"Tinkerntom" wrote in message
oups.com...


Conserve is good. Alternative fuel sourse is good. Again do you have
any practical "black and white" suggestions.

Well. considering that *every single nation in the world* seems to be able
to conserve more than we do, its a simple task to look at them and get some
"black and white" suggestions from their examples. I owned an SUV in Latvia
that got 30 mpg. The same model and make in the US gets 16. Whats wrong with
this picture? Almost every major city in Europe has an effective and
efficient mass transit system. Why not put more effort into that? Many
countries place a high sales surcharge on vehicles that get poor mileage, or
do not sell them at all. Danes have electric cars. The French ride bicycyles
a lot. The Norwegians like to ski to work. The Dutch recycle their own
glassware to buy milk and products wholesale, saving on manufacturing fuels.
There are only about a trillion "black and white" suggestions all over the
world....everywhere except the US. And all those countries I mentioned pay
over $5 a gallon for fuel, and barely any of their citizens complain about
it because they don't use so much for personal consumption.

Oh, but if your meaning is "give me some black and white suggestions that
don't actually involve me changing my lifestyle at all", then you may be out
of luck. Buy one of the electric gizmos that help you lose weight while you
eat pizza and watch TV. Let me know how it goes.

To do all this while we
have reserves to carry us through transition is wise, But who says we
are wise. Usually we wait until the situation is critical, and then
think that if we throw enough money at it we can fix anything. Maybe
when the price of oil gets high enough, we will be able to develope oil
shale, or coal.

How high is too high of a price? We are already debating drilling in
pristine areas that we used to feel were deserving of protection. And just
to get a supply of oil that will temporarily lessen our dependancy on
foreign imports by 4%, based on today's consumption. There is more to the
cost of oil than the price at the pump. With the current attitude of "I
never go there, lets drill in it", we have already passed the limit that I'm
willing to pay.

So the real question comes down to how much are you willing to pay for
a gallon of gas, in order to keep driving.

No it doesn't. It comes down to how much are you willing to sacrifice in
order to avoid doing something that you are going to have to stop doing
eventually anyway. The reserves won't last forever....even if the money
does. If we want to keep driving, its not a matter of coming up with more
money....its a matter of doing what everyone else is doing. Conserve,
diversify, get a little less stupid about it. Maybe get out of the US a bit
and see how easy everyone else makes it look. And then gaze back over the
big pond and notice that you suddenly don't feel so entitled to a gas
guzzler, and driving the 2 blocks to the store for a coke, or heating your
entire factory day and night, or selling 'muscle cars', or having a highway
full of cars with one person in them, or being 'too bothered' to take the
bus. Or a million other "black and white" things.

There's none so blind as those who refuse to see.

--riverman