L.A. Times: Gov. Brown takes emergency action to try to reduce gas prices (http://www.latimes.com/business/money/la-fi-mo-gov-brown-gas-prices-20121007,0,2291534.story)
Waiting for the Sierra Club/Surfrider Foundation lawsuit: 6.................5......................4....................3............
The Sierra Club is responsible for refinery fires, or problems with the changeover from seasonal blends which have been in effect for years? I guess I would look for a conspiracy among refinery operators, were I looking for conspiracies here. Otherwise, the Sierra Club is conspiring to increase oil company profits.
Paid $4.63 yesterday. Luckily I was between 1/2 and 3/4, so it wasn't TOO painful....
Quote from: The High Plains Traveler on October 07, 2012, 10:44:26 PM
The Sierra Club is responsible for refinery fires, or problems with the changeover from seasonal blends which have been in effect for years? I guess I would look for a conspiracy among refinery operators, were I looking for conspiracies here. Otherwise, the Sierra Club is conspiring to increase oil company profits.
One of the Sierra Club's highest priorities is to make sure that fuel for rubber-tired vehicles is as expensive as possible. Their preferred way is with increased taxes, tolls and other revenue from highway users, with all of the additional money diverted to capital and operating subsidies for transit (and especially rail transit), but they don't mind large increases in fuel costs at the pump, as long as the dollars collected do not get spent to expand, improve or maintain the highway network.
Quote from: cpzilliacus on October 08, 2012, 12:26:38 AM
Quote from: The High Plains Traveler on October 07, 2012, 10:44:26 PM
The Sierra Club is responsible for refinery fires, or problems with the changeover from seasonal blends which have been in effect for years? I guess I would look for a conspiracy among refinery operators, were I looking for conspiracies here. Otherwise, the Sierra Club is conspiring to increase oil company profits.
One of the Sierra Club's highest priorities is to make sure that fuel for rubber-tired vehicles is as expensive as possible. Their preferred way is with increased taxes, tolls and other revenue from highway users, with all of the additional money diverted to capital and operating subsidies for transit (and especially rail transit), but they don't mind large increases in fuel costs at the pump, as long as the dollars collected do not get spent to expand, improve or maintain the highway network.
The refineries have a hand in that, too, given the amount of gas they export to other countries.
http://tinyurl.com/9lqjybu
Quote from: cpzilliacus on October 08, 2012, 12:26:38 AM
One of the Sierra Club's highest priorities is to make sure that fuel for rubber-tired vehicles is as expensive as possible. Their preferred way is with increased taxes, tolls and other revenue from highway users, with all of the additional money diverted to capital and operating subsidies for transit (and especially rail transit), but they don't mind large increases in fuel costs at the pump, as long as the dollars collected do not get spent to expand, improve or maintain the highway network.
Post of the year. Great job.
Quote from: SP Cook on October 08, 2012, 08:27:17 AM
Post of the year. Great job.
Thank you for your kind comment.
Yay, wingnut conspiracy theories.
Well, just try to build a new oil refinery these days....
:poke:
And then there are all of those different 'boutique' blends of fuel that are required to be sold in certain places and that change with the seasons at specified times of the year....
:banghead:
Mike
The average cost of gas went up 20-30 cents a gallon in a matter of hours in Cal. so the reserves had to be forced open to keep the gas prices from going too high, because it all adds up when you have 10 or 20 gallons to fill for the regular commute. The problem is state regulations made by environmental groups and foreign oil sources kept us from building a new oil refinery in the last 40 years. We should solve this problem before the price of gas furthermore cost more money to keep our cars simply filled up. (and the economy working).
[Irrelevant political content removed. -S.]
Quote from: NE2 on October 08, 2012, 11:32:07 AM
Yay, wingnut conspiracy theories.
Hardly. The Sierra Club is a bunch of wingnuts who try to stop common sense road proposals such as IL-53 in Lake County or the I-355 Extension in Will County. They've gone a long way from being John Muir's conservationists.
Quote from: Brandon on October 21, 2012, 08:29:06 PM
Quote from: NE2 on October 08, 2012, 11:32:07 AM
Yay, wingnut conspiracy theories.
Hardly. The Sierra Club is a bunch of wingnuts who try to stop common sense road proposals such as IL-53 in Lake County or the I-355 Extension in Will County. They've gone a long way from being John Muir's conservationists.
Add Maryland's Route 200 (ICC) to your list. And the Md./Va./D.C. Wilson Bridge reconstruction project.
Agreed regarding "wingnuts" (and for the record, I am a lifelong registered Democrat, and a pretty liberal one at that).
Unfortunately the news media tends to regard Sierra Club members as expert in transportation and land use policies, which they are not.
baa
Quote from: NE2 on October 21, 2012, 09:51:18 PM
baa
So you are a sheep now?
FOUR LANES GOOD! TWO LANES BETTER!
Quote from: Brandon on October 21, 2012, 08:29:06 PM
Quote from: NE2 on October 08, 2012, 11:32:07 AM
Yay, wingnut conspiracy theories.
Hardly. The Sierra Club is a bunch of wingnuts who try to stop common sense road proposals such as IL-53 in Lake County or the I-355 Extension in Will County. They've gone a long way from being John Muir's conservationists.
Hate to tell you this, but there's truth in those crazy conspiracy theories.
I attended a meeting with some environmental attorneys in downtown Chicago a while back. Gas prices were spiking at the time and the talk at the dinner table revolved around the question of "what's it going to take to get these people out of their cars and SUVs and into buses and trains?" Those who were involved in the discussion (all of whom make $350,000+ salaries) were commenting that gas really needs to his $8 per gallon before we would see some "beneficial change" to the way in which the "average person" behaves.
Thankfully, the meal was delicious and my mouth was too preoccupied with food for me to have said anything that would result in an undignified exit from the proceedings. Besides, it was fascinating to obtain some insight into what these people think of the rest of us. And yes, this is the mindset. Get the little people out of their cars and SUVs by having European-style (or higher) fuel prices. Of course, they're doing good work for everyone and are too important to be taken from their BMWs, Mercs and Range Rovers. But the average Joe should be in a train. How dare he drive a truck or SUV?
It's not a conspiracy theory, it's exactly how those who lead these movements think. And they brainwash those below them to think that way too.
Wait, you mean people who claim to care about not fucking up the planet actually want the planet not fucked up? Holy shit!
Quote from: NE2 on October 22, 2012, 11:53:55 PM
Wait, you mean people who claim to care about not fucking up the planet actually want the planet not fucked up? Holy shit!
No, go re-read the post. It's about "I can have mine, but you can't have yours." If they really cared, they'd also be on the train instead of driving their gas-guzzling luxury trucks and SUVs.
You reread it. He never said that these people drove to the meeting. (And even if he had, it would likely be an assumption based on bigotry.)
Quote from: Brandon on October 23, 2012, 07:01:30 AM
Quote from: NE2 on October 22, 2012, 11:53:55 PM
Wait, you mean people who claim to care about not fucking up the planet actually want the planet not fucked up? Holy shit!
No, go re-read the post. It's about "I can have mine, but you can't have yours." If they really cared, they'd also be on the train instead of driving their gas-guzzling luxury trucks and SUVs.
They aren't the only group who feels that way. Just sayin'.
They'd also be pushing stuff like research into batteries so we can get practical electric cars, instead of trying to force everyone onto transit.
Quote from: Brandon on October 23, 2012, 07:01:30 AM
No, go re-read the post. It's about "I can have mine, but you can't have yours." If they really cared, they'd also be on the train instead of driving their gas-guzzling luxury trucks and SUVs.
I could said it's also about "Do as I said, not as I do"....>_<
Quote from: NE2 on October 23, 2012, 07:53:04 AM
You reread it. He never said that these people drove to the meeting. (And even if he had, it would likely be an assumption based on bigotry.)
Bigotry? Really?
Wow, you're making it very difficult to have any sort of a reasoned discussion here. There's no need to be offensive.
Yes, the people to whom I was referring were very wealthy and they all have nice cars. One of them (a former colleague) drives a classic Mercedes Benz 480SL. Another had a large BMW (Z5?). One lived on the Gold Coast, another in Elmhurst, still another in Vernon Hills. They discussed the subject of gas prices without ever giving hypocrisy a thought.
"
We need to get people out of their cars and SUVs and raising the price of gas is what it will take." That's the 'tude.
Quote from: Brandon on October 23, 2012, 07:01:30 AM
Quote from: NE2 on October 22, 2012, 11:53:55 PM
Wait, you mean people who claim to care about not fucking up the planet actually want the planet not fucked up? Holy shit!
No, go re-read the post. It's about "I can have mine, but you can't have yours." If they really cared, they'd also be on the train instead of driving their gas-guzzling luxury trucks and SUVs.
That's exactly the point.
I have been to hundreds of public meetings about proposed highway improvements dating back many years, and it always amused me that many of those showing up to object to proposed improvements arrived by private motor vehicles (usually with one person in each vehicle),
even if the meeting facility was directly served by a transit line.
QuoteHardly. The Sierra Club is a bunch of wingnuts who try to stop common sense road proposals such as IL-53 in Lake County or the I-355 Extension in Will County. They've gone a long way from being John Muir's conservationists.
Muir was a preservationist, not a conservationist.
I was mindlessly browsing through the racks in the magazine section of the Appleton, WI Pvblic Library several years ago and just for the h*** of it, I picked up a copy of the journal of one of those major activist environmental/BANANA organizations and what said it all to me is that when I opened its front cover, the first thing that I saw was a multi-page foldout ad for the biggest luxury soove on the market.
:spin:
Mike
Marketing people are dumb.
Quote from: NE2 on October 27, 2012, 02:04:24 PM
Marketing people are dumb.
Not if you buy what they're selling.
Quote from: NE2 on October 27, 2012, 02:04:24 PM
Marketing people are dumb.
Usually they know their target audience very well. They rarely put an ad where it won't make some money for their client. Why do you think a lot of sugary cereals and toy manufacturers had ads on Saturday morning cartoons? You place your ad where it will be noticed by your potential consumer. In this case, the consumer of the journal that Mike mentioned happens to have a bizarre sounding conflict. They are very NIMBY-esque, yet they love their SUVs. Yet, it's not as incompatible as it may seem.
One thing I have noticed, from watching places like Homer Township, Illinois (now the Village of Homer Glen) is that some of these folks move outward wanting to escape the congestion of the city and inner suburbs. They buy land in a subdivision, usually large homes on 1/4 acre lots, out in what is then the middle of nowhere. Of course, they, by the nature of them being there, bring congestion and traffic. Then, because they have built in the area, land values go up and farmers then sell to other developers who want to make money by building houses and commercial businesses. The farmers sell as the land can be sold for more than they can make growing corn or soybeans. Thus, the land gets developed and brings in more congestion and traffic.
The pioneers, if you will, get pissy about this as it ruins the so-called "rural atmosphere" that attracted them in the first place. Thus, they fight any and all improvements in order to keep others out of their area. it fails to work for the other economic factors, namely the farmers and developers, above. What these pioneers fail to take into account it that their own development of the land is what brought the congestion and traffic in the first place. Their own houses helped to increase the local property values and made it more economical for their local farmers to sell out to developers.
In many respects, these folks created their own problem that they then try to solve through NIMBYism. They don't want to realize that they created their own problem in the first place by building out there. To go back to the initial part of this, the advertisers in the NIMBY-esque journal aren't quite so strange being there after all. Many of these pioneers tend to be well-off, and buy luxury SUVs and other such items. hence why they bought their larger homes on larger lots in the first place.
In an attempt to bring this discussion back on topic, prices are plummeting in California. Prices have dropped about 70-80 cents a gallon to the point that some stations around me are below $4 a gallon. I gassed up today at a Valero and paid $3.97. At the Santa Clara Costco, gas there is $3.85 but the lines were very long.
Quote from: Brandon on October 27, 2012, 09:23:36 PM
One thing I have noticed, from watching places like Homer Township, Illinois (now the Village of Homer Glen) is that some of these folks move outward wanting to escape the congestion of the city and inner suburbs. They buy land in a subdivision, usually large homes on 1/4 acre lots, out in what is then the middle of nowhere. Of course, they, by the nature of them being there, bring congestion and traffic. Then, because they have built in the area, land values go up and farmers then sell to other developers who want to make money by building houses and commercial businesses. The farmers sell as the land can be sold for more than they can make growing corn or soybeans. Thus, the land gets developed and brings in more congestion and traffic.
The pioneers, if you will, get pissy about this as it ruins the so-called "rural atmosphere" that attracted them in the first place. Thus, they fight any and all improvements in order to keep others out of their area.
Years ago, I used to work with a few of these people that insisted they lived in the "country" because they had a half-acre lot out in the exurbs somewhere. They saw no irony in the fact they were close enough to commute into the central city for work, and they were only five minutes away from walmart.
They would complain about the developers and increased zoning and property regulations. (Some of them had houses that weren't built up to code.) But they would also complain about the farmers too, when the wind blew manure smell into their house.
One of the upsides of the housing crisis is that these exurban areas got covered with subdivisions, and then landvalues went into the toilet. People have figured out that commuting in from the "country" isn't practical with current gas prices, unless it's a very upper-class area.