I dream I'm reading a news article. An economist says "California's environmental reform package a few years ago was only a half-measure. None of us experts could predict what it'd cost to implement, how much of a chilling effect it'd have on business. I estimated $1.3 billion, but I want to confess now just how wild a guess it was. Based on nothing solid. The economic loss should have peaked in the first years of transition. Those years are past now, and the cost appears to have been... zero!

"I conclude it's now indefensible not to implement the next phase in California, and at LEAST the current California rules nationwide. California's proven such rules just aren't the economic risk we thought--and the high cost of ecological degradation is a CERTAINTY."

I'm delighted he's admitting it.

Then he adds something unexpected: "...AND we must rethink our economic theory! It predicted heavy costs for eco-regulations, and it was dead wrong."

Economists admit they're wrong? Dream on!

NOTES ON WAKING UP

• Insisting on eco-regulations = insisting on what I personally need to cure my environmental illness: allergy shots, a town with clean air like San Francisco or Honolulu; older, already-outgassed work and living spaces (I get sick in new buildings), not eating wheat, oats or barley (gut inflammation if I do), regular exercise... love?
• New policy half-implemented in CA a few years ago = when I started dating? weightlifting? not eating gluten? I'm always reluctant to take each step--a voice inside says "It'll be too much trouble, it'll take more energy than it's worth." Well, my inner economist is confirming every step has paid off--freed more energy than it took.

2001 NOTES

Well, the personal advice was sound. But why'd the dream frame it in economic terms? Four years later, as Texan power companies headed by Enron loot California with impunity provided by George W. Bush, in revenge for the state's massive vote against him... as Bush rants about spoiled Californians refusing to build power plants (when we had enough plants and had no blackouts till Bush's Enron buddies turned off working plants against direct state orders and state law)... as Bush denies global warming and pushes for drilling and nukes... well, this dream looks less personal and WAY more literal than four years ago. As we modernized and cleaned up our state, a lot of us Californians, lulled by the Clinton years, forgot just how dirty it is out there--and I don't just mean environmentally.

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