High gasoline prices are fine with me..
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High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jun 11 2008 at 12:43pm by With gas prices hitting record highs nearly every day, I for one am glad for the spike in costs. It doesn't effect me, as an avid user of public transportation. If it means that people don't get to drive to Disneyland this year, then that's okay with me! The middle class needs to learn how not to guzzle gas like it's soda pop. 
RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jun 22 2008 at 7:51pm by I share your view--to some extent. I've been refusing all my life to learn to drive.
When I was a kid, I thought a lot about how to go through life doing the least amount of unnecessary damage. My first idea was to be a vegetarian, but my mom had all she could do to cook around my dad's extremely limited tastes in food, so I shelved that idea till I got out on my own. When I did get out on my own and my friends began having children I realized that parenthood was something I would never be good at.
People don't generally have too hard a time with these two decisions. But when I was 16 and took classroom driver's ed, I decided I would never, ever learn to drive. The first thing the teacher explained was: "When you're behind the wheel, you're responsible for everything that crosses your path."
Knowing myself to be an absent minded sort who gets utterly lost in thought, I realized that I never wanted to have a death on my conscience. And that the chances were really, really good that some poor unlucky creature would wander into my path at the wrong time.
That was 40 years ago. And I can tell you, a car-free life is a great life! As an artist, I always want the maximum amount of free time, and not having a car gives me that. People who have cars very quickly become dependent on cars to a degree they never realize--until now. I always knew that the costs of buying a car, insuring a car, licensing a car, maintaining a car, parking a car and, of course, fueling a car, would put a big crimp in my free time.
A few years ago, a friend loaned my husband her car. Within a few days, he was driving 3 blocks to the store to buy beer--in good weather, yet!
I'm lucky. That's all I can say. I get lots of exercise. I live in a place, Madison, where public transit is not only great, my employer sells me a bus pass, good for unlimited rides for a year, for $5! I get lots of exercise--I can run rings around people half my age!
I'm lucky, and so are you. I would ask, though, that you keep in mind that most people are not so lucky, and it's not all their fault. It isn't easy to shrug off the effects of constant cultural pressure. Decades of advertising has an effect on people, and all that advertising can have a devastating cumulative effect. Cars aren't sold as transport so much as statements about who you are as a person. For someone like me, a born skeptic, it isn't such a deal. But when advertising pitches a lifestyle everywhere you look, and everyone around you buys into it, even the most clear sighted people can get worn down.
So don't slam the middle class--slam not, lest ye be slammed, and slamming isn't the way to convince people that life could be better, freer, less expensive and more fun. Many people have bought into the commuter lifestyle because they honestly wanted a better life for their children. Now they're stuck. I know lots of these people and their lives are sadder nowadays than they ever imagined. They're stuck on a wheel they never knew was turning, and I think they deserve better than scorn.
If people like us reached out and turned them on to ways to save money and have a better time, it would be the best thing in the world. Blessed Be, Sandie
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High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jun 27 2008 at 4:17pm by I can't say the increasing gas prices are a good thing, i mean the cost of living in general has gone up....and the gasoline just adds to more problems, yet it did make a few cars get off the road which will help the environment. Although those people do not necessarily care about the environment, they worry about the money in their pockets. High Gas prices aren't the answers, i still believe we need to advertize how we need to take care of Earth, and not just for the climate changes, but to finally understand, respect and learn from this delicate planet we call Earth. -
RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jun 30 2008 at 9:38am by You're absolutely right, brianaleah! This is a great time for us Greens to shine, because green energy is rapidly becoming affordable in contrast to non-green energy. The high (upfront) cost of Green was a huge barrier not only in terms of comparison-to-not-Green, but in terms of who could best afford Green.
Many people associated Green not with the quality of their daily lives--which seemed pretty good and affordable--but with people who were seen as Not Like Us. People with a lot of money who could afford Green if they cared about it (rich wierdos) and people who didn't buy into what was thought of as The American Dream (just plain wierdos). Real Åmericans, Regular Americans, didn't give a damn by definition.
It's now becoming clear just how caught in a web of profit taking and PR BS we are *all* caught in. Thanks to the Enron loophole a slight scarcity of nonrenewable energy has grown into a huge burden. A few people are getting filthy rich at everyone else's expense, unable to see that they are killing the goose that's laying their golden eggs. What's truly odd is the coal industry, oil industry, and nuclear industry ads that are all over TV. They're using their ill-gotten gains to persuade us that they're really the good guys, that if you have a pension plan *you* are probably part of the oil industry, so it's going to be Ok for *you*.
The coal industry is touting itself as "clean" and so is the nuclear industry. And all of them are suddenly "green", of course. And naturally, projections based on current energy misuse insist that by 20-whatever we'll need half again as much energy as we misuse now. We'll *have* to have it--no way around it--and these good friends of ours, our knights in shining armor, are already gearing up to keep us supplied with it.
That's why I think that Green is quickly going from something only not-real-Americans care about to something that's a bargain for all Americans. Sad but true, appealing to people's pocketbooks will get you a million times more attention than appealing to people's sense of what's right. Now we are at a time when the pocketbook and the right thing are becoming a united front. Blessed Be, SandieRE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jul 8 2008 at 11:35pm by So true finally respect for the greens, karma, but it's probably too late anyway, that's the thing and there will always be new polluters, even if it becomes, unfasionable, un affordable, illegal, and ignorant, there will always be people like that, unless we evolve, really evolve to where we have compassion. My compassion, as a biker instead of driver, as veg instead of carn, as a teacher instead of advertizer, all will seem ever so slight later when the real compassion is learned, it's the best I can do for right now, and to practice tollerance when baby souls spit in my face as I hand them their lives.
RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jul 8 2008 at 11:28pm by The earth is speaking, and sometimes, like a mother, the child dosen't want to obey She said"Stop drilling so much oil out of my veins, I will give you gardens of food if you stop pouring cement all over them," but the children didn't listen. And now she is saying,"Fine, you destoyed all I gave you, so no dessert my loves." That is all
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RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jul 3 2008 at 10:11pm by It is fine with me also if some families are kept from driving to DisneyWorld and squandering hundreds of dollars to corporate America.
What is NOT ok with me is that the high cost of gas is driving up the cost of food. Suppose U could either buy gas to get to your 3rd shift cleaning job at the hospital, because buses don't run after 9 at night, or paying for milk for your child at $5 a gallon? The charity and church larders are running dry by mid month and U can only go there once per quarter, your food stamps don't buy as much. All to give the pockets of rich people another layer of gold. May they suffer the fate of King Midas.RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jul 8 2008 at 11:23pm by stop worrying about food, you can grow your own, underground solar power hydroponic organic gardening man, roof tops are all waiting for gardens, the less money americans have, the better so they will stop buying so much garbage and dumping the wrappers in the ocean.
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RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jul 4 2008 at 10:44am by Daily; I ask myself "what will it take?" More lanes, more crowding more rude harried car drivers, etc. Seemingly. the answer goes right to oil. High prices hurt everyone- food, layoffs,less mass transit, etc., but overall speeds are slowing, smaller vehicles are more common. I went through the 1974 oil problem, and have ridden human powered trikes ever since, upgrading to an all-weather enclosed velomobile in 2005. High gas prices are sending scooter and bicycle sales through the roof; a much more relaxed and positive transportation lifestyle as far as I am concerned. Velomobiles are the perfect travel source for me, and hopefully will become more commonplace and more off-the-shelf in the US. High gas prices are fine; and bringing second impressions how greedy and wasteful our country has become. -
RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jul 7 2008 at 4:55pm by You've got a lot of good points, Buster. I've noticed here in Madison that the traffic flow is way, way, down and I couldn't be more delighted. Around here a new and scary driving ethic had been evolving for the past decade or so. If you've ever been to Boston and observed driving habits there, you'd have noticed a sort of Rambo approach to road etiquette. My friend Jan moved out there and stopped driving after getting into 2 accidents that weren't her fault. Once, she yielded the right of way and got bashed. Then she stopped at a stop sign and got bashed. Fortunately they have a great subway and light rail system there.
Here, the traffic on the Beltline began speeding up to 80 at least. People drove like every *other* car on the road belonged to their worst enemy. In town, it became a matter of reinterpreting the numbers. If the law said 25 mph, they drove 40. If the speed limit was 30, they drove 50. Neighborhoods set up a red flag system for pedestrians trying to cross the streets--you'd pick up a red flag from a basket, hold it up as you crossed the street, and put it into another basket on the other side if by the grace of the Gods you managed to get across in 1 piece. The city put in boulevards with plants near intersections in residential neighborhoods, forcing people to slow down or risk damage to their cars. That's actually working well.
What I'm hoping for now is that people who share our viewpoint will have some mercy on those who have lived the "normal" American life up till recently. "With malice for none and charity for all", as Lincoln put it. How would I feel if somebody who'd been telling me something for years, that I didn't want to hear, turned out to be right? Not so great. Especially if my poor choices were now costing me beyond anything I'd let myself imagine.
Gloating and rubbing people's noses in it won't do anybody a bit of good. We've seen this coming and adjusted our lives accordingly. This means we have lots of valuable advice to offer, and lots of exciting options to tell them about. We know that opting out of one particular version of the "American Dream" has lots of benefits that the non-opters never suspected were there. If we treat people with respect they will be much more likely to respond in a positive way that will benefit everyone. If we don't, we'll end up being resented and thus not listened to.
What's a velomobile? How much do they cost? I used to ride a bike a lot before I came here to live. The traffic is still too nasty and some cyclists here are assholes who ignore the laws and expect everybody to get out of their way because they're Green Angels. (Bad road behavior around here isn't just limited to motorists!) This has given motorists a real attitude, plus pedestrians like me. I don't trust myself on a 2 wheel bike, but I love the trike idea. Could you tell me more? Blessed Be, SandieRE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jul 8 2008 at 8:17pm by A velomobile is basically a recumbent 3-wheel trike. Some 2 or 4 wheel human powered velomobiles exist too, but most are usually 3-wheel. Many are more elaborate than mine; with suspension, more lights and open (mine is closed, until I open the side window. They usually are imported from Europe, and are very expensive. Mine was available as a kit in 2005 near my home in California, but is no longer available. Other kits are available I am sure! Mine is fiberglass/kevlar with windows; so it appears to be an oversized (about 3' x 3' x 9') pedal car! Many variations are around, so mine seems like an antique! Riding a bike/trike/velomobile is fairly common here, but road rage from car drivers is scary! When gas prices go up, I smile a bit more but I don't dare say anything to a car driver ;-) .
RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Aug 1 2008 at 11:57pm by I have 3 chonic illness, one of them has hit me harder than it ever has in 18yrs. that i have had it. Maybe i got conplicment and stayed in an ocupption that i should gotten out of but the pay was there to help me with the medical bills. Now i can't get to work. So i sold my truck because I havent been able to stay in a meeting without getting sick for hrs. I'm a painter by trade and drove the cheapest truck made in 2000, its just what i could afford. After seeing who killed the electric, I got dicussed by all involved. Did I know that GM had the car NOPE. If i did it doesnt sound like I could afford it. I have seen electric mini bikes they were very will to do client of my employer. Oh by the way I worked with same boss for a little over 20yrs. Now I look on the internet to see that people convert their own car in their garages. I was trying to work out a deal for a donar truck.but the deal fell thru.I bought a brand new honda that gets 30 miles to the gallon. sold my truck and motorcyle to buy the car. I thought by now i would be back at work. My Ulcertive colitis has other idea's. I was 9 months from paying off the truck but i couldnt afford to drive it. You know if I do go bankupt over this mess. I hope they take everything including the car. High gas prices are fine with me, we need to get off our asses and convert the cars we can. while I want to throw a brick at my TV listning to GM whine we need investment money to research electric car,please, if the gov. walfare system needs a example of what not to with our money I think they have it now.
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RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Jul 8 2008 at 11:16pm by Im fine with the high gas price too, because I bike, it's karma for all the people who drive and pollute my air, the true cost of driving if you include health and road repairs that are passed on to non drivers is much higher than five per gallon, Im laughing all the way to the bank. If only that were enough to stop people from driving, it isnt, now they want to drill all over the place including the coast, you know the Pacific one with the garbage patch? There might even be oil under all those pesky housing tracks in Utah, oh well we can just relocate the people and the fish if it means cheaper gas right? No Im being sarcastic, keep doing what you are doing and get what you are getting, Hybrids take 5000 gallons of gas to MANUFACTURE, how long before the fat americans wake up? It's over, bikes won the race, like the rabbit and the turtle.
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Solar Energy - Think Green 4 Yourself Posted on Jul 23 2008 at 10:20pm by Solar Energy, it’s everywhere and it’s free. Why would anyone want to spend their hard earned cash on purchasing high priced fossil fuels when there is unlimited solar energy free for the taking?
It must be due to the instinctive human nature portion that forces people to react like sheep do.
For centuries humans have been lead around like sheep, told what to eat, when to sleep, what type of job or work will best fulfill your life style. The products, including energy, that humans are to use, eat and/or manipulate daily have been prepared and made readily available in the marketplace.
These items seem minor when looked at individually but when put together as a whole, humans have become no different than sheep lead to graze. Being hand feed, lead and herded for most of their life has made them lazy to the point where they can not think outside the heard. Therefore they continue to do what the masses do even if it is wrong or outdated. 99% of the human race has become blind traditionalists who fit this profile. I like to refer this centuries old human control to stealth slavery that hopefully will begin to be recognized and addressed during this 21st century. Higher education is the answer to human enlightenment of this hidden social mind control, however when I speak of higher education this is the type not offered to the masses in fear of mass social change it will create. In simple terms the heard will disband and individual sheep will be difficult and no longer controllable.
For today be the 1% that leads and thinks outside the heard. Think for yourself. Benefit yourself and others by doing what’s productive and right in your mind.
FOR U.S. HOMEOWNERS: CONVERT YOUR HOME TO 100% SOLAR, NO PURCHASE OR INSTALL FEES: [www.jointhesolution.com]
DO IT YOUR SELF TERMITE TREAT DEVICE KIT- NO TENT [www.wavelengthemts.com]From THINK GREEN home page Follow menu; > New- for-2006 -Do It Yourself Microwave Termite Treatment Device kits-RE: Solar Energy - Think Green 4 Yourself Posted on Jul 23 2008 at 11:32pm by yes, the group mentality and ignorance has been a devastaing combo for the world. we do need to unite on some points and not feel isolated, and have power in numbers, but ultimately each of us has to be aware of what is right for ourselves and have integrity to do what we know is right. evolution is happening hopefully it can happen to humans faster than we are destroying the planet and thereby making ourselves extinct, what will it be? it is an exciting time to be alive to witness it all.
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RE: Solar Energy - Think Green 4 Yourself Posted on Jul 24 2008 at 10:37am by I liked your message! As a handspinner I love domestic sheep, but unfortunately they have been carefully bred over thousands of years to be incapable of caring for themselves. Wild sheep can and do take care of themselves--they have no need for loving shepherds who guard them against all *other* predators with the view of eating the herd themselves. I could name at least one species of domesticated primate which has the same problem.
The loving shepherds of this primate species have also taken thousands of years to cultivate a helpless, dependent, easily frightened herd which is convinced that without its shepherds, even meaner shepherds will come along and eat even more of the herd! While members of this herd actually have a great capacity to care for and think for themselves, they are (in many cases) convinced that this is the scariest possible option. It will take a lot of convincing to help them understand that:
Standing on your own 2 feet is the best possible option, not the worst;
That it's fun to do things for yourself, like cooking, gardening, building, and using your own 2 feet to walk;
That what seem like time-saving conveniences can actually end up taking way more time and effort;
That knocking large holes in the walls of your house means you freeze in winter even if 90% of the other walls are still standing;
That if 90% of your living space is covered in excrement the remaining 10% is extremely unhealthy;
That your neighbors are not necessarily people to be dreaded, shunned and ignored;
And, of course, an unlimited source of free clean energy is less expensive than a limited, dirty one.
I think we can work together to do the right, smart, practical thing if we realize that this goal is the most important thing, too. I can name at least 1 presidential candidate who thinks that we need another 50 nuclear power plants, and to find and use up every fossil fuel to be found. I used to wonder how this could possibly improve the world's energy situation until I looked at it through the lens of the current administration.
This insane idea can work if only we use an even more insane idea. Here it is:
All we have to do is grab a map and locate Africa, that is, if anybody in the USA is capable of performing such a difficult intellectual feat. Then, we find the poorest non-Islamic nation there. Then we announce that this country has weapons of mass destruction that they plan to use on us. Then, having scared ourselves witless, we invade and conquer (i.e., "win"). Now we have the perfect location to dump not only spent nuclear fuel, but other toxic industrial waste plus old ordnance and expired poison gas and surplus anthrax spores. See? No problem!
Soylent Green, anyone? Blessed Be, SandieRE: Solar Energy - Think Green 4 Yourself Posted on Jul 24 2008 at 11:43pm by that's great argument i think i also use solar energy to cook a potato when i did exeperiment on my elementary school. that's a great experiment the potato is baked well. end when i was in seventh grade i made up the alternate energy from wood industry waste and tapioca flour boil up in hot water until sticky and put on some bowl and put otside. wait for two days after that process that's called "bricket". bricket can use for cook and that the alternative energy now i'm in research to find another alternative energy from plant which have oil for daily life.
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RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Aug 3 2008 at 1:49pm by I don't drive and have not owned a car since 2001 when I moved to Australia and now I am back in SF - and refuse to have one. I have two legs, MUNI an BART to get me where I need to go. I buy groceries on demand (eat what I kill basically). But does anyone see where we are going? Back to say, pre-industrial revolution times! Buy local, live local, grow local. The days of urban dense living is rising - this allows for great economies of scale. I am lucky, living in SF - our food is produced hours away - however, those in middle America that only grow grain for example - they have to pay higher prices.
Suburbia is not dead it can be fixed - Walnut Creek has made a NEW vibrant downtown center. We are moving backwards to the days of town centers - let's restart our local manufacturing companies - yes, you can get products cheaper in China - but have you seen their pollution? Then put everything on polluting cargo ships shall I go on? Rise up and restart USA manufacturing. Save a tree, save a fish, use solar and wind. Kill your car and walk.-
RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Aug 4 2008 at 5:33pm by Great going, cjohnarnold! It would be great if somebody wrote a book or did a documentary about car-free people. It really is easier and more fun than people think.
The City of Madison is working on developing a new suburb that's "car-lite". The site has a railroad line which it plans to use for light rail, and the design includes a downtown and sidewalks everywhere. We have a sister city in Germany that operates in much the same way--most people park their cars in a carport and commute to town by light rail. There are a number of state and federal hurdles to jump before this idea can be implemented (?), but we're all hoping for the best.
Now what do we do about the 60% of the American public who think that if offshore drilling starts at once, that what small amounts of oil are found will be available *immediately* and not 10 years from now? Blessed Be, Sandie-
RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Aug 4 2008 at 6:01pm by That is great - really Madison WI that is awesome! True somebody needs to do a documentary on car free people...Car free people are usually found in large cities with great public transport - other states still have a stigma that public transport is for socio economically challanged residents. Not true - we do not need to be dependent on oil and cars (yes, time to market for oil start ups now is a long time - we don't have a long time!) RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Aug 5 2008 at 3:47pm by Oh yeah, that stigma stuff. You're right about that. The stigma thing is one of the keys to changing the culture "we" have had for too many years.
I've talked to people who are actually afraid to ride the bus! Not afraid of standing outside at 11:30 pm all alone, but actually afraid to ride the bus. It's not just me and poor people who ride the bus, but that's what people think. There are sometimes annoying individuals riding the bus, but there are even *more* annoying individuals driving the Beltline at 85 mph. Given the accident rate due to road rage, alcohol and drivers who just don't get enough sleep, the annoying people on the bus are no problem at all.
The culture has been telling people for years, via advertising and other forms of BS, that the worst possible fate is to be mistaken for poor people. In order to avoid this, we have to live in huge houses, drive huge cars, have huge pesticide-ridden lawns, buy everything brand new. As a result, we now have a country that's up to its eyeballs in consumer debt. There's no room for "growth" anymore, because the credit bubble has burst. Now what?
We have a lot of people who bought into the idea that there's only one American dream, and that dream consists of impressing the neighbors with humungous piles of stuff. That's why this is a dangerous political time. There's a lot of genuine suffering by people who got robbed by unregulated lenders.
The lenders will be spending billions to convince these unfortunate people that predatory lending isn't the problem--that anyone who tries to put the brake on predatory lending is an elitist who doesn't want poor people to have credit. Look at what the oil, coal and nuclear industries are doing. They're spending billions to convince people that we need to drill for more oil in offshore areas and wildlife preserves. And that drilling will make everything the way it was before, which is the only reasonable way to live because that's the only American dream there is.
If we can't convince people that there are better alternatives than car culture;
And those alternatives are fun;
And that the purpose of those ads is to make sure the rich get richer at everyone else's expense;
And that getting ripped off by human predators is about the vilest thing there is;
We'll end up with more suffering people and more people suffering.
I can't help noticing over the last 28 years or so that it's only a class war when somebody is trying to put upper limits on how much wealth a corporation is allowed to corner. When these corporations arrange for the poor and middle class to get screwed--well, that's not class war! And this idea can only work in a society where nobody wants to be seen as poor or middle class, because it's somehow shameful to be poor or middle class.
We will have a hard time offering Green as an alternative as long as this stigma exists. Unless people understand that real wealth is *not* owing more money than you can possibly repay and that self-sufficiency is much smarter than living on an endless treadmill that makes the credit card companies rich, we will have dangerous political times. How can we do this? Blessed Be, Sandie
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RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Aug 4 2008 at 5:33pm by Great going, cjohnarnold! It would be great if somebody wrote a book or did a documentary about car-free people. It really is easier and more fun than people think.
The City of Madison is working on developing a new suburb that's "car-lite". The site has a railroad line which it plans to use for light rail, and the design includes a downtown and sidewalks everywhere. We have a sister city in Germany that operates in much the same way--most people park their cars in a carport and commute to town by light rail. There are a number of state and federal hurdles to jump before this idea can be implemented (?), but we're all hoping for the best.
Now what do we do about the 60% of the American public who think that if offshore drilling starts at once, that what small amounts of oil are found will be available *immediately* and not 10 years from now? Blessed Be, Sandie
RE: High gasoline prices are fine with me.. Posted on Aug 5 2008 at 11:03am by Although I was born in San Francisco, CA.; and visit often; it is so very chaotic! I have to use a 3-wheel trike or velomobile due to my lack of balance, but getting around those multi-lane traffic "snakes" in SF is too scary. Living south of SF was almost car-free in the 1950s and early 1960s, but the swelling car culture grew and grew, It is not as rush-rush-rush as SF is - here.....yet! I bought a recumbent trike from a business in SF in 2003 that offers test rides in SF, but I "chickened out" and had it shipped to me in Santa Cruz, CA. High gas prices didn't seem to slow down tourism all that much in central CA.; but food, housing, entertainment, and the "go west youngster..." lifestyle seems to be slowing down. I would love living in a car-free town!
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