I've had way too many things to say on several other threads concerning this issue so I'll stay out of this one. BUT I'll probably keep driving regardless of what the price of gas is 'cept I won't be driving the SRT as much. It's time to get serious about this crap because unless the speculators in the futures market settle down we'll never see $3.00 p/gal. There is way too much money to be made by those individuals wealthy enough to play in the commodities world & unbridled (mostly) capitalism is what this country is built on today. I'm not saying that's a bad thing just that money drives money.
It's time for me to start looking for a more fuel efficient vehicle. It'll kill me but my job is waaaaaay over there & I'm waaaaay over here. That's the reality of the situation. Houses aren't selling so putting my home on the market isn't a realistic solution.
Oh, to heck with it.........ignore my first sentence!
Like Crossbowme, Waldig & several others have mentioned I too went through the Arab oil embargo in the seventies. It wasn't pretty & it changed the face of Detroit & the car world forever. We will & in fact already have, begun to see this today. Prius's are selling like hotcakes, we hear about alternative fuels everyday so things are changing & I have to agree with the changes I see. Ethanol?, nope: no long term viability, well not unless the producers start to develop an infrastructure & use some other biomass other than corn & sugar cane. Biofuel/biodiesel?, perhaps but it runs into the same issues as Ethanol. Hydrogen? Once again perhaps, but it will take a whole bunch of energy to create enough Hydrogen to fuel this nation.
Solar & electric cars do have a long term viability. Problem with solar is that there aren't enough sunny days, worldwide, to produce that amount of energy. We'd need to get the panels up yonder & we'd need to build them BIG. And, of course, that would create all kinds of other problems: who funds this project? Blocks of countries? A single nation? Business? Heaven forbid, the oil companies? Who protects it? Who maintains it?
But, the positives might just outweigh the negatives. We would still need the oil to produce plastics, fertilizers, grease, etc., etc. & we could eliminate the largest user of oil, the internal combustion engine.
We still don't utilize hydroelectric as we should, either. How many of you have dams somewhere close to your residence? How many have turbines installed? The state I live in is lucky in that regard as we have plenty of water available in rivers & streams. The Wisconsin River is loaded with dams, many with active generating capabilities (mostly used by the paper mills that line its banks), many with non-working turbines. Why don't we develop more hydro? It's reasonably cheap though not always reliable.
We have been spoiled & we've been frivilous. Like Cross mentioned above, our love of BIG STUFF is now coming full circle.
I've said this before but we just don't live long enough to understand what "long-term" means. Doubt me? Drive past a new strip mall somewhere that wasn't there when you were younger. Tell your children what used to be there. Watch as their faces change to non-comprehension. Their perspective just isn't there & can't be. You can close your eyes & visualize the field that the strip mall now occupies, your children cannot. Some of our younger members cannot understand what us oldsters went through during the early seventies, they cannot; their perspective isn't there. We have to be able to stop thinking in what the cost of gas is going to be tomorrow & start thinking about what we can do to help stop the slide or our younger members aren't going to be driving anything in the near future.
Man, I've just got to stop sucking beers while I'm on this forum. I apologize for the long ramble but I just felt the need to vent a little.
Now, back to Xfire stuff.......it's a lot more fun & a lot less depressing!