----- Original Message -----
From: "Jed Rothwell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[email protected]>; <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, March 10, 2007 10:15 PM
Subject: Re: [Vo]: Outrage !!
I confess that I pulled the toll of $1 per mile out of a hat. The correct
figure should be ~$0.25 per mile. This is based on the average fuel
efficiency of U.S. cars
(20 mpg) and the cost and damage caused by burning a gallon of gas ($5).
The cost including buiding roads, and damage includes environmental
destruction, war > and other costs not covered by drivers. The cost of
accidents is covered by drivers, with insurance.
Then give me my Monte Carlo back and tax me less, with 28mpg average, and
even less if and when I drive the efficiency up higher. What do you pay for
the roads with then?
With present day gasoline technology all we have to is charge $5 per
gallon tax, which is what they charge in Europe and Japan. It doesn't hurt
them and it will
not hurt us.
Beg to differ here. And in case you didn't notice, this is not Europe nor
Japan. This is our country (apparently not yours, you don't seem to like it
much), if you like the way things are done overseas so much, please, go
there.
You are saying that the rest of us to pay for your lifestyle.
The hell I am. I work for a living and pay my taxes, quite a bit of which
will pay for the lazy who choose not to work. Can you read? We are all in
this together, one way or another. If there are no mechanics, you will not
drive, because you will have no one to fix your plastic Prius. Or if you
take the bus, what if the bus breaks down? Does it fix itself? If there are
no little-guy machinists and contractors, you won't get any services from
them. Ditto for all the hundreds of other things you personally need every
day to maintain your lifestyle. Strangle us out of existence, and you will
begin to feel the heat overnight, personally.
I don't mind contributing to a depressed area of the country for a decade
or so, but I think that if you
cannot maintain your way of life over long periods without massive help
from other people, you should move.
To where? Most of us cannot afford to leave...transitioning means time with
no income, and the cost to move. If I move X miles, under your system, I
also have to pay X mileage tax. And as I said, I have maintained my life so
far with NO help from others. In fact, I have helped THEM where possible,
with what little I have. Again CAN YOU READ?
In this case, you want me to pay for your
transportation either directly in cash, or indirectly by suffering from
more pollution, global warming and wars for oil. You way of life is not
sustainable and it
cannot be made economical with today's technology, so you must abandon it.
Of course the rest of us should pitch in to help you make the transition,
but not to
permanently support you.
I pay for my car, my fuel, upkeep and repairs on my own, you don't. As far
as global warming, I don't want to hear it. It is still being debated, and
should be. As far as pollution, some of us are actively trying to find ways
to reduce it or get rid of it by experimentation. Do you do experiments, or
just rock back and forth in your chair and shout orders to us dirty,
polluting little people? What are YOU doing to make a difference?
Can't be made economical with today's technology....yet it worked 50 years
ago. Wow, that logic would really impress Mr. Spock. And as far as pitching
in to help, why don't you try and actually make a difference, get your hands
dirty working on something, and stop trying to micromanage other people's
lives. I don't want your money. I don't want permanent support, nor am I
receiving it. If you are implying that I am getting "help" from how "little"
I pay to drive, then everyone who drives is getting "help", including the
extremely wealthy.
How about Pelosi and her jet she has been demanding? Bet that jet doesn't
get good mileage. Tsk Tsk on the emissions too. Or Al Gore and his
incredible waste of electricity in his giant mansion. *I* am supposed to
change my life, when people like these high-minded jerkoffs are contributing
FAR more to polluting this earth than my entire family? What the hell is
wrong with you people?!
The same goes for the "small, independent farmer" who is forever demanding
huge infusions of tax money. I do not think farmers deserve decades of
help any
more than programmer, hairdressers, or taxi drivers do. Just because
farming is an ancient way of life and programming is new, I see no reason
why farmers are > privileged or why the rest of us should pay them to
maintain their lifestyle. In the end, this is a capitalist, free-market
country, and we all have to play by capitalist > rules. That is as it
should be. It is not pure dog-eat-dog capitalism, and we should help
people in distress, but "help" should not last for 10 or 20 years.
Why are you preaching to me about "help" lasting for 20 years? I was the one
who complained about multitudes of blacks and other minorities on welfare
for no reason other than not wanting to work. I guess we should kick them
off. Dog-eat-dog and all that...oh wait....that would be rather racist
though, right?
There is no reason we cannot make synthetic fuels using energy derived from
solar power, as far as I know. This has nothing to do with how the middle
and lower class people live their lives, it has to do with the people on top
not being willing to get off their asses and do something about it. Again,
it is far easier for high-minded individuals to just scream about the
problems and come up with blanket "solutions" to the symptoms rather than
bite the bullet, lose the laziness, and DO something about it. "Cold fusion"
ain't the damned answer either, and it looks like it never will be in the
forseeable future. Post something here explaining exactly how to do it and
make it generate enough excess heat to boil me a pot of coffee, and we'll
talk. Until then, it is barking up the wrong tree, when we already have
existing methods to generate intelligent energy (I dislike the term
alternative energy...in the end, its all from the sun anyways*, just a
question of how long you wait to get it and at what cost).
Dog eat dog, eh? Ok. How about a federal ban on any environmental impact
studies when we start paving the desert with solar collectors. Ditto for
windmill generators. Then we can get something built without some bleeding
heart organization worrying about an oddball caterpillar that might wander
by. And while we are at it, ban the petrocrats from interfering. Don't tax
them to pay for construction, just forbid them to interfere. Here's how it
is: God put a very bloody big fusion reactor a convenient 93,000,000 miles
away from us. I suggest we use it.
*Even nuclear is solar, from a certain point of view; it came from the
death-throes of an O or B star out there somewhere.
--Kyle, will build solar collectors for food, will carry a .357 in case a
greenie tells him the collector is bad for the environment.
