As the blame game goes around and everyone has a position about energy I have some random thoughts. Recently my budget had a short respite from insanely high gas prices. The reduction of gas to just under $3 dollars per gallon seemed to make a difference with a lot of things in the economy.
It seems that every side has an agenda and it is not hard to be just plain mad about what we are told. Maybe there are a lot of ignorant people in the populace, many would hold up the re-election of the president as an example. I know what the high cost of producing oil is and the infrastructure that is needed for it.
I know that the other alternative forms of energy are being developed and will reach a profitable state. You cannot stop the march of technology. We came so close to Hydrogen fueled vehicles until Big Brother put an end to that for now.
I was reminded yesterday of a story that has been told many times because it did happen. In the 1970's in a Ford dealership a customer was so happy with his new car that got over 30 miles per gallon. When in for service he bragged on it and the mechanics made a call to Ford and a hold was put on the car that included police and then security people holding the car until that carburetor, which was not supposed to be out of the factory, was removed and a standard carb was put on sending the mileage down to 12 MPG where it was supposed to be.
The same thing happened in a Chevrolet Dealership in Western Kansas in the 60's with the same result. I personally know a family friend who managed to make a big block Chevy engine installed in an old farm truck get over 25 MPG. When he tried to patent the design he was hit with a blizzard of lawyers and legal actions. He went to his grave a bitter man.
These stories are attributed to local legend yet there are people who witnessed all this first hand. It is like the irritation that so many who saw Cougars in Kansas were branded idiots by the State. Until there was photographic evidence.
Go into the back pages of the news over the last 50 years. Every time the auto industry was forced to raise MPG there was a great furor about the technology just not being able to meet the new standards, yet they made them. In the last 10 years when 30+ MPG was mandated the industry said they could not do it until 2050. Now we See ads for 30 & 40 MPG cars and they finally got a pickup up to 20. No surprise since Fords and Chevy's have been doing 50 & 60+ MPG in Europe, and Mercedes has a truck engine that will do 50+ over there.
We are awash in oil and gas. We could shut off the importation now if the will was there. We have allowed the government to make refinery construction come to a virtual stop. We have every interest group trying to stop one energy or another from being implemented.
On the other side we have refinery shut downs for maintenance happening right when the price is dropping to rebound the price. Shut downs of a majority of refinery's at the same time is not an accident.
So what I am ranting about is that lets stop the politics! It only encourages politicians and radical groups. I want the inventors to push the technologies and the cost of energy to get down to a reasonable level. I want to quit sending the best of our youth to fight wars in places that live in the 8th century and want to dictate how we live.
In other words I want everyone to quit shouting at each other and set down and talk.
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