Gas Boycott

I hope all the people that voted for him are happy now. Everybody knows that oil prices are always politics and this plays right into his big game. Katrina was the icing on the cake since the Gulf Coast brings in a miniscule amount of our oil imports. Of course if people would stop trying to “keep up with the Jones’” with their SUV’s, we’d at least be using less gas and not contributing to smogging this planet to death (and I’m not even a Treehugger, although there is nothing wrong with being one lol).

Hmmm,

a few thoughts, I have heard many of these types of discussions since the ‘ 73 Iran oil embargo. I always hear the same old arguments dragged out of the closet, so the following is an answer to those ideas, not to any person today( Dan : ) ).

1.We have only had One car for the last 25 years. Kathy has never wanted a car and uses a bike full time and has walked the kids to school etc.
Each household should look into their own situation before denouncing society or trying to engineer the ‘stupid masses’ at large.

Maybe we should make everyone wear green army clothes, ride a bike, carry a little book of rules ( let’s color it red ) and take all the money and property away from private owners and give it all to the 10 leaders who can control the society and make all the decisions for everyone because they know better, and then hey we might even shoot a few who step out of the party line….

It’s not that riduculous as it has been done already and…. 100 million people died from communism, I think that is enough.

2.Public transport has been done in many cities and in those big industrial cities it is Always Broke( and subsidized by those who Legally pay taxes ), Always expensive to the rider ( for the last 40 years the NY systems have been expensive ), and many times results in much denser more crowded and more crime ridden populations ( brooklyn, queens, staten island, manhattan alone has 9 million people).

3The carpool lanes need to be opened up during commuting times. These lanes are from an outdated 70′s social engineering ( trying to force people to do things that some elitists came up with ) mentality that has failed. In the LA area we all don’t live in the same place and don’t all work in the same place.

4Oil and gas are high today due to the threat of Iran. Opec has stated that the price should be down around $ 45 per barrel from their supply side of the equation.
Also China and India are now competing with us for oil and driving the price higher.
The tv has programed so many to instantly blame the big bad business man,– ‘oh its those greedy bastard oil companies.’

5There are not enough refineries, I believe because of the environmentalists have fought the building of them. That will change when the price gets higher.

6We are in a major economic interest rate cycle. Commodities are now coming up in price and will continue to do so. The US government, no matter if it’s rep or dem, will have very little effect.

Either we will have a major recession or a depression by 2013, then recover and economically prosper, IF the world is still going.

Ya, I am with you: a one day gas boycott will accomplish nothing, or at least nothing positive. I know that the idea is that their schedules will still be disrupted and screw them up, even if people go back and buy it the next day instead, but (#1) that will only happen if very large numbers of people actually participate, and (#2) if it is effective enough to cause them a big enough inconvenience or added cost, they will simply pass that cost of preparing for that sort of thing in the future on to us in the form of even higher prices.

I agree that the real solution is to cut down the actual amount of driving you’re doing, day to day. I’d love to see a huge expansion of public transportation options and availability here in socal. The problem has always been that people around here seem to be to “independent” to do anything other than take their own cars to go anywhere. Just look at the carpool lanes on the freeways, which are largely either unused or at least underutilized. There’s an easy solution to “encourage” (push) people towards public transportation, though: raise prices and/or tax gasoline like crazy while at the same time using the additional income from that to subsidize public transportation to make it extremely cheap and widely available.

Dave:

It’s not that riduculous as it has been done already and…. 100 million people died from communism, I think that is enough.

The US government, no matter if it’s rep or dem, will have very little effect.

WTF? Why must you bring your agenda into this?

IF the world is still going.

Is that a reference to the rapture or the result of the corrupt leaders of the world not caring about the earth?

#Carpool lanes should be increased to only piss the single occupancy cars off even more and make them realize there is another solution.

#Iran means nothing right now. I would believe more that the administration is pushing this _____ to the media for an excuse so the oil companies can raise the gas prices rather then Iran being a real threat.

#Public transport is more effective financially and civilly then you think. NY is such a poor example for you to bring up. What about other cities or countries that rely on it.

All your other points just try to sway this conversation into the depths of right wing hell so I rather not go with you on that.

in the 70s Iran greatly influenced the flow of oil, If they stop exporting today for even a month, the price of oil will shoot over $ 100 per barrel. This scenario is very likely IMHO for this year.

Dan, no flames ok,

remember I said it wasn’t about a person on the blog…

” if the world is still going ”
* the last major economic recession/depression brought about major change and the rise of communism. WWII happened, today if there is a major economic collapse then there will be war and war in this modern age could be really really bad, that is all I meant.

“The US government, no matter if it’s rep or dem, will have very little effect” … on large economic cycles
* this above is totally about the price of oil, we are in the beginning of a major economic cycle that
includes oil prices going up. so it germain to the discussion.

*carpooling has failed and will continue to

*iran is everything ( it has nothing to do with bush and is about Isreal ) and will keep driving up the price as long as the nutball pres
keeps talking about ” wiping Isreal off the map ” ( you must have seen that on the internet
at least ).

* the whole communism discussion is because when people start with the social engineering talk its always about what they think others should be doing according to Them.

*public transport has failed to pay for itself. in every major city it is subsidized and in the east it is expensive. Chi, up and down the east coast. So, I think you can pay at the pump or pay with taxes. Paying with taxes means getting the government involved which is always more expensive.

*

Man, this conversation is going all over the place. I’ll try to be brief and, in doing so, will probably miss responding to some of the points.

Carpooling is only ineffective because so many people can still afford not to do it; so when that changes it will become a much more attractive option.

Relating mass transport to crime and/or crowding is absolutely ridiculous. Manhattan was crowded for a long time, and the train system was designed to address that problem, the crime/crowding wasn’t created by it.

Like I said above, you could easily make public transportation cheaper by subsidizing it even more, via additional taxes on gasoline that will push people towards more environmentally conscious ways of living.

Don’t even start saying that trying to “force” people to live in a more environmentally conscious way is akin to some sort of repressive governmental regime. Governments (including the ones you admire) force people to live in certain ways via the law all the time. People generally regard murder and rape as bad things, and any decent government will have laws against them (which curtail “freedom” to some degree, if you want to call it that) for the better interests of the society. If you believe that destroying the environment is a bad thing (which I do), then it stands to reason that the government should attempt to prevent people from doing it.

Similarly, there are also good and necessary things that any decent government must do (public school, fire and police departments, etc.) which must be funded by taxes, and I doubt that you would argue with that. So don’t say (or imply) that taxes are *never* the answer. Sure, you may disagree with some particular thing or another that they are used to pay for, as well as the bureaucratic incompetence that results in a lot of that money being wasted, but the solution to that is to reform the system, making it more efficient, not to completely dismiss the concept of taxes as evil. It might also help to cut back on some truly out of hand expenses, like military spending, which is currently more than double what we spend on health care and education combined (even with all those so-called “illegals” supposedly sucking our economy dry in those areas).

If you have a group in charge of managing money, and they are corrupt and doing it poorly, the proper response is to fire them and create a structure that will manage the money better, not to say that we need less (or no) money management at all.

I see no problem with making gasoline carry a heavy “sin tax”, just like cigarettes and tobacco do, as long as there are other public transportation options available, which can be funded by the escalating taxes on gas, as well as better all around money management.

I do agree with you that it would be great for people to remove their dependency on gasoline to power their own vehicles. Of course, I believe that public transportation is by far the fastest and easiest way towards this goal, but I’d also love to see alternative energy sources explored with much more effort.

Solar energy is certainly one piece of the puzzle, but it has not advanced to the point that individual people would be able to power the daily use of their cars exclusively by the power provided from a solar apparatus that would fit within their property, especially people who live in more condensed areas (apartments, etc.) Personally, I feel that nuclear power is an absolute necessity and it will be come apparent in the next few decades. Of course, we must continue to explore this most efficient means of energy production with a great deal of precaution and find creative ways to deal with the waste produced (like putting it into space).

Forcing people thru taxation ( to get them to feel pain) is so old and all it does is waste money except for the people who work for the government at the new agency to manage it.

I like the your idea of a mpg tie in somehow to the price, Dan.

We have over 1 Trillion barrels of oil in western colorado. shell oil has perfected a way to get it out safely.
Right now we get more oil from Canada than saudi.

Either get solar or the fuel cell online to kiss the mid-east oil barons goodbye and then turn around and sell them food and blankets.

Radioactive waste on the backside of the moon would never hurt anyone and would solve the biggest problem with Nuclear power.

I do believe with everything else you said except the taxation of gas simply because most product transport relies on gas which then effects everyone’s pocket and not just the luxurious people who can afford to fill up their H2. It also doesn’t help too much with the people who just can’t help but drive by themselves.

Something extremely complicated that could work better would be gas prices that change on the relation to the price and MPG of your car. Similar to tax breaks for hybrids and vehicle registration fees.

Forcing people thru taxation ( to get them to feel pain) is so old and all it does is waste money except for the people who work for the government at the new agency to manage it.

I like the your idea of a mpg tie in somehow to the price, Dan.

We have over 1 Trillion barrels of oil in western colorado. shell oil has perfected a way to get it out safely.
Right now we get more oil from Canada than saudi.

Either get solar or the fuel cell online to kiss the mid-east oil barons goodbye and then turn around and sell them food and blankets.

I never suggested that SUVs should be eliminated. Perhaps you should read my comment again, but this time, try to take off the “right-wing” shaded glasses that attempt to categorize people into having a boxed set of opinions that lead you to assume things that I never said. Just because you think of “lefties” or “liberals” (or whatever you labels you want to make for people) as having a stereotypical set of beliefs, by no means makes that accurate.

I said there should be laws that prevent people (as much as possible) from destroying the environment. I stated clearly that I don’t think that measures should be taken to reduce individual driving without providing a viable alternative (in public transportation) that we currently do not have available to us.

There are no other options (trains, buses, carpools) available for me personally to get to work. If there were, I would use them. Instead, I have a very economical car that gets pretty good gas mileage. If you’re saying that simply because our family also owns an SUV, that means I have a “do as I say not as I do” attitude, then I’d point out again that you weren’t reading my comment very well, but rather reading a number of things into it.

Dan has mentioned the fact that there are successful public transportation systems all over the world; I didn’t see the need to repeat that fact, especially since it probably wouldn’t change Dave’s mind anyway. Dave’s argument that in many cases public transportation systems aren’t *profitable* is irrelevant to this discussion in my opinion. Public services (like the ones I listed above) rarely “pay for themselves”; that was my point. If they are deemed necessary, then they can and should be paid for (or at least subsidized) by tax money; that’s what it’s there for.

The idea that getting the government to be in charge of something is automatically bad is incorrect, in my opinion. I’ll be the first to admit (and already did above) that there is rampant mismanagement and needless levels of bureaucracy in government today, but as I said above, the solution to *poor* money management isn’t *less* (or more) money management, but rather *better* money management.

Well, you don’t quite have it “straight”, since I don’t think anything that’s been spun that much could really be considered straight. You got some of my ideas down, but obviously I would present them in a more positive light.

I do feel that the government should arrange for an infrastructure of public transportation that will end up being cheaper and more environmentally conscious for everyone in the long run than what we are doing now. I do also feel that to put such a system in place would require a huge amount of finances, and I have absolutely no problems with raising taxes in all sorts of ways (including gasoline, at a rate that increases with the local availability of public transportation options, so as to alleviate the economic burden you refer to).

There’s plenty of money out there to be had. The necessary funds can come from a variety of sources. A big one would be the streamlining and trimming of the current mess of bureaucratic management (which I would think we would agree on, but maybe not). Others would include cutting all kinds of unnecessary spending in some areas (the specifics of which I’m sure we and everyone else would disagree over endlessly), as well as increasing taxes. We complain an awful lot about taxes, but we don’t really pay that much relative to a lot of the rest of the world. I obviously also feel that the wealthy should pay a much higher percentage of their income in taxes than the poor. A rollback of the recent tax cuts for the rich would be a good start, and I would even favor increases which would cut down into my income level, because I believe that it’s a necessary thing to do.

I never suggested that government should be “bigger”, just better managed, but I’m not surprised that the phrase came up, since it seems to be the generic scripted response to any suggestion of tax increases or government managed programs. I could be similarly ridiculous and suggest that since “big government is evil” we should do away with it altogether, and that, as a proponent of “the people being empowered to spend their own money rather than the government spending it for them”, you may be adopting a hypocritical stance when you drive on the roads that you do every day, or when you “support our troops”, since those things are paid for by a whole lot of tax money.

As for cataloging the public transportation systems around the world, I don’t really have time to do that right now; try Google. You already listed Tokyo as a good example; whether or not there are more good than bad overall (or vice versa) is irrelevant. Personally, my experience with the Manhattan subway system was pretty good too, despite Dave’s negative reviews. Sure, it could be improved, and that’s exactly the kind of change that I’m proposing. I think a rail system in LA would be great too, so I’m not sure what the argument is as far as that goes.

Also, just to be clear, I should state that I am aware of the fact that the solutions I propose are somewhat idealistic, I just don’t let that stop me from suggesting them anyway.

Lest you think I’m insane, I do, in fact realize that reform on such a level would be pretty much impossible in our politically polarized climate. It’s much more likely that whatever our energy & environmental solutions end up being reactive rather than proactive, since no one will ever agree to do anything until we’re forced to do *something*, at which point it will be too late for a lot of the better options to even be on the table.

Well, you don’t quite have it “straight”, since I don’t think anything that’s been spun that much could really be considered straight. You got some of my ideas down, but obviously I would present them in a more positive light.

I do feel that the government should arrange for an infrastructure of public transportation that will end up being cheaper and more environmentally conscious for everyone in the long run than what we are doing now. I do also feel that to put such a system in place would require a huge amount of finances, and I have absolutely no problems with raising taxes in all sorts of ways (including gasoline, at a rate that increases with the local availability of public transportation options, so as to alleviate the economic burden you refer to).

There’s plenty of money out there to be had. The necessary funds can come from a variety of sources. A big one would be the streamlining and trimming of the current mess of bureaucratic management (which I would think we would agree on, but maybe not). Others would include cutting all kinds of unnecessary spending in some areas (the specifics of which I’m sure we and everyone else would disagree over endlessly), as well as increasing taxes. We complain an awful lot about taxes, but we don’t really pay that much relative to a lot of the rest of the world. I obviously also feel that the wealthy should pay a much higher percentage of their income in taxes than the poor. A rollback of the recent tax cuts for the rich would be a good start, and I would even favor increases which would cut down into my income level, because I believe that it’s a necessary thing to do.

I never suggested that government should be “bigger”, just better managed, but I’m not surprised that the phrase came up, since it seems to be the generic scripted response to any suggestion of tax increases or government managed programs. I could be similarly ridiculous and suggest that since “big government is evil” we should do away with it altogether, and that, as a proponent of “the people being empowered to spend their own money rather than the government spending it for them”, you may be adopting a hypocritical stance when you drive on the roads that you do every day, or when you “support our troops”, since those things are paid for by a whole lot of tax money.

As for cataloging the public transportation systems around the world, I don’t really have time to do that right now; try Google. You already listed Tokyo as a good example; whether or not there are more good than bad overall (or vice versa) is irrelevant. Personally, my experience with the Manhattan subway system was pretty good too, despite Dave’s negative reviews. Sure, it could be improved, and that’s exactly the kind of change that I’m proposing. I think a rail system in LA would be great too, so I’m not sure what the argument is as far as that goes.

google — Dr. M. KIng Hubbert for the secret answer to the rising prices.

Join the cause that will make a difference, but it can’t
succeed without your help. Go to http://www.bobcooks.com and
click on the gas girlcott or gas boycott link. Forget
nucular, oil, gas and coal – now is the time for
alternative energy, with wind, solar and geothermal
leading the way. The earth will be happier and we can
live with that.

Bob from Buffalo

I am sorry if this is in the wrong place or wrong group.
Acting Together Will Make A Difference! visit http://www.end2crazygasprice.com now!
Our objective is to Force the gas companies to lower their gas price by asking the consumers in Canada and in the United States NOT TO PURCHASE ANY GAS from the selected gas companies posted below. We can have a significant impact on the price of gas IF WE ACT TOGETHER to initiate a GAS PRICE WAR!!! So Please Start The Boycott Now!
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