Idiot politicians, Stupid American public and Oil

So now the solution to gas prices is to give everyone $100.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,193327,00.html

Look, I'd like $100. Really, it'd be nice. However, this goes against so many of my political beliefs it's not funny.

1) It's income redistribution. - Don't look at me like that. If every taxpayer gets $100, regardless of what he paid in, it's income redistribution. I don't appreciate that. If you don't want my money, don't tax me. (This isn't a diatribe on taxes, so I'll stop here).

2) It fixes nothing. So you give me a hundred bucks, and I buy a couple tanks of gas with it. You've actually raised prices (this won't happen b/c people won't spend the money on gas, but let's pretend) by letting the increase in prices not stiffle short term demand.

3) Let's talk about the plus here - it opens ANWR for drilling. I've gotten in no less than 3 arguements from people saying "it's the oil companies, I mean you can't blame the tree huggers". That's EXACTLY who I blame. If we were drilling in ANWR and off the cost of FL, then oil wouldn't be at $75 a barrell, since supply would be up.

Let's take this further
a) Not allowing drilling in ANWR and FL
b) Boutique blends of gasoline, including summer and regional blends that reduce refining capacity and create pockets of fuel that cannot be used in other places
c) Opposing nuclear power plants, instead having plants that use oil.
d) Lack of new refineries.

Granted none of the above fix the instability in Iran and Nigeria that is helping to drive oil up, but it would certainly mitigate it.

Speaking of which, Qatar says oil prices would drop if people would shut up and stop inciting panic. Not sure about that, but it seems easy enough to try. Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid... want to see?

http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/06/front2453851.3097222224.html

I'm all for being energy independent. The best way to do that is to create DOMESTIC sources of energy. Yeah, alternative technologies are great, and eventually they'll be mastered but it's not happening right away. It'll take 15 years to replace the automobile supply in America. We're flat out not going to conserve ourselves out of the problem.

A better arguement for domestic consumption is who we're propping up. Take a look at this link.

http://www.reason.com/0605/fe.rb.peak.shtml

"Economides worries that the conventional wisdom that oil-producing countries do not want to cause a global economic recession is wrong. “The danger posed by the axis of energy militants—Venezuela, Iran, and, increasingly, Russia under President Vladimir Putin—is that they could not care less,” he says. “These militants hardly have functioning real economies whose workings would be adversely affected by a recession.”

This is the part I think is key.

But seriously, how are we going to fix the problem, when most Americans think it's as simple as Exxon price gouging?

need podcasts

What are you favorite podcasts?

I ditched my XM radio for now... In the car each day I listen to the PennRadio podcast. Problem is, it's 45 minutes long, but my drive each day is 50-60 minutes.

I have a few others I like (here and here) but they are updated very infrequently.

Most others I've found are not much better than the "Brad & Britt lets-pretend-we're-lot-leftists" show or the "Bill & Sherri in the Morning show" AKA "the Survivor/American Idol rehash show".

Please help me avoid these!

Scripted TV Sucks

Ryan's complaining got me thinking, here in Atlanta the WB is showing all the episodes of The Simpsons in order. It it amazing how good some of those episodes are.

I'm not going to claim that the show is at its peak right now, but it is still better than most of the scripted crap on TV. The Loop? What's Fox's problem? They are just living off TV Karoake.

NBC is running this stupid Howie Mandell show all the time and now "Celebrity Cooking? What the hell is that? Having said that, it's got more than the other Big 4 with Scrubs, My Name is Earl, and the Office (although they stole it from the BBC, seriously, couldn't they be less blatent). Still it'd be nice if they could fill up their lineup w/o the same show three times a week.

ABC doesn't even have a scripted show on I watch right now - and what the hell is this Geena Davis brainwashing bullshit. That pisses me off. Don't try to tell me Desperate Housewives is good, or I'll smack you upside the head.

That brings us to CBS. CBS has the annoying habit of having 6 of the same show on. Seriously, how many CSI's can there be?

My DVR is filled with movies and the Discovery Channel right now.

What do you guys watch?
-Simpsons
-Family Guy
-South Park
-Scrubs
-Earl
-Office

That's about it for scripted TV.

Animated Serieses

Yeah, I saw all the stuff about the Simpsons movie... I assume everyone did. All I can say is that the original producers & writers better be making it and not the current crappy writers. I finally finished reading Planet Simpson. Maybe I'll write a review at some point, but one of the main themes was the fact that seasons 3/4 through 7/8/9 ish were the "golden years" of the Simpsons. Since then, it's been pretty stupid and predictable. I kind of agree.

Anyways, I haven't seen a movie in the theater Since "Die Another Day" (2002). We'll probably try and take the kids to see Cars this year so he can see what a movie theater is before they all go out of business. But I'm not wasting money on seeing a movie in a theater unless it's gonna be good.

By the way, have ya'll be watching South Park lately? Those guys are at the top of their game, and still generating controversy. (And seriously trashing Family Guy, too.)

While I'm talking about animated serieses...

I tried watching 2 or 3 episodes of The Boondocks. Not entertaining enough for my limited viewing time.

The Adult Swim show that I do like to watch every so often: Aqua Teen Hunger Force (because it's just so stupid it's funny.)

What a loon!

Damn, the foolishness never ends!

From today's nuze:
McKinney's putting our tax dollars to good work.

BTW: Cynthia McKinney is a crackhead.

Mark your calendars

What are you doing July 27, 2007?

I can't believe that no one has mentioned this yet.

If you haven't seen the preview (what you weren't watching last week?) it's here.
http://movies.yahoo.com/movies/feature/thesimpsonsmovie.html

This has taken forever, so it better be good. Let's just hope it's not the beginning of the end.

Couldn't have said it better

Another opinion on the crackhead.

Cool or Scary?

I can't decide if this is more cool than scary, or vice-versa...

TrackStick GPS Data Logger

It won't be much longer before these have wifi or cell-phones built in so they can call home every few minutes.

The "homing device" will be available to everyone now...

Go sell crazy somewhere else, we're all stocked up here!

I've said it before, and I'll say it again...

Cynthia McKinney is a Crackhead!

It's the only reasonable explanation for all of the incredibly dumb, moronic things she has said and done. Anyone else have a better explanation? I didn't think so.