- Clueless

The CEOs of the big three automakers flew to Washington DC in luxurious private jets to beg Congress for $25 billion in taxpayer money to avoid bankruptcy. I really don't know what else to say. It was so refreshing to hear a subcommittee member confront them directly about this, and ask "Couldn't you at least have jet-pooled?" ABCNews online reported that the round trip for one of the CEOs cost about $20,000, while seats on a 'normal' flight ranged from $288 to $800 from Detroit to DC.

I hope they don't get their bailout money. I hope they are embarrassed about being called out about their expensive trip to ask for money. They were asked to go home, come up with an actual plan explaining in detail about how it is they need money to save their companies. The next time they return to DC in early December, it will be interesting if they take the hint and leave their private jets at home and fly commercially.

This should be a wakeup call of the Acme-anvil-on-the-head variety. They are losing money because they didn't take the energy crisis of the 1970s to heart and make better cars back then. No, gas prices eventually went back down, the Gordon Gecko greedy 80s arrived, and they forgot all about the gas shortage.

Well, here we are, 30 years later, another gas crisis, but gasoline prices are waaaay down again, and what kinds of cars will be seriously considered now? I've been hearing and reading a lot about T. Boone Pickens and his plan to get America off foreign oil addiction. The US is the Saudi Arabia of natural gas. Natural gas is already being used to fuel public transit in some big cities, and it can't be that farfetched to have cars use this or be converted.

We really need to wake up this time. Somebody famous said that if we don't pay attention to the past, we are doomed to repeat it. Well, the 1970s happened, and we need to pay attention. Our new president has a chance right now, to challenge our auto industry to make natural gas cars a reality, like John F Kennedy challenged our space industry to put a man on the moon in ten years. When JFK issued that challenge, we had no idea how to do that, and basically started from scratch. At least we already have a working knowledge of how to get, use and implement natural gas, so this challenge wouldn't be that difficult.

It's time. That the oil-producing nations that have our country by the you-know-whats is getting old. We need to get back to our old-fashioned ingenuity and say no to everyone's oil and use what we have plenty of.

It's time.