Addiction: The persistent compulsive use of a substance known by the user to be harmful. That’s how Webster defines addiction. It also pretty well describes our relationship to oil. Coal too, for that matter. I’m sure the folks at Massey sent a gift basket to the guys at BP for knocking them off the front page.
But in the end, it’s us. We’re the addicts. We want to believe whoever will tell us that our addictive use of fossil fuel and the off-shore drilling, strip-mining and endless Middle East wars are okay so long as we can get our next fix. Obviously we still need to get around and I’m typing this on a computer that’s plugged into the wall and just before turning on the AC, so what to do?
I think if we spent as much on education as we do on defense in this country, we might know the answer to that question.
Eric Shaw Quinn 