BoppWeBlog

Is this really a bad thing? I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t want to pay more to the oil companies. It’s not fun to spend more money at the pump, while Exxon mobile records record profits. We all know this is pretty shady, and I hate it just as much as the next guy. But there is a positive side to this in my mind.

Somehow here in the US with gas prices continually going up, we continue to see the rise of gas guzzling vehicles as well. So are we really feeling the pain of high gas prices? It doesn’t seem like it to me.

So my question is, how high to prices have to get before America actually take fuel efficiency, and alternative fuels seriously?

Over the years we have developed amazing things. Amazing ways of generating power. There have been many alternatives to the gas engine proposed and built. Electric cars have been manufactured, and for he brief time in which they were offered, electric cars were in high demand. People were on waiting lists. (if you want to know more check out the movie “Who killed the electric car?”). So why do I see America still sitting around complaining about gas prices while they are filling up their 40 gallon gas tank.

I can’t really argue with why gas prices are high. It’s a product of capitalism. If the oil companies can get away with charging us that much for petroleum, why shouldn’t they? After all, the whole idea of working in a commercial society is to make as much money as possible. I’ll agree that it seems extremely unfair. But there are options. We can decrease the amount of gas we use if we really want to. Our society to a certain degree chooses to be dependant on oil.

Maybe if gas continues to rise we will eventually start demanding more fuel efficiency and begin looking for more viable alternatives. Just about everyone will say they want fuel economy, but if that really were the case for everyone when it came time to purchase a vehicle I think we would see a lot more options for fuel economy out there because of the demand.

Maybe crippling us with $5 per gallon gas prices is exactly what we need. A little kick to send us in the right direction.

In my previous post I touched on this. But I’d like to talk about it even further. I can’t say that this is an area in which I am very passionate. But it does seem pretty straightforward, and I’m very puzzled as to why it is even an issue here in the U.S. If you haven’t guessed already I’m against punishment.

There are actually very few countries that still allow this in the world today. So how is a country that claims to be on the cutting edge of technology and human rights still allowing this? Have we not evolved far enough to realize that killing doesn’t solve anything? Ninety seven percent of all executions in 2004 happened in four countries - Iran, China, Vietnam, and the U.S. The states that still allow this do not have less violent/death worthy crimes. In fact, in general they have more. Perhaps these states have always had a bigger problem with crime, thus ‘needing’ the death penalty. But it is unlikely. Consider, for example, the fact that crime dropped by 20% in Canada after it dropped the death penalty.

Another popular argument is the cost to the taxpayers. In actuality, it costs on average as much to execute someone as it does to hold them in prison for 40 years.

Human life is sacred. There is only so much ‘justice’ that can be done here on earth. Leave the rest to God.

Family and friends who hope to find closure in this final punishment for the ‘evildoer’ I would have to imagine only end up living much of their life dwelling and obsessing over vengeance.

And finally, most importantly, rather than deterring violence in our country and world, it mearly feeds the complicated social problem, worsening the climate of violence in the worl.