Small government + limited resources = we are doomed

Hey, let me explain something to you.  It'll just take  a minute, so put down your tuna sandwich and give me your undivided attention.  I'll be done before the bread gets soggy.

In Alaska, an idea that sells well with the public, politics-wise, is "small government."  Alaskan citizens think the  idea of efficient government is pretty cool.  We like our taxes low.  We don't want a bunch of weird projects on the ledger.  You know what else sells well in Alaska?  SUVs. 

In case you're braintarded, here's the connection: taxes on petroleum production account for 90% of the state's income, not counting federal largesse.  Petroleum is also (if you believe the scientists, anyway) a non-renewable resource.  That means that we'll run out some day.  In fact, the production trend would suggest that we are in the process of running out.

If you want to make a lean, mean government, you have to do it on a tax base of stable revenue.  Then you can balance a budget and coast along on the proceeds as you go.  It would be like, say, having a solar powered car: the sun comes up every day, you can get to work on the energy it provides.  The Alaska economy model should be different.  It should be more like a rocket: you have a shitload of propulsion up front, and it gets you to escape velocity so you won't need it anymore.

So in Alaska we have an expendable resource and we're trying to use it for our daily commute for the forseeable future.  Unless you flunked thinking, it ought to occur to you that this will not go on forever.  One day, perhaps one day soon, Alaska's last drops of sweet, precious, nourishing oil will trickle out of our hose, and we will lay spent and forgotten, a crushed beer can on history's highway. 

Of course, this isn't inevitable.  It's merely very likely.  What Alaska needs in order to survive the petrocalypse is some kind of industry.  Preferably one that provides energy.  Something along the lines of wind, hydro and geothermal.

If you want small government in Alaska, you want renewable resources in Alaska.  But don't bother writing your congressman about it: he's an oil man.

See, your tomato soup doesn't even have a skin on it yet.