[ExI] EP and Peak oil

[Damien Broderick]

At 08:45 PM 3/30/2008 -0700, Lee wrote:

>The free market will do a great job of it,

The free market in the USA? How free is that free market?

>unless,
>of course, we get some very bright people into positions of
>power who think they know better.

Ah, as in Enron, Halliburton, etc, as well as govt (rather often, the 
handmaiden of corporations)?

>In which case, things indeed
>will go to hell very quickly.

Sometimes going to hell quickly is built in to the problem. Maybe 
this isn't one of those instances. Have there ever been *any* 
worrying situations in history, Lee, where a free market has failed 
to deal with them triumphantly? (This is *not* a question about 
whether there have been other polities or economic systems that did 
better. Sometimes when a ship goes down *everyone* drowns, even the 
good swimmers.)

Damien Broderick