Originally posted by Stor Mand
I didn't see the complaining post. I saw one (mine) stating facts about the costs of driving. Some states are very expensive to drive in, especially Taxachusetts. If states actually used tax revenue toward what the tax was intended to pay for ... never mind, that is a whole other issue.
Many drivers feel it is their "right" to drive and use resources as they wish. Well, it's not a right, it's a privledge (also another issue).
We totally agree on that one.
I've been there (Europe, love the place) and there are "incredible bits of automotive technology" but I've got news for you also: they have gas guzzlers also - Mercedes, BMW, Porche, any Japanese sports cars ... they have them (gas guzzlers) just not in the form of SUV but equally bad mileage.
I never said that they had *no* gas guzzlers. The difference is that the proportion is quite lower; have a gander at the number of SUVs, big trucks, and other gas-hogs that live on the freeway during rush hour, relative to the number of economy cars. Now, look at the Autobahn during its rush hour -- Porsche 911s and Mercedes S-class vehicles are more the exception than the rule; the average vehicle is more likely to be a small-engined Volkswagen, Puegot, or BMW.
Furthermore, in America, it is almost *mandatory* that one drive; find me a hundred people over the age of sixteen that don't have a driver's license and access to a car -- good luck. In Europe, many people don't buy cars until much later in life, because its sooooo expensive to do so. That, and with the rather decent public transit, it's not needed.
I'm not saying that the Europeans are perfect, but they're still kicking our collective a** here.
No matter how "environmentally concious" some of you feel you are, you are still part of the problem. Look at the clothes you wear: anything synthetic? Even if not synthetic, there is still processing and dyes. Is there plastic that you use for anything? Do you cook or have electricity or heat? The bike you ride didn't just grow out of the ground, there was a manufacturing process.
Get off your high horses, because there isn't one of us that is not part of the problem with this world unless your walking around naked and eating everything raw.
skol
Now we're at the <i>ad absurdium</i> level; everything we do is going to "damage" the environment in one way or another, that's a given. The goal is, then, to reduce the amount of damage as much as possible, and to find ways to repair the damage we've caused. I'll wager, that my two bicycles, all of my lycra, grease, and cycling gear amount to less than one percent of the total energy expenditure required to manufacture a SUV; that hardly puts me at the same level of pollution generation as an SUV owner.