If it weren’t for my dentist, I would never even pick up Newsweek. The last straw was the “Conventional Widsom” section wherein a reader is led to believe that “everybody” is a snarky twentysomething. Week after week, the arrow next to Bush is locked in the full downright position and next to it is some witty phrase like “New Jersey ‘terrorist’ bumblers cannot find Fort Dix, Can Bush find an Al-Qaida connection?”
Drudge links to this Newsweek online article about Obama’s misstep in blasting Detroit auto industry execs. It doesn’t take long for this “news” article to play to the same conventional wisdom which defines them.
First the news:
This week, Sen. Barack Obama attempted to fuel his presidential run with a scalding speech to the Detroit Economic Club, castigating Motown’s big wheels for driving our dependence on foreign oil. “For years, while foreign competitors were investing in more fuel-efficient technology for their vehicles, American automakers were spending their time investing in bigger, faster cars,”
…
What played as an act of courage in the rest of the country, is being seen as political suicide here in Detroit.
Then the tongue bath for Obama:
Obama was now showing he wasn’t the typical Midwestern Democrat, kowtowing to Big Labor and Big Factory Bosses. “This was a cheap political stunt,” snapped one Detroit auto exec. “He wanted to generate headlines that ‘Obama goes in and talks tough to Detroit’.”
That’s exactly what he did, too. And that plays well in the rest of the country. Detroit’s reflexive defensiveness on boosting gas mileage goes over like sand in the gears in a country struggling with $3 a gallon gas (and worrying it will go to $4). The fact is Japanese automakers do lead in hybrids and fuel-efficient crossover models, while Detroit remains too dependent on big SUVs and trucks. Sure, American automakers are now working on new mileage misers, but they are playing catch-up.
Brother Obama, you may be a political neophyte, but you do speak truth.
Now, the sermon. Wanna know how I feel on gas consumption? Read closely, it’s real subtle.
As pump prices reach record levels again this spring, American drivers show no sign of letting off the gas. Even with gas above $3 a gallon, gasoline consumption is expected to rise at nearly twice the rate of last year, according to the Energy Information Administration. Every day in America, drivers
burn through 380 million gallons of gas, up 18 percent from a decade ago. This
record guzzle rate is being driven by all our driving. On the road last year, all the odometers in America combined to turn over 3 trillion miles for the first time. That’s nearly 15,000 miles for every driver on the road in 2006, up from 10,616 miles per driver back in 1982, federal highway statistics show. Our
insatiable demand for petrol, combined with ill-timed refinery shutdowns, has left spring gasoline inventories at their lowest levels since 1956. And that’s causing all this pain at the pump. “This caught oil companies by surprise,” says oil analyst Phil Flynn of Alaron Trading. “People are shocked that demand is not going down with gas prices going up.”
Why won’t we stop guzzling?
Um, because we peasants have jobs to go to? Because while you can afford expensive New York, DC or Bay Area real estate, many of us schlubs live in the outer ‘burbs where we can afford a piece of the American Dream.
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This entry was posted on Monday, May 14th, 2007 at 10:13 am and is filed under General.
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May 14th, 2007 at 7:58 pm
Er., I think Newsweak’s Bush CW indicator is stuck in the downward position. It may also be an indicator of the same position, on a permanent basis of the editor’s wangs.:oops:
May 15th, 2007 at 7:19 am
Our insatiable consumption?
Let’s see. Every year more young drivers hit the roads. Every year people are living longer and driving past the point of senility.
We need to declare our dependence on oil a national emergency and open up ANWR. We need to drill for oil in an elk’s ass. They always said “it would take ten years before we ever got anything out of it”.
Well sister, if we’d started drilling then we would have it right now wouldn’t we?
May 15th, 2007 at 7:38 am
I could ride the #16 bus to my job, but then I’d have to work with the stench of B.O. fresh in my nostrils, the memories of guns being pulled on gang members next to me as I calmly duck under the seat fresh in my mind, and the verbalizations of the schizophrenic community fresh in my ear.
Yeah, when you make enough money, you just don’t want to ride with the proletariat nor is it particularly convenient if you did.
May 15th, 2007 at 10:11 am
Uh, Mr. Barack HUSSEIN Obama…perhaps you could advise us as to which brand of hybrid YOU drive.
Yup…thought so.
Anyone want to guess when we’ll get the NEXT lecture on using our resources responsibly from a liberal hypocrite?
May 16th, 2007 at 12:32 pm
Moo-slime Headed Bastard!
May 16th, 2007 at 1:39 pm
Careful Swampy…you are headed for a Fatwa!
May 16th, 2007 at 1:57 pm
Bring on the fat-twats…..
May 16th, 2007 at 2:40 pm
Leave the toads alone, and we’ll get along just fine.