Energy Efficiency progams are one of the most successful political campaigns by activists worldwide. The benefits of reducing the misuse of energy has always been the first step in moving towards a more sustainable society. There is still much to do, especially around cars and agricultural misuse water. For just how much more can be done, check out the first articles here. Energy Conservation is not about lowering our standard of living, but about using the best available technologies to reduce energy use.

As an example of how different areas of the country have responded to working on energy conservation, Californians use 6 times less electricity as Texans per capita, with very similar climates. Yet Japan is even more conservation minded than California.

The electric companies of the United States have been pushing to deregulate the electricity market. The California Energy Crisis is a great example of how ratepayers are losing their power to control their local or state energy policies.

Oops! Californians weren't given the real story about the state's energy crisis. There were no serious opponents to the failed 1996 move to give away the state's infrastructure to private companies. The enivironmental community was represented by the Energy Foundation and the National Resources Defense Council, which had spent the previous decade pushing for "win-win tactics" at the state level that killed California's grassroots energy infrastructure.

Not once have you heard anywhere but here, that the root cause of the 1996 deregulation fiasco was the 1988 Diablo Canyon Rate Case that allowed electric rates to jump 50%, giving the PG&E customers the highest electric rates in the country. That huge increase gave big users the impetus for calling for the draconian industry deregulation gambit.

This is one of the most important policy issues to address the public in the last 100 years. There is a reason why General Electric owns NBC. Over the last 100 years there has been a major political battle in the U.S. and elsewhere over who should produce electricity for society. Private companies have waged an a vicious and deceitful war that has included outright lies and manipulation to maintain economic control over who power production here. There are major examples of publicly owned power programs in cities like Los Angeles and Seattle that have for years produced electricity at rates substantially lower than commercial power companies.

Attempts to demonstrate the major differences between public and private control of electricity have been recently demonstrated with California's failed push to give away California's electric infrastructure to companies like Enron and PG&E. America's media conglomerates, led by General Electric have waged a national campaign to deregulate electric power. The results have been huge economic damages and higher costs to ratepayers.

Americans have become addicted to oil as badly as heroin addicts. The heroin dealers (oil companies and countries) are interested in keeping people addicted. Over a decade ago, studies in Australia showed that the U.S.'s excessive reliance on the private car had made us the most inefficient transporation system in the world! Ralph Nader and DARE's campaign to reduce violence on the roads has done very little to reduce the economic fallout of a society trapped by the oil and car industry. Whether its from insurance costs, health issues or quality of life, reliance on private cars is rapidly becoming the bane of human survival.

Alternatives exist, but they take time. It took nearly 100 years for America to develop the current car infrastructure. It can't just go away in a few years. Yet there is no real plans in place to deal with the growing reliance on cars. Since the 2005 Katrina disaster, U.S. oil use, leveled off and in 2008 has declined due to the steep increase in gas prices. Republicans and the energy industry has gone on a major PR push to claim that the country can solve its energy dependence by drilling, more nukes and clean coal. Sorry, but our oil is coming from elsewhere.

The primary problem is how we design our communities, forcing people to work far from where they live. Activists have demonstrated models that remove the car from communites, while actually increasing the quality of life.

The model programs, primarily in Europe will never get an airing in America as long as car and oil companies are allowed to dictate what people think about how we live.

As a result, our oil addiction has created a worldwide security crisis focussed oil producing areas like the middle east.

America's militant behavior these days is nothing more than a cover for our growing oil crisis. Isn't about time you got educated about what our society's addiction to oil is doing to the Earth and people everywhere?