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Just a thought…
It’s funny how the Blue States tend to have the highest gas prices. Could it be that they… in the most part… have the highest state by state taxes on gas too. (California was the first to have regular gas go over $3.00 per gallon at the pumps. If I got this right… the state of California also has the 2nd or 3rd highest taxes on gas in the United States of America with New York and Hawaii running right up there with them.)
How much do you already pay in taxes on gas where you live???
I for one do not want to see any more taxes on gas in my state…
AubreyJ………
Honestly, i think the blue states realize that gas needs to be taxed a bit more because of how fast we’re going through it. Also, those states tend to have more dense metropolitan populations which necessitates taxes that encourage people to take public transportation. Red states are more likely to have fewer gas taxes and “sin” taxes because they’re politically unpopular and feel Unamerican.
I saw the “We Were Warned” presentation on CNN last night and after the panicky apocalyptic hurricane + al qaida = the end of America bit, they had a really cool segment on the use of sugar cane ethanol in Brazil. Apparently the government didn’t just get behind a push towards energey independence, they mandated it. In the late 1970′s after all the fuel crises and shortages, Brazil turned to sugar cane and now upwards of 40% of all fuel in that country is made of ethanol. The factory/farm that they went to for the segment makes enough ethanol to fuel 11,000 cars a day every day out of sugar cane. And the fiber that isn’t used to make sugar or ethanol is burned to fuel the refining process. So here’s a decades-old technology that is relatively cheap, completely renewable, clean, and obviously it works. So why aren’t we using it (even as just a supplement to petroleum) in the US?
Yes, it’s a good thing that prices are going up, because that will bring new, cleaner energy technologies online. There are plenty of good reasons why we don’t want to burn oil for everything.
I think it is a good thing that we are finally looking at alternative fuels to replace oil, but we will suffer mightily as a result of our inadequate planning, and inability to respond to dwindling oil supplies. We’ve known like the Brazilians that oil would become a scarce commodity since the gas lines of the ’70′s. Back then anyone who advocated solar or wind power was viewed as a lefty environmentalist, and very little investment was made in alternative fuel sources. Thirty years later we are paying for it.
We have a hidebound failing auto industry still cranking out gas guzzlers, commuters still loving their SUV’s, long-term political instability in the Middle East as a result of alliance with repressive regimes that allowed us access to cheap oil, and leadership that bows to the oil industry, giving it generous tax cuts, and going so far as to allow oil execs to write our national energy policy. Even GWB has had to admit that our oil addiction is dragging down our country. My point is that the shock at the pump that consumers are experiencing could have been avoided by better planning and much greater investment in alternative technologies. those technologies are about twenty years away-can we afford to wait that long???
My main concern right now is that it’s happening before we’re ready for it. Yes, this shock can be a good thing because it will force us to look into alternative fuels that, as a side benefit, tend to be more environmentally friendly.
What scares me, as was already mentioned, is that it’s happening so quickly and it’s happening before we’re ready with the alternatives. This is going to hit us hard because we’re so heavily dependent on oil and we’re not even close to being ready to get ourselves off that dependence. Had we learned our lessons from 30 years ago, the current concern, which may very well reach crisis stage before this summer is over, could have been a non-issue.
The positive side of this is that, unless history repeats itself (which there is a risk of this), this issue will leave us with an infrastructure that is not as dependent on one energy source in the future and is also more environmentally friendly. The negative side of it, though, is that we very possibly won’t have time to move away from oil before this becomes an outright crisis.
I found the following comment from kritter interesting:
Back then anyone who advocated solar or wind power was viewed as a lefty environmentalist…
How is that any different than now? At this very moment, there’s a debate around here about building wind farms. Don’t think the “lefty environmentalist” term is not being used by some to describe nearly anyone supportive of the wind farms.
The difference is that this administration is now going to have to respond to the current energy crisis by listening to the lefty environmentalists! Did you ever think you would hear GWB advocating conservation and alternative energy sources?
As for these increases coming too suddenly, I think that’s the only way our country would take action to cut our oil consumption. Dire warnings of global warming with pictures of drowning polar bears will never have the impact that paying $3.15 for a gallon of regular at the pump will have.
In a perfect world, we could have forseen that the era of cheap gas wasn’t going to last forever, that we were too dependent upon a commodity originating from an unstable part of the world where our interference was making us increasingly unpopular, and made gradual changes. Our free market economy and our reactive leadership in the white house and in Congress circumvented this option. I really believe that if Big Oil had no political influence we would be much further along in developing alternative energy sources. It is extremely unfortunate for us that we are so unprepared for what lies ahead. Our addiction to oil has already perverted our foreign and environmental policies. Just imagine if we could have put the money we have spent and are spending in Iraq in R &D for hydrogen fuel cells or improving hybrid technology!
In addition to increasing gas prices, electricity just went up in my area 72%! Does anyone else worry about a world-wide recession?
Just a thought…
It’s funny how the Blue States tend to have the highest gas prices. Could it be that they… in the most part… have the highest state by state taxes on gas too. (California was the first to have regular gas go over $3.00 per gallon at the pumps. If I got this right… the state of California also has the 2nd or 3rd highest taxes on gas in the United States of America with New York and Hawaii running right up there with them.)
How much do you already pay in taxes on gas where you live???
I for one do not want to see any more taxes on gas in my state…
AubreyJ………
Honestly, i think the blue states realize that gas needs to be taxed a bit more because of how fast we’re going through it. Also, those states tend to have more dense metropolitan populations which necessitates taxes that encourage people to take public transportation. Red states are more likely to have fewer gas taxes and “sin” taxes because they’re politically unpopular and feel Unamerican.
Oh Lord…
AubreyJ………
I saw the “We Were Warned” presentation on CNN last night and after the panicky apocalyptic hurricane + al qaida = the end of America bit, they had a really cool segment on the use of sugar cane ethanol in Brazil. Apparently the government didn’t just get behind a push towards energey independence, they mandated it. In the late 1970′s after all the fuel crises and shortages, Brazil turned to sugar cane and now upwards of 40% of all fuel in that country is made of ethanol. The factory/farm that they went to for the segment makes enough ethanol to fuel 11,000 cars a day every day out of sugar cane. And the fiber that isn’t used to make sugar or ethanol is burned to fuel the refining process. So here’s a decades-old technology that is relatively cheap, completely renewable, clean, and obviously it works. So why aren’t we using it (even as just a supplement to petroleum) in the US?
Yes, it’s a good thing that prices are going up, because that will bring new, cleaner energy technologies online. There are plenty of good reasons why we don’t want to burn oil for everything.
However, that doesn’t mean I have to like it!
I think it is a good thing that we are finally looking at alternative fuels to replace oil, but we will suffer mightily as a result of our inadequate planning, and inability to respond to dwindling oil supplies. We’ve known like the Brazilians that oil would become a scarce commodity since the gas lines of the ’70′s. Back then anyone who advocated solar or wind power was viewed as a lefty environmentalist, and very little investment was made in alternative fuel sources. Thirty years later we are paying for it.
We have a hidebound failing auto industry still cranking out gas guzzlers, commuters still loving their SUV’s, long-term political instability in the Middle East as a result of alliance with repressive regimes that allowed us access to cheap oil, and leadership that bows to the oil industry, giving it generous tax cuts, and going so far as to allow oil execs to write our national energy policy. Even GWB has had to admit that our oil addiction is dragging down our country. My point is that the shock at the pump that consumers are experiencing could have been avoided by better planning and much greater investment in alternative technologies. those technologies are about twenty years away-can we afford to wait that long???
My main concern right now is that it’s happening before we’re ready for it. Yes, this shock can be a good thing because it will force us to look into alternative fuels that, as a side benefit, tend to be more environmentally friendly.
What scares me, as was already mentioned, is that it’s happening so quickly and it’s happening before we’re ready with the alternatives. This is going to hit us hard because we’re so heavily dependent on oil and we’re not even close to being ready to get ourselves off that dependence. Had we learned our lessons from 30 years ago, the current concern, which may very well reach crisis stage before this summer is over, could have been a non-issue.
The positive side of this is that, unless history repeats itself (which there is a risk of this), this issue will leave us with an infrastructure that is not as dependent on one energy source in the future and is also more environmentally friendly. The negative side of it, though, is that we very possibly won’t have time to move away from oil before this becomes an outright crisis.
I found the following comment from kritter interesting:
How is that any different than now? At this very moment, there’s a debate around here about building wind farms. Don’t think the “lefty environmentalist” term is not being used by some to describe nearly anyone supportive of the wind farms.
The difference is that this administration is now going to have to respond to the current energy crisis by listening to the lefty environmentalists! Did you ever think you would hear GWB advocating conservation and alternative energy sources?
As for these increases coming too suddenly, I think that’s the only way our country would take action to cut our oil consumption. Dire warnings of global warming with pictures of drowning polar bears will never have the impact that paying $3.15 for a gallon of regular at the pump will have.
In a perfect world, we could have forseen that the era of cheap gas wasn’t going to last forever, that we were too dependent upon a commodity originating from an unstable part of the world where our interference was making us increasingly unpopular, and made gradual changes. Our free market economy and our reactive leadership in the white house and in Congress circumvented this option. I really believe that if Big Oil had no political influence we would be much further along in developing alternative energy sources. It is extremely unfortunate for us that we are so unprepared for what lies ahead. Our addiction to oil has already perverted our foreign and environmental policies. Just imagine if we could have put the money we have spent and are spending in Iraq in R &D for hydrogen fuel cells or improving hybrid technology!
In addition to increasing gas prices, electricity just went up in my area 72%! Does anyone else worry about a world-wide recession?