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M2me
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 - 12:19 am: | 
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I've said it before and I'll say it again. Energy, Transportation and Agriculture are not true free market capitalist systems. They are heavily regulated and controlled by government. If we are going to come up with a solution for our future energy needs we have to have a clear understanding of how things are right now.
Saying get government out of the way is not a realistic answer. Energy is simply too vital to our nation to leave the public policy up to free market capitalism. Public policy is not the role of corporate America. Although we need strong free market capitalism we also need good government policy.
The corporate boardroom is not the place for setting public policy. Unfortunately, we have been moving more and more in that direction. Too many people have been sold on the idea that capitalism is "good" and government is "bad". This is simply false. The truth is that both capitalism and government have good and bad attributes. We need a sound public policy on energy and allowing oil companies to set that policy is a bad idea. That truly is bad government.
(Message edited by m2me on September 14, 2005) |
Aesquire
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 - 01:17 am: |
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Dang, M2me I agree with that whole post.!!!
The exact mix of Govt. regulation & control is a debatable point. "Pure" free market is not the answer, since there are Enron's out there.
Top down soviet control is a disaster.
It's also misguided over regulation having 40 different gasoline formula's in the U.S.
A company should clean up it's own messes, but technology innovations mean a over detailed regulatory structure is a failure too.
So..... we Need good energy policy. Congress is going to farce er, force it on us, no matter what we want. Should oil companies run this process? No. should they not have input on the subject? That's not smart either. Does your senator understand the safety issues of anti matter? I doubt it.
I do think that the failed policies of the past should not be replaced with the same, but more. ( the typical, inertia prone govt. response. )
Social engineering by Taxation is not a good thing. |
Brucelee
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 - 09:44 am: |
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A couple of thoughts on M2s post:
Certainly no one is suggesting that the government has NOT had a role in energy matters, they have. I would assert that on balance, it has not been a positive one.
To equate their disparate actions with something so lofty as an "energy policy" is a stretch to my way of thinking. If the US Government (and all of the states) has a clear, succinct "energy policy" I would love to see it and to see how closely their actions map on to this mythical policy.
Therein lies the rub. The government says one thing, does many others. As you point out in the so called energy bill, tax credits and "incentives" are sprinkled around like so much fairy dust.
So, yes, the government mucks around, and to my way of thinking, does more harm, than good.
If this is true, then my argument is, do you want more or less government intrusion? If you want more, well God Bless you.
I want less, as I have stated very clearly and consistently. I do not want to subsidize a very questionable technology simply because the Green types think that it is cute (read hybrid).
Toyota was selling more hybrids than they could build BEFORE the tax credit. Why is the US Government trying to drive up the price of the Prius (Supply and Demand) when they can't fill the orders on the car as it is.
This whole subject was in response to the proposal that there be a huge increase in gas taxes to dampen consumption. I have not heard one credible economist speak in favor of this move and I certainly haven't seen anything in the governments behaviour that would suggest that I want to give them more of my money for NO VALUE ADDED! |
Brucelee
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 - 10:25 am: |
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After reading the following, you have to ask yourself, "Do I really want more of this kind of "policy making and leadership" with regards to energy matters, or LESS?
Read on and enjoy!
From the WSJ
A 'Moronic' Proposal
September 14, 2005; Page A20
Some public-spirited folks in Bozeman, Montana, have come up with a wonderful idea to help Uncle Sam offset some of the $62 billion federal cost of Hurricane Katrina relief. The Bozeman Daily Chronicle reports that Montanans from both sides of the political aisle have petitioned the city council to give the feds back a $4 million earmark to pay for a parking garage in the just-passed $286 billion highway bill. As one of these citizens, Jane Shaw, told us: "We figure New Orleans needs the money right now a lot more than we need extra downtown parking space."
Which got us thinking: Why not cancel all of the special-project pork in the highway bill and dedicate the $25 billion in savings to emergency relief on the Gulf Coast? Is it asking too much for Richmond, Indiana, to give up $3 million for its hiking trail, or Newark, New Jersey, to put a hold on its $2 million bike path?
And in the face of the worst natural disaster in U.S. history, couldn't Alaskans put a hold on the infamous $454 million earmark for the two "bridges to nowhere" that will serve a town of 50 people? That same half a billion dollars could rebuild thousands of homes for suffering New Orleans evacuees. One obstacle to this idea apparently will be Don Young, the House Transportation Committee Chairman who captured the funds for Alaska in the first place. A spokesman in his office told the Anchorage Daily News that the pork-for-relief swap was "moronic." Sounds like someone who wants Mr. Young to become "ranking Member" next Congress.
In all there are more than 6,000 of these parochial projects -- or about 14 for every Congressional district -- funded in the highway bill. The pork reduction plan is particularly appropriate as a response to Katrina, because we have learned in recent days that one reason that money was not spent on fortifying the levees in New Orleans was that hundreds of millions of dollars were rerouted to glitzier earmarked projects throughout the state of Louisiana.
We're hearing all sorts of bad ideas about how to offset the $62 billion of spending already authorized for Hurricane Katrina relief. Cancel the Bush tax cuts, raise the gasoline tax by $1 a gallon, increase deficit spending, and sharply cut spending on national defense and the war in Iraq. In Washington, it seems, everything is expendable except for the slabs of bacon that are carved out of the federal fisc to ensure re-election.
The glory of what is happening in Bozeman is that taxpayers are proving to be wiser about priorities than their politicians. We like the suggestion by Ronald Utt of the Foundation Heritage that, when the new levee is built to protect the Big Easy from future storms, it should bear a bronze plaque stamped: "Proudly Brought to You by the Citizens of Alaska." |
Brucelee
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 - 10:28 am: |
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More on our so called energy policy matters.
No Blood for Oil
September 14, 2005; Page A20
With $3 and $4 gas in some markets, all sorts of bad ideas are making a comeback. Price controls are the worst, but not far behind are Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards, known in the Beltway argot as CAFE. What proponents of this idea won't tell you is that they're in favor of trading blood for oil.
This notion goes back to the 1970s, and requires automakers to produce cars that get more miles per gallon across their entire fleet. The leading current proposal, promoted by environmental groups and Congressional Democrats, would raise the standard to 40 mpg by 2010 from 27.5 mpg today.
This might save gas, but we know for sure it will cost lives. That's because a primary way auto companies meet CAFE standards is to reduce the weight of their cars. Auto weight fell by about 500 pounds per vehicle after CAFE rules were introduced in 1975. Research has consistently confirmed that the lighter the vehicle the more dangerous it is in a crash because there is less survival space and less physical structure to absorb impact. A 2001 National Research Council study concluded that CAFE contributed to 2,000 additional deaths on the highways each year. Raising the standards to 40 mpg could raise to 5,000 the number of annual CAFE-related fatalities, according to a study by the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
Ralph Nader also knows lighter cars are more dangerous, though he too is a CAFE advocate. His 1972 book, "Small on Safety," described the lightweight Volkswagen Beetle as a death trap. One of the Beetle's primary attractions was its ultra-fuel efficiency. One cause of the Ford-Firestone defective tire episode of some years back was that Ford attempted to increase the fuel economy of the Explorer by making the tires lower in weight, thus contributing to the rollover effect, according to an analysis by none other than Joan Claybrook's Naderite offshoot, Public Citizen.
Under political pressure to do something, the Bush Administration proposed its own overhaul of fuel standards last month. The plan creates six categories of "light truck" vehicles and sets standards ranging from 21 mpg to 28 mpg according to size. This would increase fuel efficiency of SUVs, minivans and pickup trucks by about 6% starting in 2008. At least these rules were designed to balance fuel conservation against the dangers to passenger safety and the additional costs to struggling U.S. automakers. But it's a sign of the political times that the plan was ridiculed by the environmental lobby for not going far enough.
In fact, CAFE won't do much more to reduce gasoline use than higher prices are already doing. As oil prices have soared, cost-conscious drivers haven't needed politicians to tell them to look for more fuel-efficient cars. Sales of hybrids and high-gas-mileage cars are rising, and SUV sales have fallen off the cliff. Economist Robert Crandall of the Brookings Institution, a long-time student of CAFE, has concluded that during the 1970s high gas prices had a far greater impact on reducing fuel consumption in the U.S. than did fuel regulations.
Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta says CAFE standards are "preferable to raising taxes on consumers." It's more accurate to say that CAFE is a hidden tax on consumers, with even the new modest standards eventually raising the costs of an SUV or minivan by another $250.
Imagine the media and Sierra Club uproar if a private manufacturer put a new product on the market that knowingly killed 2,000 people every year. Yet CAFE supporters ignore the scientific evidence and pretend that no trade-off between safety and fuel efficiency even exists. If Congress really wanted to help American drivers, it would repeal CAFE. |
Brucelee
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 - 10:31 am: |
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Ah to be a politician, Life is so simple!
Fun for Politicians,
Legal Nightmare
For Gasoline Retailers
September 14, 2005; Page A21
You can learn a lot from the Web, including brushing up on your college psychology. For instance: "Pavlovian conditioning is the fundamental building block of learning. It is so basic to how animals adapt to their environment that it is shown by virtually all animals, from simple multicellular organisms such as flatworms (Planaria) to humans. There is even evidence that single-celled animals such as Paramecia are capable of Pavlovian conditioning."*
There is evidence, too, that members of Congress are capable of this form of learning, and perhaps only this form of learning. Consider their response when presented with the reality of sharply rising gasoline prices: They shout "price gouging" and, assuming they haven't slipped and hurt themselves in a puddle of their own planarian drool, rush to the TV cameras to be seen calling for legislation, investigations and crackdowns on sellers of gasoline.
When prices are falling, which they do about as frequently as they rise, Congress people do not rush to the cameras and charge consumers with "price gouging" and propose legislation to protect oil companies. Such are the fathomless mysteries of nature.
Take a particularly sophisticated organism, Sen. Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, a planarian among paramecia. Last week he proposed a windfall profits tax on oil companies. These are the same oil companies that, in response to higher oil prices, we are relying upon to increase investment in the search for oil and production of gasoline. His bill would be perverse and self-defeating. But Mr. Dorgan was quick to add he didn't plan on it actually becoming law: "Most likely Congress will do little or nothing but talk a great deal and hold hearings."
A sophisticated flatworm, indeed, is one capable of such multileveled dialogue. Advertisers are increasingly able to target consumers individually. Mr. Dorgan will one day be able to use the Internet to tailor separate and totally contradictory messages for every voter in his state, depending on whether they are clueless enough to believe that confiscating oil company profits would improve the gasoline situation.
We tease Mr. Dorgan but could substitute the names of dozens of Congressmen and women who failed to resist this hackneyed bit of political theater. Oh well, harmless fun, right?
Two weeks ago, the country survived the long weekend holiday -- one of the busiest travel periods of the year -- without the predicted shortages, thanks to gas stations putting up their prices and tamping down demand. Refiners, wholesalers and pipeline operators responded to Katrina with heroic efforts to recover and make sure gasoline could be had, even if at a higher price.
All in all, the Bobo-like resiliency of the American economy makes a striking contrast to the unutterable banality of our political class, whose stupidity and craven opportunism accomplished little except to obscure from the average American the results of this unwanted but heartening experiment in the nation's adaptability and resourcefulness.
And, no, the fun was not entirely harmless. In a moment of national challenge, not only did politicians become champions of ignorance and prejudice while other Americans were getting their hands dirty. But long after the hacks have milked all the political mileage from their theatrics, dozens or hundreds of gasoline merchants around the country will be contending with subpoenas, legal fees and plea bargains for behaving like business people.
In essence, they can expect to be ground up in the wheels of legal persecution so people like Andrew Spano can hold a press conference.
He's the elected executive of Westchester County, N.Y., which boasts 400 or more gasoline stations but yet felt it necessary to target 11 with subpoenas for the fanciful crime of price gouging. Gasoline is the most visible price in the economy, easily discernible from the roadway without even slowing down. Yet the head of the Westchester consumer protection office went on local TV and all but pronounced one station owner guilty because he raised his posted price more than the next station down the street.
Such exercises in scapegoating became epidemic last week. Solemnly, one political mahatma after another vouchsafed the economic insight that even though the price of oil in the ground may be rising, even though the price of gasoline at refineries may be rising, even though the price of gasoline futures traded on commodity exchanges may be rising, the price of gasoline in the tanks at gas stations must remain unchanged until it's all gone (which it soon will be). One Florida station owner told investigators exactly why he raised prices -- because he had too many customers. For his sensible honesty, he was named in the first lawsuit brought as part of the state's "gouging" dragnet.
In this cavalcade of ignorance and rascality, it's almost worth applauding those politicians who satisfied the urge to playact over gas prices by calling for the temporary suspension of fuel taxes. In principle, this would have no effect on the prices needed to balance supply and demand in the short term (though it might cause some shuffling of supplies from high-tax to low-tax states). But neither would it make victims out of small business owners, many of them immigrants, who operate a goodly portion of the nation's gas stations. So much of good politics is simply resisting the urge to do harm.
A word for the children, who may be shocked by this column's likening of our elected leaders to unappetizing creatures that live in weedy ponds and feed on decaying animal matter: We respect democracy; we honor the choices of voters by seating their elected representatives in legislatures and executive offices around the nation. That doesn't mean we have to admire the personal qualities of those so elected, and many of them have given us little to admire over the past week or two.
*from the Encyclopedia of Psychology, at psychology.org. |
Aesquire
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 - 10:04 pm: |
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My Dad has a Prius. He likes it. The electric bits add a lot of mass, ( nice in a rear end collision ) and enough power to more than balance the extra mass, and the underpowered Echo engine that's the gas part of the hybrid.
That "underpowered" comment comes from Dad, who's driven the Echo loaner while the Prius was in the shop. Not a bad car. IF the complicated nature needs no excess repairs, & the battery lasts, with $3+ gas payoff should be about when trade in time comes. maybe. Meanwhile, 40+ mpg isn't all bad.
Read "The Prize" a history of Oil. Better written & more sense than 90% of politicians comments, ever.
Are the evil oil companies price gouging? Since they show record profits year after year, one would think so. If profits are down in the wake of Katrina's forced reinvestment, then I'd say they are simply corporations responsible to their investors. If record profits show in the next 2 quarters? Ok, then they ARE evil money grubbers. Get back to me.
By the by, the last time I worked in a gas station, the owner would check the prices at the stations down the strip on the way in. We would then change to match more or less. She was an independent in a world of major chains. She also changed prices when the supply company ( that filled 1/2 the stations on the strip, by the way... name brand my butt. ) called to inform us of price changes.
Typical profits on gas are tiny, pennies a gallon. It's a loss leader to get people in to YOUR store ( not the guy across the street ) to spend too much on cigarettes & Beer. You have to make enough on THIS tank full to pay for the next. Some Station owners are pulling a momentary quick bundle. Can you tell which ones? Maybe you should vote with your pocketbook if the station jacks prices to absurd #'s. Use common sense. ( unlike our congress critters who are in a perpetual dishonest state of, look at me...love me...the other guys sucks. ) |
Reepicheep
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 - 11:14 pm: |
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I would not put much stock in the "profit" statements of any company. Lots of 'voodo' in there, and plenty of places to create 'losses' to make it look like a loosing quarter. Or the opposite.
I won't be alarmed until Road Thing starts talking about his summer home on the french riveria. |
M2me
| | Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2005 - 11:43 pm: |
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I do not want to subsidize a very questionable technology simply because the Green types think that it is cute (read hybrid).
Ummm, the fact is that ALL transportation is subsidized by the government and that means you if you pay taxes. Where does the bulk of transporation subsidy money go? To cars, automobiles, internal combustion technology. It's a fact! Who builds the whole infrastructure, roads, bridges, etc. so that these machines are useful? Who sets and enforces traffic laws so that the system is orderly? We all do through our taxes! Will free market capitalism take over all these costly tasks? Of course not! It's a no win situation. In order to make a profit at it you would have to charge so much that few people would actually use it. This is why government, through public money, finances it. Government does it because it greatly benefits the public even though it isn't profitable.
Is oil even a real problem? I don't think we and a lot of other Americans would be having this discussion if it wasn't. The days of cheap and easy oil are over. This doesn't mean that the sky is falling or that we will run out of oil in any of our lifetimes but we have to start looking at our consumption of oil and seriously start thinking about alternatives. We shouldn't wait for the market to solve it. The market will eventually solve it but the results will probably not be very pretty.
I don't think hybrids are "cute". I think they make a lot of sense. A lot more sense than pure electric or pure gasoline cars. What's cute about 37% better gas mileage? That isn't cute, that's great! |
Road_thing
| | Posted on Thursday, September 15, 2005 - 09:30 am: |
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Je n'ai pas de maison a la Riviera.
Tengo El Ranchito Chingadero!
rt |
Brucelee
| | Posted on Thursday, September 15, 2005 - 09:40 am: |
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m2
You continue to stray from the essential points I have addressed so I will restate one more time.
Government is involved in all these matters that you mention and I for one, am critical of the efficacy of those interventions. You yourself have been loudly critical of the energy bill and so have I, for different reasons. That example can be generalized if one likes, government "energy policy" is an oxymoron and any attempt to create one is doomed to failure in my opinion.
And therein lies the problem. The more government is involved, the more it makes choices for you and me that in my world, should be made by individuals. Bluntly, we make better choices for ourselves, thank you.
That is called freedom and responsibility.
As it stand now, the government has decided that a Prius is good and is taking money from my pocket and using it to lower the price of that car so that others will think it is good!
Toyota is happy with that, Brucelee is not.
Now, whether the hybrid is a good product depends on what you value. I rented one last year and hated it, wouldn't buy it no matter what the tax credit looked like.
But that is not the point. The point is that the hybrid should be allowed to develop in the marketplace without the US government lowering its price with my money. If the Prius makes it on its own, fine and dandy! If not, fine and dandy.
And back to the point of this thread, the US government already taxes gasoline quite nicely. I cannot see the logic of it heaping more tax upon this commodity when the price of the commodity has ALREADY started to diminish the demand for it, without an ounce of government intervention.
If you are going to debate issues, it is useful to stay on the issues. Bringing in so called subsidies to build roads is disingenuous or simply sloppy logic.
No one has disputed that government needs to build roads. That has never been the issue.
So, lets keep it to original topic. Tell me why the government adding taxes to our gasoline is going to be a superior method to allocate the scarce resource of gasoline than will be simple supply and demand economics?
Tell me why the US government deciding which type of car should win in the marketplace is a superior way to decide these things versus having consumers vote with their checkbooks.
BTW-should the US govt subsidize the cost of replacing those batteries in the Prius when they go bad? Where will we "recycle" all those old batteries someday.
Hint, the Greens haven't thought of all those old batteries to be disposed off. Imagine a country of 20 million of so hybrids.
Hmmmmmm! |
Brucelee
| | Posted on Thursday, September 15, 2005 - 10:45 am: |
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How price rations supply and demand!
A MINORITY VIEW
BY WALTER E. WILLIAMS
RELEASE: WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 2005, AND THEREAFTER
THE ROLE OF PRICES
Click here to Print |
The fallout from Hurricane Katrina has featured a lot of ignorance and demagoguery about prices. Let's look at some of it. One undeniable fact is that the hurricane disaster changed scarcity conditions. There are fewer stores, fewer units of housing, less gasoline and a shortage of many other goods and services used on a daily basis. Rising prices are not only a manifestation of these changed scarcity conditions, they help us cope, adjust and get us on the road to recovery.
Here's a which-is-better question for you. Suppose a hotel room rented for $79 a night prior to Hurricane Katrina's devastation. Based on that price, an evacuating family of four might rent two adjoining rooms. When they arrive at the hotel, they find the rooms rent for $200; they decide to make do with one room. In my book, that's wonderful. The family voluntarily opted to make a room available for another family who had to evacuate or whose home was destroyed. Demagogues will call this price-gouging, but I ask you, which is preferable: a room available at $200 or a room unavailable at $79? Rising prices get people to voluntarily economize on goods and services rendered scarcer by the disaster.
After Hurricane Katrina struck, gasoline prices shot up almost a dollar nearly overnight. Some people have been quick to call this price-gouging, particularly since wholesalers and retailers were charging the higher price for gasoline already purchased and in their tanks prior to the hurricane. The fact of business is that what a seller paid for something doesn't necessarily determine its selling price. Put in a bit more sophisticated way: Historical costs have nothing to do with selling price. For example, suppose you maintained a 10-pound inventory of coffee in your cupboard. When I ran out, you'd occasionally sell me a pound for $2. Suppose there's a freeze in Brazil destroying much of the coffee crop, driving coffee prices to $5 a pound. Then I come around to purchase coffee. Are you going to charge me $2 a pound, what you paid for it, or $5, what it's going to cost you to restock your coffee inventory?
What about the house that you might have purchased for $50,000 in 1970 that you're selling today? If you charged me $250,000 for it, today's price for its replacement, as opposed to what you paid for it, are you guilty of price-gouging?
Recovering from Katrina means resources will have to be moved to the Gulf Coast. I ask you, how does one get electricians, plumbers and other artisans to give up their comfortable homes and livelihoods in Virginia and Pennsylvania and travel to Mobile and New Orleans to help in the recovery? If you said pay them higher prices, go to the head of the class. Higher prices, along with windfall profits, are economic signals of unmet human wants. As such, they encourage producers to meet those human wants.
Politicians of both parties have rushed in to exploit public ignorance and emotion. Last week Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (Democrat) threatened to prosecute gas companies. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott (Republican) is threatening legal action against what he called "unconscionable pricing" by hotels. Alabama Attorney General Troy King (Republican) promises to vigorously prosecute businesses that significantly increase prices during the state of emergency. The Bush administration has called for the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission to look for evidence of price-gouging, and Congress plans to hold hearings on oil company "price-gouging."
There's an important downside to these political attacks on producers. What about the next disaster? How much sense does it make for producers to make the extra effort to provide goods and services if they know they risk prosecution for charging what might be seen as "unconscionable prices"? Politicians would serve us better by focusing their energies on tax-gouging.
Return to Articles Page |
M2me
| | Posted on Thursday, September 15, 2005 - 11:06 pm: |
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If you are going to debate issues, it is useful to stay on the issues. Bringing in so called subsidies to build roads is disingenuous or simply sloppy logic.
No, it isn't sloppy logic. The issue is the cost of gasoline/oil. What is one of the largest uses, the "demand" of gasoline/oil? Cars, automobiles, internal combustion driven machines. What gives these machines so much value and usefullness? The roads and highways. Who finances the roads and highways? We all do through our taxes, which are collected by government. It's public policy, driven by government, that has decided that cars should succeed by financing, through public monies collected from taxes, the building of roads and highways. This is not just a fact, but it's also very logical.
Is it a good long term public policy to continue to gulp oil like a drunken sailor on a 48 hour pass? Look at the chart that I posted in my original post on this thread to see the reality of how we compare to other industrialized countries. I don't think it's a good idea, economically, enviromentally, etc. How can we effect change? Wait for free market capitalism to correct it? Free market capitalism didn't create the situation in the first place. Public policy did! Don't you see the logic?
Call me naive, call me idealistic, call me a whacko, but I still believe that government in the United States is of the people, by the people and for the people. Government is not some inaccessible group of people who decide our fate behind locked doors. Government is us. We are the government!
Why don't you trust the people to do anything? It sounds like you only trust corporate America with the decisions that are vital to our future. Corporate America does make their decisions behind locked doors (unless you're a shareholder or a member of the board). That isn't how public policy in America should be set. It should be set by government, by our elected leaders. |
Az_m2
| | Posted on Friday, September 16, 2005 - 08:31 am: |
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Should the government offer tax credits to purchasers of motorcycles? All of mine get 40+mpg, some 50+. |
Ceejay
| | Posted on Friday, September 16, 2005 - 09:21 am: |
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If you are going that route-tax credits for high mpg #'s, then why not bicycles? Or those that live within 3 miles of thier job, or those that walk, or pay for buses for those that don't own or choose not to own cars? The list could go on and on. Hopefully the higher gas prices contribute to building of better more efficient cars, slowing/stopping suburban sprawl, and thus shutting up the folks that continually bitch about the habitat eradication of the spotted/horned/feathered/newt/gnat/osprey |
Brucelee
| | Posted on Friday, September 16, 2005 - 10:08 am: |
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"No, it isn't sloppy logic. The issue is the cost of gasoline/oil. What is one of the largest uses, the "demand" of gasoline/oil? Cars, automobiles, internal combustion driven machines. What gives these machines so much value and usefullness? The roads and highways. Who finances the roads and highways? We all do through our taxes, which are collected by government. It's public policy, driven by government, that has decided that cars should succeed by financing, through public monies collected from taxes, the building of roads and highways. This is not just a fact, but it's also very logical."
Yes, we have agreed through practice that it makes sense for govt to build roads that are financed by taxes. This has not been disputed but has nothing to do with the issues at hand which were:
A-Should government pick out certain cars to be winners and losers and to help sell those cars though tax credits to consumers.
B-Should government (instead of market forces) set price via new taxes on gas?
I vote no, you vote yes. I say let consumers decide this based on the true cost and features of the cars. As I pointed out and you ignored, currently hybrids are selling as fast as they can be made so tell me why this additional handout makes sense and why the government should be picking these winners and losers at the micro level?
Why do you think this is wiser than letting consumers vote with their own money?
"Is it a good long term public policy to continue to gulp oil like a drunken sailor on a 48 hour pass? Look at the chart that I posted in my original post on this thread to see the reality of how we compare to other industrialized countries. I don't think it's a good idea, economically, enviromentally, etc. How can we effect change? Wait for free market capitalism to correct it? Free market capitalism didn't create the situation in the first place. Public policy did! Don't you see the logic? "
You make many assumptions (because they suit your thesis) in the above. Factually the US uses more energy per capita than other nations. Factually, our standard of living, GDP, and other measures of OUTPUT with that energy also lead the world. I for one am NOT critical of our energy consumption, it is simply one of the factors needed to be who and what we are.
Moreover, you seem to assume that it was the government and its wisdom and leadership that lead us down the road to auto use etc etc.
If government spending could generate a shift like this, then we would all be going down to the railroad station right about now.
But no matter how much money the govt throws at mass transit, NO ONE WANTS TO RIDE ON IT!
Fact is we love our cars and PUBLIC POLICY has followed, not lead this trend.
"Call me naive, call me idealistic, call me a whacko, but I still believe that government in the United States is of the people, by the people and for the people. Government is not some inaccessible group of people who decide our fate behind locked doors. Government is us. We are the government! "
Yes, you are totally naive. Clearly you do not read the news! And was it not you that was highly critical of the recent energy bill? Is that YOUR energy bill?
Nor, did I ever suggest that "energy policy" should be left to corporations (who owns THOSE by the way?). That would be you and me!
The fact is that "we the people" ie consumers, are already changing our habits in response to prices. We need no help from the government to do so, we simply figure out what is best for us and do it. That is our energy policy and I trust that process a whole lot more that one driven by the Fed.
"Why don't you trust the people to do anything? It sounds like you only trust corporate America with the decisions that are vital to our future. Corporate America does make their decisions behind locked doors (unless you're a shareholder or a member of the board). That isn't how public policy in America should be set. It should be set by government, by our elected leaders."
Again, I have infinite trust in the people, It is you who suggested that we need to be told by the government what to do, which cars to buy.
Also you believe government should place additional taxes on our gas so we will do the "right thing" and cut back.
Frankly, it is YOU who do not trust the people.
BTW-I totally do trust corp. to do the right thing for their shareholders. That is why they are created. The cool thing is to do that, they MUST respond to consumer wants and demands or they will perish (Looks at Ford Motor as it struggles with having made the wrong cars and trucks).
That makes them MUCH more accountable than government, who by all measure will not go bankrupt not matter what policies or practices pursue.
Face it, if you really looked at the way that "policy" is arrived at within the governmental world, you would really not want these guys to do MORE! |
Brucelee
| | Posted on Friday, September 16, 2005 - 10:16 am: |
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As Az and Ceejay point out, once the government starts to pick winners and losers look out.
As you all know, we MC riders are NOT their favorites.
Soon we may need their permission to ride out "non essential vehicles" on THEIR roads. |
Brucelee
| | Posted on Friday, September 16, 2005 - 10:47 am: |
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http://www.cei.org/gencon/019,04830.cfm
If you want to see the best argument against more "energy policy and leadership" from Washington, read this!
(Message edited by brucelee on September 16, 2005) |
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