>The difference is more than semantic; it obscures the fact that what >America suffers from is not so much a lack of conservation as a broad >array of government programs aimed at fostering hyper-consumption. >The same day that Matthew Wald was holding forth on the national >appetite, Washington Post energy reporter Thomas W. Lippman wrote >that Bush administration officials had nixed various conservation >measures because they "deviate[d] from the administration's >free-market, anti-tax philosophy"--begging the question how a system >dependent on vast, unreimbursed government outlays for highways and >other services could possibly be described as "free market."
Thanks, both this and the Amtrak article were particularly welcome, as they focus in part on what I have come to believe is an important (if not "the" important) Achiles Heel Hypocrisy of those who equate their supposed "free market" advocacy with their anti-progressive vehicles stances. It is to get down and dirty and analyze, and really understand and disect, where there are hidden subsidies (i.e. NON-free-market mechanisms) to favored transportation or energy solutions over others). We are so often faced with free market advocates who claim to be interested in a "level playing field" and in "ending subsidies" to alternative energy proposals and "alternative fuel" proposals. Yet, are they *really* interested in advocating a level playing field. I suggest that, even if some of them are, they are unwittingly (or irresponsibly and not wisely) allowing others to hide in their skirts whose interest is not free market advocacy but advocacy of their pet industry or company while taking the cause celebre of free market advocacy as being enormously sociologically expedient by which to smuggle in what is really, for them, an agenda of favoritism toward their company or industry. Anyway, both articles taken a somewhat uncompromising stance, with which I am not in agreement, that is roughly increased taxation and subsidization is absolutely critical, given the unfair advantages quietly accorded to competing technologies, though this may be a somewhat unfair brief summary. I think at least I could concede their point that when journalists cover these issues they have failed to allow for increased taxes and subsidies and the public policy points those mechanisms *seem* to make in some economies. In the meantime what I think is over-ridingly important, as well, is the continued analysis and discussion of secret, hidden messy hard-to-define subsidization of some of our markets and industries and companies, and the need to debate and discuss those subsidies. I.e., there are two ways to level the playing field, one by raising everyone's advantages (fair or unfair, as the reader may be judge) or two, by eliminating everyone's advantages (fair or unfair, as the reader may judge). Also, this may be simplistic. Perhaps there are other ways to look at it, such as whether in some cases the playing field should not be "level" but whether there are cases calling for societal intervention (such as a wartime need to manipulate fuel technologies so as to win the war rather than continuing to enrich one's enemies or claimed-enemies by buying fuel from them). I wonder if the U.S. continued to buy fuel from any Axis powers after Pearl Harbor in WW II? If so, how much? As to the Amtrak article, likewise, I thought it was terrific. MM >The Washington Post was guilty of a particularly telling >juxtaposition on Feb. 21. On page A5, it ran an update on the Bush >energy plan, followed by an article on page A6 about the >administration's new $105.4-billion highway construction >program--with no hint in either story that there might be a >connection between the two. > >There are a number of reasons for such institutional >short-sightedness. Given that taxes remain a dirty word inside >Washington, reporters tend to view Japanese or West European-style >gas taxes as simply beyond the pale and therefore not even worth >considering. > >In addition, the reigning political conformism and cultural >insularity in most newsrooms promotes the assumption that anything >America does is natural, right, and proper, no matter how out of step >with the rest of the world, and taht any problems that might arise >are merely incidental. Cheap gas, cars, and highways >are--unquestionably--the American way. > >Thus, a front-page Los Angeles Times (2/13/91) on chaotic suburban >sprawl was fairly frank concerning such problems as traffic >congestion, three-hour commutes, etc. Yet it was remarkably cursory >as to the reasons why. The paper cited white flight, fear of crime, >desire to own one's own home, and so on as reasons that middle-class >Southern Californians are settling in ever more far-flung >subdivisions. > >Yet it made no mention of the seamless web of public subsidies that >make rampant suburbanization all but inevitable--everything from free >highways and parking to suburban infrastructure grants and federal >homeowner tax subsidies. It's rather like discussing the U.S. weapons >industry without mentioning the role of Pentagon expenditures. > >Daniel Lazare is a New York-based journalist who writes frequently on >energy issues for In These Times and the Village Voice > >Biofuel at Journey to Forever: >http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html > >Biofuels list archives: >http://archive.nnytech.net/ > >Please do NOT send Unsubscribe messages to the list address. >To unsubscribe, send an email to: >[EMAIL PROTECTED] > >Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ > > Biofuels at Journey to Forever http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel at WebConX http://webconx.green-trust.org/2000/biofuel/biofuel.htm List messages are archived at the Info-Archive at NNYTech: http://archive.nnytech.net/ To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
