living Large in America

Cars and Cows
By GEORGE WUERTHNER

The family of a friend of mine used to say they were “living large” whenever they were enjoying something that was a bit decadent like having two desserts after dinner or buying something frivolous that they really didn’t need like another TV set for the bathroom so they wouldn’t miss a single moment of their favorite sit-com even when Nature called.

Living large could easily be a term that applies to Americans—not only to the increasing girth of our stomachs, but also our excessive consumption of global energy resources. Yet no one in America’s political system--not Republican, not Democrat--appears willing to say that living large by excessive consumption of fossil fuels is killing the nation’s economy, killing our people, destroying our national security, and increasingly cooking the planet.

This morning oil futures reached $135 a barrel. Across America people are complaining about high gasoline prices at the pump—but high pump prices are just a symptom of a major policy failure and lack of leadership. Americans are suffering a much deeper cost in economic and social security as more of our dollars are exported to pay for expensive fuel, reducing the buying power of the dollar, and helping to give greater political power to authoritarian producing nations like Venezuela, Russia, and Saudi Arabia which in turn gives them greater influence over America’s economic and national security.

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