Why gas needs to hit $10 a gallon
...Because people are dumb asses.
It's the old "boil-the-frog" story: as long as the price of gas goes up just enough to be uncomfortable each time but not excruciatingly painful, people will piss and moan for a few weeks, then continue to drive their Hummers and Lincoln Navigators.
<begin old-fart mode>I remember being in high school and paying thirty cents a gallon. After getting out of college, the first Energy Crisis hit. Gas sky-rocketed to a buck a gallon and it was as if the apocalypse had begun: odd and even day rationing, lines of cars snaking around the block, people generally convinced the fall of civilization was eminent.</end old-fart mode>
The way I look at it, if people in honkin' big pickups are still whizzing past me on the freeway during my morning commute, gas prices haven't gotten expensive enough.
I realize these outrageous prices affect me, too, but I feel a little like the woman who found the genie in the bottle and was told by the genie she could wish for anything but that her ex-husband got twice whatever she wished for.
After a few minutes thought, she said, "Beat me half to death."
It's the old "boil-the-frog" story: as long as the price of gas goes up just enough to be uncomfortable each time but not excruciatingly painful, people will piss and moan for a few weeks, then continue to drive their Hummers and Lincoln Navigators.
<begin old-fart mode>I remember being in high school and paying thirty cents a gallon. After getting out of college, the first Energy Crisis hit. Gas sky-rocketed to a buck a gallon and it was as if the apocalypse had begun: odd and even day rationing, lines of cars snaking around the block, people generally convinced the fall of civilization was eminent.</end old-fart mode>
The way I look at it, if people in honkin' big pickups are still whizzing past me on the freeway during my morning commute, gas prices haven't gotten expensive enough.
I realize these outrageous prices affect me, too, but I feel a little like the woman who found the genie in the bottle and was told by the genie she could wish for anything but that her ex-husband got twice whatever she wished for.
After a few minutes thought, she said, "Beat me half to death."
Comments
In old-fart-joint-reminiscence mode: Well, the first time those price went up was a little earlier -- you were still in college (I was hitchhiking). Arab oil embargo (after the '73 Yom Kippur War). 65 cents a gallon, the lines, the rationing, and the rest. Then they went down. Then yeah, up to a buck. And then they came down and stayed down for a long, long, long time.
I've had a recurring fantasy about taking out a Hummer or two with anti-tank missiles. But I think this way might be more satisfying.
My yardstick: one should not own a car any bigger than one can push when it's out of gas.
I appreciated your effort at HTML Old Fart Mode.
You apparently didn't code something properly, because it didn't come out as ALL CAPS, THE WAY MOST EMAILS FROM PEOPLE OVER 65 ARE GENERALLY WRITTEN.