Dear Friends,
LISTEN TO THIS WEEK’S PROGRAM:
(01:14) Water and the Endless Growth Economy, with Mark Clipsham
(19:46) Are you a vexatious person?
(36:17) Josh Mandelbaum, candidate for mayor of Des Moines
(53:55) Growing food in historic neighborhoods, with Kathy Byrnes
World Resources Institute’s updated Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas shows that “25 countries — housing one-quarter of the global population — face extremely high water stress each year, regularly using up almost their entire available water supply.”
Read that again: ALMOST THEIR ENTIRE AVAILABLE WATER SUPPLY!
Yet water scarcity isn’t just a distant, third-world crisis, or a problem facing the US Southwest. In lush, verdant Iowa, a multiple-year drought coupled with greatly increased water consumption spells serious trouble in the very near future.
Who should Iowans blame? Beyond the obvious impact climate change has on our weather, let’s start with Microsoft. As reported in Axios Des Moines this week, Microsoft’s West Des Moines data centers consume 11.5 million gallons of water for cooling each month! Globally, Microsoft’s water consumption spiked 34% from 2021 to 2022 to nearly 1.7 billion gallons.
Sidebar: For all you lovers of the “free” market, Microsoft has received $219,785,484 in taxpayer handouts for seven Iowa projects, according to Subsidy Tracker. Corporate socialism is alive and well in the US heartland!
What’s not alive and well is intelligent planning, which Mark Clipsham (pictured above) and I discuss this week. Running out of water may be what finally shakes the most staunch US capitalist (and the most hard-line Chinese communist) out of their stupor, compelling them to admit that the limits of growth have been surpassed.
We need to say it over and over again: the Endless Growth Economy is a failure. The “grow or “die” mentality is a lie. Billionaires must be abolished. Comfortable citizens of affluent nations must learn to live with less — and perhaps even discover they’re happier. Global population must plateau and eventually decline. We need to replace GNP with something like HDI (Human Development Index) — a tool developed by the UN to measure a nation’s well being beyond just economic growth.
Merely greening up the Endless Growth Economy isn’t the answer. Sure, solar and wind are better than oil, gas, and coal. But if we stick with Materialism as our national religion and believe there’s a new man-made fix just around the corner, well, that’s just secular idolatry.
Thanks for reading, listening, and taking action!
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Please support the local businesses and non-profits who make this program possible. Click on their logos on the Fallon Forum website and in our weekly email, and visit Bold Iowa, and Birds & Bees Urban Farm. Thanks to Des Moines Irish Session for providing our bumper music, and thank you for supporting the civil alternative to the shock jocks!
Ed Fallon