What is Digg?1077 Comments
- Andyschism, on 05/29/2008, -23/+434Just in case it goes down (be gentle diggnation):
1. RIP for the internal-combustion engine
They may contain computer chips, but the power source for today's cars is little different than that which drove the first Model T 100 years ago. That we're still harnessed to this antiquated technology is testament to Big Oil's influence in Washington and success in squelching advances in fuel efficiency and alternative energy.
Given our achievement in getting a giant mainframe's computing power into a handheld device in just a few decades, we should be able to do likewise with these dirty, little rolling power plants that served us well but are overdue for the scrap heap of history.
2. Economic stimulus
Necessity being the mother of invention, $8 gas would trigger all manner of investment sure to lead to groundbreaking advances. Job creation wouldn't be limited to research labs; it would rapidly spill over into lucrative manufacturing jobs that could help restore America's industrial base and make us a world leader in a critical realm.
The most groundbreaking discoveries might still be 25 or more years off, but we won't see massive public and corporate funding of research initiatives until escalating oil costs threaten our national security and global stability -- a time that's fast approaching.
3. Wither the Middle East's clout
This region that's contributed little to modern civilization exercises inordinate sway over the world because of its one significant contribution -- crude extraction. Aside from ensuring Israel's security, the U.S. would have virtually no strategic or business interest in this volatile, desolate region were it not for oil -- and its radical element wouldn't be able to demonize us as the exploiters of its people.
In the near term, breaking our dependence on Middle Eastern oil may well require the acceptance of drilling in the Alaskan wilderness -- with the understanding that costly environmental protections could easily be built into the price of $8 gas.
4. Deflating oil potentates
On a similar note, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad recently gained a platform on the world stage because of their nations' sudden oil wealth. Without it, they would face the difficult task of building fair and just economies and societies on some other basis.
How far would their message resonate -- and how long would they even stay in power -- if they were unable to buy off the temporary allegiance of their people with vast oil revenues?
5. Mass-transit development
Anyone accustomed to taking mass transit to work knows the joy of a car-free commute. Yet there have been few major additions or improvements to our mass-transit systems in the last 30 years because cheap gas kept us in our cars. Confronted with $8 gas, millions of Americans would board buses, trains, ferries and bicycles and minimize the pollution, congestion and anxiety spawned by rush-hour traffic jams. More convenient routes and scheduling would accomplish that.
6. An antidote to sprawl
The recent housing boom sparked further development of antiseptic, strip-mall communities in distant outlying areas. Making 100-mile-plus roundtrip commutes costlier will spur construction of more space-efficient housing closer to city centers, including cluster developments to accommodate the millions of baby boomers who will no longer need their big empty-nest suburban homes.
Sure, there's plenty of land left to develop across our fruited plains, but building more housing around city and town centers will enhance the sense of community lacking in cookie-cutter developments slapped up in the hinterlands.
7. Restoration of financial discipline
Far too many Americans live beyond their means and nowhere is that more apparent than with our car payments. Enabled by eager lenders, many middle-income families carry two monthly payments of $400 or more on $20,000-plus vehicles that consume upwards of $15,000 of their annual take-home pay factoring in insurance, maintenance and gas.
The sting of forking over $100 per fill-up would force all of us to look hard at how much of our precious income we blow on a transport vehicle that sits idle most of the time, and spur demand for the less-costly and more fuel-efficient small sedans and hatchbacks that Europeans have been driving for decades.
8. Easing global tensions
Unfortunately, we human beings aren't so far evolved that we won't resort to annihilating each other over energy resources. The existence of weapons of mass destruction aside, the present Iraq War could be the first of many sparked by competition for oil supplies.
Steep prices will not only chill demand in the U.S., they will more importantly slow China and India's headlong rush to make the same mistakes we did in rapidly industrializing -- like selling $2,500 Tata cars to countless millions of Indians with little concern for the environmental consequences. If we succeed in developing viable energy alternatives, they could be a key export in helping us improve our balance of trade with consumer-goods producers.
Additional considerations
Weaning ourselves off crude will hopefully be the crowning achievement that marks the progress of humankind in the 21st Century. With it may come development of oil-free products to replace the chemicals, pharmaceuticals, plastics, fertilizers and pesticides that now consume 16% of the world's crude-oil output and are likely culprits in fast-rising cancer rates.
By its very definition, oil is crude. It's time we develop more refined energy sources and that will not happen without a cost-driven shift in demand. - stfucupcake, on 05/30/2008, -11/+325“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”
Charles Darwin - slapded, on 05/30/2008, -3/+250well in 2015 im getting a hoverboard
- DDDavinnn, on 05/29/2008, -35/+248A positive spin on this issue is long overdue. This progressive thinking is just what we need.
- Kythas, on 05/30/2008, -5/+205Some valid points in the article.
I just bought a scooter this past weekend to commute to work in because I'm tired of paying $60+ to fill up my SUV. So far, I'm exceeding 80 mpg on it.
So, I've just gone from spending $60+ per 5 days to fill up my SUV to $8 per 5 days to fill up my scooter.
A friend of mine told me at lunch this week "Six months ago, I'd have laughed at you for buying that. Now, I think it's smart." - docphysics, on 05/29/2008, -52/+198We need to ween our dependence on foreign oil. This would do it. :-)
- sodade, on 05/30/2008, -10/+153They left out my #1 reason: so I can laugh just a lil bit harder at all the idiots who bought Hummers. Pure ***** comedy.
- ozroy, on 05/30/2008, -15/+136"Anyone accustomed to taking mass transit to work knows the joy of a car-free commute."
Is he being sarcastic? - RabbitAbout, on 05/29/2008, -8/+113A good alternative to oil is required.
Meanwhile, I will not be rejoicing while the cost of Everything keeps increasing. After all, everything that we buy needs to be transported to the shops!
Here, in the UK, approx 60% of what we pay at the pump is taken on tax!!! - stfucupcake, on 05/30/2008, -25/+127About # 3 on the list: there is no reason the US should be responsible for 'ensuring Israel's security'.
If anything, we ought to seriously be re-thinking that entire policy as it is the source for all our problems in the middle east. - MrFurious2k, on 05/30/2008, -47/+123I'm really getting tired of these eco-idiots telling us how wonderful high prices are. Until there is a realistic substitute for oil, increasing prices can greatly damage our economy to the point where a massive recession or depression occurs. Here is a tip: If your economy is collapsing, research funding for alternative fuels becomes extremely scarce.
Story buried. - inactive, on 05/30/2008, -16/+90Wow. I can only assume the author lives in some nice lil condo squired in the middle of San Francisco, where everything is minutes away via public transportation.
Does he really think $8 gas is the answer? What is his answer to the inevitable social upheaval that will occur as people are no longer capable of sustaining their strained finances, choosing between food and energy? Remember, as gas skyrockets, so does the cost of heating and electricity.
Are we all to abandon our houses moving into suddenly available and affordable housing in the urban centers? Will all those business suddenly relocate also?
Will affordable, mass produced hybrid vehicles appear overnite at my dealership. - PoisonousDrool, on 05/30/2008, -14/+85$8 gas means a lower standard of living. If your job doesn't disappear, you will work longer hours for less pay. At some point, war would occur. Be careful what you wish for.
- inactive, on 05/30/2008, -7/+75Uh, duh...yes...It'll all be free and totally painless! Goods and services won't become more expensive and we'll magically be out of debt!
Oh, look at me! I'm making people happy! I'm the magical man - from Happyland! In a gum-drop house on Lollypop Lane! - inactive, on 05/30/2008, -7/+64wean.
/spellingnazi - Kythas, on 05/30/2008, -2/+57Update: I'm hitting over 110 mpg at the moment on my scooter.
You haters can kiss my ass. I'm not attached to my image. - graddatadda, on 05/30/2008, -3/+55I need to correct your sentence to drive the comedy home...
"They left out my #1 reason: so I can laugh just a lil bit harder at all the idiots who bought Hummers ON CREDIT. Pure ***** comedy" - jsmith39, on 05/30/2008, -7/+51My main problem with the article is that I think the author is living in some mental fantasy land where the 'growth pains' between $8 a gallon gas and an alternate energy source means you get 1 apple for lunch not 2, and you have to give up HBO but not cable.
If/when gas hits $8 a gallon people will be quite literally starving on the streets as those of us with a middle class income stop buying anything we don't absolutely need causing the retail markets to force massive layoffs on the minimally employed.
We do need to get off oil as a energy sources, and we need to replace it with a viable renewable energy source but we would cease to exist as a nation if we end up with 20-30 percent of citizens unemployed. This is not a 'rejoicing' situation that would take 5-6 months to overcome. - IgWannA, on 05/30/2008, -15/+58$8 a gallon? it's $11 a gallon in the UK...
- bigpeeler, on 05/30/2008, -6/+48Remind me to call my broker and buy stock in Schwinn.
- baskannu, on 05/29/2008, -29/+70We all worry about the high gas price. But this is a very nice commentary about the good things for environment and the world.
- silentforest, on 05/30/2008, -20/+59"...Confronted with $8 gas, millions of Americans would board buses, trains, ferries..."
And, what would those buses, trains and ferries run on? magic pixie dust? What about all the shipments of goods, would delivery trucks also run on magic dust? I think someone is snorting some magic dust.
Unless you force big rig tractor/trailers/buses/trains/ships on something other than dino fuel, the US economy is f**ked. - cyrix, on 05/30/2008, -7/+46ICH LIEBE GRAMMATIK!!!!!!
- yunus, on 05/30/2008, -8/+46"Confronted with $8 gas, millions of Americans would board buses, trains, ferries and bicycles and minimize the pollution, congestion and anxiety spawned by rush-hour traffic jams."
I'm gonna be the guy driving to work when it hits $8 a gallon cause there will be no traffic jams and I can afford it cause I have a car that gets good gas mileage. For me $8 a gallon is the same as someone today with an Excursion at $4 a gallon. - ninjacob, on 05/30/2008, -8/+45Someone could steal your scooter for all I care.
- TonyTheTerrible, on 05/30/2008, -14/+51ignorant fantasies with too much faith in our ability to detach ourselves from the teat of foreign oil.
- inactive, on 05/30/2008, -25/+61There would be nothing good about 8 dollar gas. Everything everywhere would cost more as a result. How the ***** do you think that stuff gets to the store? (hint, its not horse and buggy and its not magic)
Even half of these things are *****:
#1 We still use internal combustion because its a pretty damn good way to provide power. Real viable alternitives dont exist yet, as much as some people want to pretend they do. And we are no where close to having another solution for big rigs.
#2 That money is already being spent.
#3 Wont argue with this one, the less important that ***** of the world is the better.
#4 Again, good.
#5 More mass transit is nice and all, but it sure sucks to have to use it most of the time. The chances of your house and your job being right by the tracks are pretty small.
#6 Great, we all get to live in tiny houses in ***** parts of the city crammed in, awsome. How is this a good thing?
#7 Tanking the economy is not a good thing. - stevealford, on 05/30/2008, -1/+37But can you evade Biff and return to 1985 and preserve your own timeline?
- graddatadda, on 05/30/2008, -5/+40 See, showing you have a scooter means you didn't need that big ***** tank in the first place.
- DangerCollie, on 05/30/2008, -2/+31There's another angle to this. Anyone who wanted to do five minutes of research could have seen this coming. More global competition for oil and gas, the devaluation of the dollar, refining capacity typically running at levels slightly below peak demand. Prices had nowhere to go but up. I bought a new car two years ago. I really, really needed a pickup, a big pickup. Instead I bought a sensible car that gets 32 mpg highway. It's not much good hauling lumber but I can get around without getting a second mortgage to pay my gas bill. I had no trouble finding the car I wanted because no one wanted 4 cylinder engines. The crowd wanted SUV's the size of an apartment with power and luxury. A lot of people paid $40,000 for a vehicle that gets 12 mpg. I got a discount on my car because it sat on the lot so long. It's not a pretty truth to face, but I don't feel sorry for anyone buying a monster, gas guzzling SUV in the last two years. Just like I don't feel sorry for anyone who couldn't see the mortgage crisis coming. I unloaded all my real estate investments in '05-'06. But everyone wants to blame the government for high gas prices and conveniently overlook the contribution of their own bad judgment.
As much as people dislike Jimmy Carter, he really had on the right energy track. It was painful but it was working. It worked so well the Saudis subsidized the cost of oil hoping we would use more. Then Regan derailed our energy policy, undid everything Carter had started. Gas was $0.85/gallon and we squandered it. Giant SUV's, luxury boats, RV's, 4 wheelers, snowmobiles. We created new gas powered toys and justified buying a giant pickup truck so we could haul our toys out to the twigs to burn more gas tearing up the landscape. We developed a national sense of entitlement to cheap fuel.
We're in this mess because we made bad decisions. People are losing their homes because they bought more home than they could afford. People are going broke buying gasoline because they made a bad decision on the last car they bought. And we don't have any leadership in Washington because we make poor decisions about who we put in office. - bloomanchoo, on 05/30/2008, -2/+31Escalades are hilarious too....
- jmoo, on 05/30/2008, -3/+30So we just keep all the oil on our land and drill any place like Alaska or off shore? What happens when that runs dry in 30 or 40 years? Right back where we started.
Lets for once just face up to it and work off the massive need for oil in this country. - jcaino, on 05/30/2008, -1/+27I commute to work by bicycle. Gas be damned. But the price of oil affects me in food and good prices. ***** thing sucks.
- Pittance, on 05/30/2008, -0/+26there is only so much dumb in the world. stop hogging it all mike.
- frankengeek, on 05/30/2008, -9/+35He forgot #9. The total collapse of the American economy so that it will turn into a socialist state. While there are some good points on this list but I fail to see how this will be good for the middle and lower class. It's better for those that worship the earth rather than use reason. I'm all for getting aware from anything that ties us to another country but doing so on the back of the lower and middle class is outright selfish. But then again I'm a crazy fool because I don't believe that mankind can effect the environment on a global scale.
- inkyblue2, on 05/30/2008, -0/+26oh, the irony of this comment.
- brstilson, on 05/30/2008, -13/+39I just bought a scooter that gets over 100 mpg. Gas could hit $10 a gallon for all I care.
- shadowmoose, on 05/30/2008, -5/+31Hey I'm over half way there! Northern California dishes it out at $4.45 for the cheap stuff.
- rootsm3, on 05/30/2008, -10/+36why don't we stop talking about gas and think about how we're dumb enough to get into this mess? i think it's kind of brilliant yet horribly depressing how the world has become so codependent on this resource.
forget about petroleum. think of something new, monkeys. - WaxTrax, on 05/30/2008, -0/+24How many times do we have to go over this? Mr. Fusion only powers the time-circuits and the Flux capacitor. The engine still runs on ordinary gasoline, it always has.
- hyperspaztik, on 05/30/2008, -4/+28I don't think people really understand what is going on in Europe. Gas is so high there so they can discourage the use of large vehicles. By increasing the tax on the gas, the hope more people will buy the small, smart cars that get 50 miles to the gallon or buy a moped instead. It's not that expensive so they can make a profit...
- lolinyerface, on 05/30/2008, -0/+24Wait a minute, I don't get it. It's the future, there is no gasoline, but everyone is driving around in cars.
(I love that movie!) - kimbellina, on 05/30/2008, -1/+24I'm hoping that public transportation will become better as a result of the gas prices. I take the train to work, but they only come every 60 minutes, so I'm completely screwed if I miss it. Also, I'm stuck with either having to take a 20 minute lunch, or an 80 minute lunch, because of the timing.
I've already seen an increase in people riding the train to work over the last few months, and if gas prices continue to rise, they'll have to add in more and more trains, and maybe even some buses to the train station from where I live. Either that, or the trains will get too crowded and just end up being later than usual... So here's to hoping that jersey transit will make my life better instead of worse. - anarchytv, on 05/30/2008, -14/+37Two words: MAD MAX / ROAD WARRIOR. Take your pick as to which two. As in the movie. Blowing up other vehicles on the highway for gas. Yeah. Soon. Real soon. When it hits $50-$100 a gallon.
- llewner, on 05/30/2008, -1/+23Two words: Electric Cars
Three words: Flying Electric Cars
Ten words: Flying Electric Cars, Driven By Robots, Armed With Freakin' Lasers! - AndreiOttawa, on 05/30/2008, -0/+21What do you drive, a bus?
- marx2k, on 05/30/2008, -0/+21What's hilarious is that TV is still advertising Escalades as "Bigger, Bolder.... if it had a bathroom, you could live in it"
It's a good example of our auto industry.. just not getting it. - brstilson, on 05/30/2008, -5/+26"That we're still harnessed to this antiquated technology is testament to Big Oil's influence in Washington and success in squelching advances in fuel efficiency and alternative energy."
That's easy for someone with zero experience in automotive engineering to say. Yes, the technology is the same because it works. Do we have to give up the wheel just because it's "ancient" technology?
Other than that, I agree with most of this article. - RadicalEdward, on 05/30/2008, -1/+22Didn't people say this about every dollar mark? I heard there was going to be mass rioting at $4.00 a gallon. I'm paying $4.25 right now.
- raynar, on 05/30/2008, -15/+34When you're in the real world, you'll understand that most people HAVE to live farther away from work, because not every town has jobs for everyone..you stupid nutsack.
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