Seriously, People Voted For This Moron?

[CuteOldGuy]

She wasn't talking about cheaper gas. You're as bad as WTF at making up facts.

[blue3122]

Originally Posted by waverunner234

Let's just say that solar, wind and watercraft energy is a lot better for your health.
And maybe it is more expensive at the moment, we'll get used to it.
There are many countries where gas prices are $8-9 per gallon or more, and many of those countries do a lot better than the US. They just got used to a higher price.
Think of Germany, Netherlands, Dnmark, Norway, Zweden

Completely off base here when it comes to alternative. The cost is more like 20-50 times what we pay for conventional, if you include subsidies (which any person who is paying taxes would). If we could cover the entire US with Solar panels and windmills, we would still only produce 20% of what we need. Also, in most European countries, a "long" drive is considered to be more than 20 miles. They use far less fuel just because those are smaller countries. Personally, I am in favor of $5/gallon fuel tax here but it would be horribly regressive. It might finally force us to come to the nuclear electricity/natural gas automotive solution.

[essence]

Originally Posted by Fast Gunn

As for Europe getting used to $9/gal gasoline, I think that would kill our way of life in the USA.

So how did the Europeans do it?

Basically, by lowering their standard of living and driving cartoon cars with lawn-mower engines!

. . . I would never give up my souped-up Batmobile for one of those goofy little cars!

Anybody who writes the above tosh is in no position to be on a thread discussing stupidity.

I always love it when the people who complain most about gas prices are the worst drivers - they accelerate fast off the lights, and brake heavily at the lights. they are too stupid to see that if the lights 200 yards away have just turned red, they can coast along at 30 mph and break gently.

I was driving a Fiat 100 in Houston the other day. Got a lot of admiring looks from hot girls, wanting to see if they should ask daddy (me!) to buy one for them. Not my choice, only rent car available, but it made me think of the opportunities to give test drives.

Some people are stuck in the '50's. Lawnmowers are the new black. Stupid is using a big truck to go round the corner to get groceries. Absolutely blind ignorant stupid.

[waverunner234]

Originally Posted by Fast Gunn

As for Europe getting used to $9/gal gasoline, I think that would kill our way of life in the USA.

So how did the Europeans do it?

It is several things that work together.

1. A job in those countries involves a work contract. It's hard to get laid off once you have the job, so it makes more sense to move to a place close to work.
2. Most of the high price is tax, which is used to develop public transportation systems that are only comparable to what we have in New York City. Much less need for a car. Most families share 1 car.
3. Americans are lazy, need the car to drive from one place in the shopping center to the next place in the same shopping center, just one parking lot further down the road.
4. Americans waiting in their car with running engines in the line at the drive through for lunch, the most idiot thing I've seen in my life.

And I can think of a few more situations where we use way more energy than needed.

Edit: I almost forgot, they also have a system that the comparable costs for public transportation to and from work are usually tax free reimbursed by the employer, and if not (for small companies) those costs are tax deductible. From the principle: the costs that you make to earn your living are a tax deduction.

[joe bloe]

Originally Posted by Fast Gunn

Just because you disagree with her point of view, does not make her stupid.

I have not delved into the issue, but she does make some strong points about lead, arsenic and mercury.

. . . I think you are just trying to stir up some shit as is your wont.

Barbara Boxer is famously stupid. I know because I delved into it. Here's one example of her stupidity. There are many more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTUK2f-xIVo

[robin hood]

Originally Posted by CuteOldGuy

She wasn't talking about cheaper gas. You're as bad as WTF at making up facts.

Now that's a quote worth remembering.

[I B Hankering]

Originally Posted by joe bloe

Barbara Boxer is famously stupid. I know because I delved into it. Here's one example of her stupidity. There are many more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTUK2f-xIVo

+1

[joe bloe]

Originally Posted by TexTushHog

First, you are wrong. She's quite bright. I've met her on several occasions dating back to when she was in the House of Representatives. She has a degree in economics and is whip smart.

As for the numbers, they are not "made up." It's called epidemiology and Industrial hygiene. You figure out who much cheaper gasoline would be using basic supply and demand modeling, use the elasticity curve of gasoline to determine how much more gasoline would be used because of the lower price, and then use basic environmental models to predict increased pollution and mortality from increased gasoline usage. How else do you think cost benefit analysis is done?

So using less gasoline will save lives? That's a totally specious argument. By that "logic" we would be better off going to back to horse and buggy days.

Just think about it; air polution would be greatly reduced, which would no doubt save thousands of lives. No one would die in car wrecks; that would save thousands more.

Mark Twain said there are three kinds of lies. There's lies. There's damn lies; and then there's statistics. You can use statistics to "prove" anything, no matter how absurd.

[waverunner234]

Originally Posted by joe bloe

we would be better off going to back to horse and buggy days.

Maybe we would, much less complicated

[Iaintliein]

Originally Posted by essence

Anybody who writes the above tosh is in no position to be on a thread discussing stupidity.

I always love it when the people who complain most about gas prices are the worst drivers - they accelerate fast off the lights, and brake heavily at the lights. they are too stupid to see that if the lights 200 yards away have just turned red, they can coast along at 30 mph and break gently.

I was driving a Fiat 100 in Houston the other day. Got a lot of admiring looks from hot girls, wanting to see if they should ask daddy (me!) to buy one for them. Not my choice, only rent car available, but it made me think of the opportunities to give test drives.

Some people are stuck in the '50's. Lawnmowers are the new black. Stupid is using a big truck to go round the corner to get groceries. Absolutely blind ignorant stupid.

Actually, stupid is being in a Fiat that is hit by the big truck going around the corner. That isn't blind, that's something I've seen and wish I hadn't. If you feel that you have to defend the European way of life, go ahead, but ad homonym attacks aren't arguments (well, maybe they are in Europe).

[I B Hankering]

Yes! Let us all return to the idyllic, pre-automobile days. Those were pristine days in Chicago, San Francisco and New York at the turn of the 19th-20th century. Pedestrians enjoyed the equestrian aroma and the sensuous sensation of being mired in horseshit to their ankles on inclement days and—when the drying warmth of spring and summer permitted—the tufts of wind that spread equestrian filth into shops and homes; which liberally dusted kitchens, food, furniture, bedrooms, bed sheets, clothing, lips, nasal passages and eyes with a fine, pestilent-harboring film of powdered horseshit. BTW, the first “terrorist attack” on Wall Street occurred at 12:01 p.m. on Thursday, September 16, 1920 using a horse-drawn wagon.

They're still looking for the VIN # on the horse.

[waverunner234]

Like you said, Idillic

especially when you don't mentione the shit.

[Iaintliein]

Wait a minute, people are worried about lead (tetra ethyl lead hasn't been used in gasoline in a very long time), and mercury (yet agree to forced utilization of florescent light bulbs)? Oh yea, their leftists, never-mind.

[essence]

Originally Posted by Iaintliein

Actually, stupid is being in a Fiat that is hit by the big truck going around the corner. That isn't blind, that's something I've seen and wish I hadn't. If you feel that you have to defend the European way of life, go ahead, but ad homonym attacks aren't arguments (well, maybe they are in Europe).

Well, we can argue about who is most stupid till the cows come home, who is the stupid one, the one in the fiat or the blind one in the truck who can;t keep lane discipline? if you are going to use Latin, at least spell it correctly. It is ad hominem. The fact that you can't spell it shows that anything you ever have or ever will say is worthless.

False arguments? I must go back to the great neglected book

http://neglectedbooks.com/Straight_a...d_Thinking.pdf

See the appendices in particular. But wouldn;t arguing lose all its fun if you followed all the rules?

To set the record clear - most of what has been written about the situation in Europe above is completely false, certainly in the UK. Jobs for life disappeared a long time ago, you cannot claim commuting or driving to normal place of work as an expense or tax deductible.

[I B Hankering]

Originally Posted by essence

Lawnmowers are the new black.

Would you please explain this colloquialism. It is new to me.