don’t panic

Some days you wake up and find yourself completely flabbergasted at the idiocy your own government has concocted while you where sleeping. Today was one of those days.

The GOP has put together a package to help relieve the pain at the gas pump, and in essence there are some good ideas in there. Repealing tax incentives for oil companies and and allowing the Federal Trade Commission to prosecute retailers unlawfully inflating the price of gasoline are great no-brainer’s. They even went so far as to say:

“The measure would also give the Transportation Department authority to issue fuel efficiency standards for passenger vehicles, expand tax incentives for the use of hybrid vehicles and push for more research into alternative fuels and expansion of existing oil refineries.”

Sounds good. I’m not sure what expanding existing oil refineries does to help the situation, but I’ll bite…

Oh yeah, then they want to give $100 to every tax payer in America to, “offset the pain of higher pump prices for gasoline.”

Say what?! Let me get this straight. They want to give every taxpayer, regardless of whether or not they even drive a car and whether or not that car goes 100 miles a day at 9 mpg or 5 miles a day at 60 mpg, a check for $100 dollars so that we can feel good about the fact that gas is only going to be that much more “painful” next year?

Do businesses get a check too?

Can I expect Uncle Sam to ease my pain next year as well?

What if I drive a Hummer and pay over $1000 a month for gas? One Benjamin isn’t going to ease that pain a whole lot. Maybe I should get more?

And they’re going to get this pain relief from where? It’s not like the government has this huge surplus of funds they don’t know what to do with. And any time the government gives you money, especially money that goes to every single tax payer, SOMEBODY is going to pay for it somewhere. In this case, I guess it’s those that pay the greatest percentage of their income in taxes… that would be the poor and middle-income families in America. The rich get another freebie. What a surprise.

And the real kicker of this deal – the thing that absolutely chaps my hide – is that it also includes a proposal to open part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska to oil exploration.

Alaskan oil won’t make more than single digit change to our domestic oil production at the expense of our last great natural reserve. Even if we drilled that place until it was paved like a parking lot, there’s no guarantee that it will make but a few cents difference at the pump which could more than be eaten up if there’s any kind of altercation in the Middle East. And how likely do you think that is?

Yeah, it’s a stupid idea. And to put it in there literally days after Bush is touting how “green” he is with his Hydrogen Economy, is just insulting. Giving people money to “ease the pain” is nothing more than a publicity stunt to improve his ratings. A piddling $100 isn’t going to make anyone feel better when gas hits four dollars a gallon, or five.

This is akin to taking a pain-killer to fix a broken leg. Your limb is still broken, regardless of whether you can feel it or not. Sooner or later you are going to have to deal with it or end up a cripple. In the plainest of terms, the gas rebate is our own government handing us a pair of crutches.

Will someone please clue the President in on basic physics.

It seems our fearless leader took advantage of Earth Day to push his hydrogen economy. And to most people it sounds like a great deal… We break from our dependence on foreign oil, it’s clean burning, and as Mr. Bush puts it, “is the way of the future.”

Yeah? And where do you get all that hydrogen? It’s not like it’s found anywhere naturally, and for it to make enough of a difference to sever our ties with big oil, we are going to need a stinkin’ huge amount of the stuff.

We’ll make it locally, you say?

Using electricity?

I see. And how do we generate electricity?

Yeah… Oil. Oh, and coal. I’m sure it won’t hurt the environment any when we strip-mine our country into a wasteland of blackened pits to satisfy our ferocious need for energy. And I’m also sure that the trillion-dollar big oil industry is just going to smile as we slowly put them out of business. I mean, they already have the President of the United States in their back pocket, so who else do they really need? Especially when he does such a good job of snowing the general public, most of whom are suckers willing to believe that our leader actually has our best interest in mind and not just that of his political buddies.

So once again, Bush, you are either an idiot or a liar. Either way, leave Earth Day alone you hypocrite. You’ve probably done more to hurt the Earth than any leader in human history.

So I read an article on Engadget about an eight year old girl who wrote Apple with some ideas on improving the iPod and got back a nasty letter about how they don’t accept unsolicited ideas and to not send suggestions… signed by Apple’s Senior Council Mark Aaker no less.

Nice one guys. Aside from earning yourselves a big fat raspberry from every Mac fan who has ever supported you, you instantly bought untold hours of free negative publicity for Apple showing just how arrogant you really are.

Just where do you think all those great ideas over the years have come from? Pure inspirational genius? Nah! Unlike Microsoft, you actually listened to your customers… Until now anyway.

Aaker shouldn’t have called to apologize… He should have been FIRED on the spot. There’s this incredibly huge pool of creativity in the form of user ideas, that they give up FOR FREE, and Apple basically thumbs their nose at them. Take away half of Aaker’s salary and give it to a couple dozen interns devoted to sorting the junk from the gems and do a call for creativity, I say. The more kids the better.

So it would seem that the recent protests fueled by new legislation to change immigration laws here in California have spread to the high schools. Kids are actually walking out of classes and carrying signs. Early on they actually started doing damage to shops.

I’m all for peaceful protesting. Sometimes it’s the only way to get a point across to politicians.

But these are kids.

I’m sorry, but they are. They neither have the understanding, nor the control to stage a protest. How many of those teens know the laws regarding what they can and can’t do as a mob? How many of them understand the process needed to make a change in government? How many can even vote yet? How many are just there because it’s more fun than English class?

It’s a very dangerous precedent to allow our children to take to the streets, and I’d be very surprised if ultimately they did so on their own, without being persuaded to by an adult who could care less about their futures.

And then there’s the issue itself… Migrant workers. but that’s a bucket of worms that I’m not yet ready to tackle.

I tend to think of myself as a reasonably unprejudiced guy… Okay, I do have a serious bias, and that’s to stupidity. But you can’t run from that, it’s everywhere. Consider that the average IQ score is 100… that’s the middle of the road, folks.

But every now and then I run across someone who just rubs me the wrong way. Honestly, most of the time it’s a white jerk in an SUV. But today I passed an article on CNN that made me really lose heart in our governmental system.

Here’s a Congresswoman who walks into a government building without her “identifying lapel pin”, (whatever that is – but obviously it’s something they are supposed to be wearing) and then blows off the authorities when they ask her to stop… three times. Then, when an officer does his job and tries to put his hand on her to stop her, she hits him.

Now, obviously, there’s a lot more to this story that that boys in the news room are spinning such that we are being led down a given path… but no mater how you look at this, it’s an affront to our system of authority. I don’t care who you are or what color your skin is, when an officer of the law asks you to stop while entering a government building, you stop. If you want to get all huffy about it later, fine. With terrorism being bush’s number one agenda, you would think that at least the people directly working for him would have the sense to try and at least show a good example.

Not this gal. Instead of an apology she throws out the race card, the sex card and may seek civil action against the officer. Nice. Of course, the “black clergy” run to her side and praise her. Why not the white clergy? Don’t they read the same Bible? Why the clergy at all? What has she done that warrants any attention at all from the leaders of the church? Maybe a chance for a striking pubic statement and a photo session?

That officer shouldn’t have placed a hand on her. Nope. He should have pulled out his weapon and shot her in the leg. Congresswoman or not, you simply don’t thumb your nose at the authority that you are trying to protect while working for that government.

If this is an example of racial profiling, as “her supporters” have suggested, then guess what? You have just given that officer the perfect example of why he was right to do so.

But hey, she’s got a new do, so that makes it alright.