Oil democracy? Aha..

More and more Americans are taking the public transport system to work these days, says a New York Times report. This does not imply however, that Uncle Sam’s nieces and nephews have suddenly started to count their carbon footprints. It’s just that oil prices have skyrocketed to such an extent as to propel the dollar-rich Americans to walk (or ride, shall we say) the plebeian way.

Now isn’t this a classic example of chaos theory being played out in garish technicolour! The fluttering wings of a butterfly might not (or maybe yes, who knows) cause a typhoon in Brazil, but big daddy’s oil democracy is definitely backfiring at a time when any false move can be fatal. But as the biggies play out their own games in the circus called “world politics”, let’s try and feel the pulse of what the common man on the road … er tube is thinking about shifting gear.

Samuel Jones, a worker with a construction company, is one such person who has had to “downgrade” his commute from a smooth ride down the highway in his own car to a jostling-for-elbow-space travel in a Boston tube. His wife has recently bought a swanky new car but doesn’t have enough dough to pay for its gas on a daily basis. Samuel and his wife now feature in a growing breed of Americans who are feeling the pinch where it hurts the most because of a blinkered foreign policy and cut-throat capitalist ideology.

While this happens, thousands of miles away on the other side of the globe, a city witnesses sudden boom and a skewed growth. But when the euphoria dies down at this side will the denizens please spare a thought on the enormous cost such a political (read: economic) model entails?