Originally posted by kestra
What also picks my ass is the jacking up of prices on long weekends.
NO KIDDING!!!!! What kind of cutthroat, jackassed r-tardness is this? I'm totally disgusted by this, and I'm glad someone else noticed it. It's totally lame to screw families and people wanting to vacation by jacking up prices on known long weekends. They even do it locally when they know the public schools are going on a long weekend. Totally lame.

Originally posted by kestra

Experts say we're about to run out of oil. But we're nowhere near having another technology ready to take its place.
Actually, scientists say that if they had to do so, the car companies could probably come up with an alternate source tomorrow. The problem is that there's not enough pressure for them to do so. I've been reading for 20 years alternate methods of powering cars. Tons of scientists have come up with various things, but the gas and car companies won't come on board. With the CAFE standards STILL being so low, they won't do so.

Originally posted by kestra

Is it because government isn't making it much of a priority?
Totally. The problem with it is that the one company that comes up with the new standard will eat the R&D costs while the other companies will just ride their coattails. That's why no one will be the "first" unless the government creates a reason for them to do it. You see the same phenomenon in child labor. While many companies wanted to get rid of it, they wouldn't have been able to compete with the companies that didn't get rid of it. Thus, it took the whole practice being outlawed in England for the everyone to stop doing it at the same time. (I hope that I explained that sensibly.)

Originally posted by kestra

As a side note, it's always struck me as odd that scooters are so prevalent in european countries, both inner city and suburban. Why hasn't it caught on here as much?
We love our damn cars in North America. In the Asian countries, half of the population is on scooters or motorcycles. 25 years ago it was almost all motorcycles or bikes, and it was pretty easy to get around even in a city the size of Bangkok. About 10 years ago, you could barely get around Bangkok because there were so many freaking cars. People were having babies in their cars at a record number, so the solution was to build more and more roads. Now the pollution has skyrocketed beyond belief.

Sigh!