Green Eyed Monster

I recently wrote in these pages that we ought to rename the upcoming holiday in honor of Stephen Milles whose act of note was to attempt to throw his shoes at the chairman of the MTA in a parody of Islam's greatest insult. I got some real flack about this, mainly because the commenter felt it was an insult to the memory of a "great american." The commenter missed my point so now I will clarify it.

Stephen Milles is a great guy because he is someone who finally had the courage to oppose the MTA, who have been riding roughshod on the backs of suburban commuters for years while feathering their own cushy, highly paid, boondoggles. (To mix some metaphors, but you get what I mean). Realizing that their old ways of taking money from the riding public using the threat of service cutbacks no longer appeals to a formerly docile ridership, they have switched tactics to engage the current craze for saving the planet from climate change and proposing a "green" monthly ticket which will resonate with some doomsday fanatics to get them to voluntarily part with their money. We all know where the money will ultimately end up. Obviously they now feel that begging will do more for them than protection-racket type tactics.

The fact that they can even propose such a funding plan illustrates how far the green craze has developed. Very early in the game, I realized that Rachel Carson would be responsible for a movement as powerful and dangerous as nazism and communism. In the short 48 years since the publication of "Silent Spring," the educational establishment worldwide has successfully indoctrinated 2 generations of the world's population who are ready to die for environmentalism. I recently heard a news story on BBC where an Australian woman with a heavy German accent was bemoaning what to her seemed the imminent disappearance of a beach on the Aussie coast. Climate change and rising seas are now so accepted as truths that some people really believe that a beach will vanish before their eyes. What they expect the beach to be replaced with is anybody's guess. This attitude reminds me of an incident with my (then) ten year-old son who ran into the house one day slamming the door because he spotted a moth and he had just donned his new wool suit. He explained that he didn't want the moth to eat his suit.

Not only is this climate change nonsense ludicrous but it's leading some of our more level headed political and financial leaders into some massive mistakes. The New York Times just reported that Detroit has decided to risk billions of dollars to develop an all electric car which they are not sure will sell. I am sure that the impetus for this decision comes from the recent congressional and media discussions about the bailout of the auto companies. Every report on the issue mentioned that the auto companies were not doing enough in the field of green technology as if that was the cause of their financial difficulties. If they go ahead with the electric car, they will really be in the soup!

Who, in his right mind is going to buy a car which will go 100 miles and then require a 6 hour stopover to recharge so that it can go another 100 miles. The article states that most people drive an average of 35 miles per day. Take a typical retired couple in Michigan that use their car to go to the local Wal-Mart, go to church on Sunday and maybe once in a while go to the big city to have dinner and go to a movie. They also drive to Sarasota every winter and spend 4 months there where they use their car in the same manner. It would take them 10 days to get down there and also ten days to get back. Even if they could manage more than 100 miles a day, what do they do during the six hours they are plugged in? Or take the case of a family in Des Moines that wants to visit the Mall of America for the weekend. The weekend would be over before they got there!

I hope they don't build this car. After all, with the bailout, it will be our money they're risking.