GLOB - The Blog for Dyslexics

I'm strating a new blog for those of us whop are dyslexic or just using an iPhone. It's called GLOB. Hope you like it.

Gasostrich

I went to sleep last night with the news of the republican "solution" to the current gas crisis on my mind. It was the last news story I read on the nyt.com website and I was feeling a sense of outrage, disbelief and frustration over the news.

This morning, I woke up to read the democratic response, which appears at first glance to be equally misguided.

$100 check? To solve problems that have been plaguing us for decades? Billions of dollars for investment in new technology? Opening up one of the last remaining true wilderness areas on the planet to development for oil? Removing of the federal gas tax for a few months?

Is this the best that the most powerful (for now) nation on earth can come up with? Is our system fatally flawed to only offer short-term solutions for political expedience, without ability to take a hard look at profound problems and see the big picture.

The big picture is as obvious to me as an elephant floating outside my window.

We drive too many big, inefficient cars over too long distances. Hello! Wake up call - elephant at the window and she's got a gas hose up her nose and she's suckin hard.

So, what do our brilliant political leaders come up with? Incentives for people to use MORE fuel, not less. Let's jsut throw them $100 of their own money - that'll make them happy. We'll surely get the vote so we can repeat this insane thinking for a few more decades until a) there simply isn't any more oil and/or b) we've destroyed the environment so badly that the economy crashes.

Maybe I'm a fool here, but doesn't basic economics 101 teach us that in order to reduce prices, one should reduce demand, not increase it?

So, I humbly submit these solutions to our "current" "crisis".

1) Immediately place a $1,000 a year tax on any new vehicle that gets less than 20 Miles Per Gallon.
2) Invest the money earned from this tax on promoting the use of smaller, lighter vehicles and mass transportation.
3) In crowded urban areas, restrict the use of cars to two or more people per vehicle.
4) Encourage the use of motorcycles, mopeds and bicycles through incentives, special lanes, free parking etc. in urban areas.
5) Place tolls on all federally funded highways that charge users as they do in Europe - the result there is that driving is expensive and thereby discouraged, but the roads are very well maintained so fuel efficiency is increased and traffic is reduced which benefits the environment.

Driving a car is costly - it should be as it has tremendous impacts on our economy and our environment. We can encourage citizens to begin to change their habits and patterns so our energy use and environmental impact come closer in line with other nations on a per capita basis.

Call me crazy - the elephant outside my window will disagree.

does google own blogger?

Why is google next to the copyright date? Why do I notice things like this at 4:30 AM? Or perhaps the best question of the morning is, what am I doing awake at 4:30 in the morning.

More later - I'd better get back to bed.