Gas Prices Soaring Again

[susanann]

What we need is Bio-diesel hybrids. Mandate that by 2012, 20% of all cars sold must be bio-diesel hybrids and then bump that up by 5% every other year till we hit 40%. Increase minimum fuel standards in vehicles to at least 25 on the highway by 2012 and 30mpg by 2020. There is a lot we could do to make ourselves completely energy indepentant by 2020 and no reason beside politics and greed that we can't accomplish it.

Even if we did all those things, if you double/triple your population, you will still be using more energy and we will also have less energy remaining in the ground.

You can only reduce consumption per captita by so much, but there is no limit to population growth.

 

[benjdm]

Then you will have to stop buying anything, because almost anything you buy(including food) at the store, uses enormous energy fossil fuels to create, and transport.

Of course. I can't do it overnight. But as less fossil fuel energy gets used I'm not going to curl up and die. I want to live and be happy. Everything else is details.

We add 50,000 more people to our country each week. I doubt that you can save enough additional energy, each week, to offset what 50,000 other new people coming in are going to be using.

Reducing per capita consumption can never offset multiplying the population and multiplying energy use by the aggregate.

Absolutely true. Yet, the available energy is going to drop. I don't currently have the ability to live very well on lower energy. Over the next few years I will be investing in ways of living well on lower energy (house thermal efficiency, lower energy transportation, etc.) and learning other ways of living. A long and daunting task. But unavoidable.

 

[ACougar]

Even if we did all those things, if you double/triple your population, you will still be using more energy and we will also have less energy remaining in the ground.

You can only reduce consumption per captita by so much, but there is no limit to population growth.

The population in the United States is fairly stable, I think we would be around 0 population growth if it wasn't for imigration. People who are not focused on survival eventually become stable populations and in some cases even decline.

Alternative energies, renewable energy, greater energy efficiency and much more local production of energy.

In a hundred years a significent percent of the population might live in homes that realize an energy surplus through solar and wind power, cars will have diversified to teh point where only 1/3 of the vehicles on the road rely primarily of carbon fuels and they average more than double the fuel economy of vehicles today.

 

[ONEGod]

Itsgreattosee that some realise the importance of population to this situation, so lets deport 30 mil+ illegals and get back to fiscal energy conservation. Except those that want America to conserve are mainly those that want millions of Conquitadors to live here as well ! Taking our jobs and using our resources.
They want to aggravate the problem AND complain about it not being solved ! The confusion of the political mindset !

 

[ONEGod]

Lets cure our excessive use of oil by sending 30 million illegals back to where they came from. Keep America's employed with American jobs, DOUBLE BONUS ! ! !

 

[benjdm]

Lets cure our excessive use of oil by sending 30 million illegals back to where they came from. Keep America's employed with American jobs, DOUBLE BONUS ! ! !

Neglecting anything other issues with this, I'll magically grant you this as done. In 1-3 years the U.S. is right back where we are now as the oil depletes. It doesn't really make a difference. We will still adapt to energy scarcity.

 

[susanann]

The population in the United States is fairly stable, I think we would be around 0 population growth if it wasn't for imigration.

Native born American women went below zero population growth way back in 1970.

We "should" be using much less oil than we did back in the 1950's and 1960's.

 

[susanann]

Quote Originally Posted by: ONEGod Lets cure our excessive use of oil by sending 30 million illegals back to where they came from. Keep America's employed with American jobs, DOUBLE BONUS ! ! !

Neglecting anything other issues with this, I'll magically grant you this as done. In 1-3 years the U.S. is right back where we are now as the oil depletes. It doesn't really make a difference. We will still adapt to energy scarcity.

It is probably more like 20 million illegals, but who knows? It could be 30 million illegals, and lots of people dont count the children of illegals in their numbers, which would probably comprise 5 -10 million in itself.

We would not be right back where we were if we also called a temporary halt to immigration until we had enough resources ( oil, gas, water, etc) and jobs and federal budget surpluses to resume immigration once again.

It would take a very long time to find out if oil is scarce, after the US drastically reduced its demand, and after embargoing all trade with china caused them to stop buying oil. With the US and China buying very little oil next year, and in the next several years, I would think OPEC would be drowining in their unsold oil that few people wanted.

 

[susanann]

In a hundred years a significent percent of the population might live in homes that realize an energy surplus through solar and wind power, cars will have diversified to teh point where only 1/3 of the vehicles on the road rely primarily of carbon fuels and they average more than double the fuel economy of vehicles today.

In a hundred years, if you dont stop immigration, and if you dont stop deficit spending, and if you dont stop balance of trade deficits, the US will have over a billion people, no factories, and hundreds of trillions of dollars more in debt. We probably will be quadrillions of dollars in debt by then with hyperinflation.

Nobody is going to be able to afford any these things you speak of, and the dollar will be worthless.

 

[peanutbutter12]

In a hundred years, if you dont stop immigration, and if you dont stop deficit spending, and if you dont stop balance of trade deficits, the US will have over a billion people, no factories, and hundreds of trillions of dollars more in debt. We probably will be quadrillions of dollars in debt by then with hyperinflation.

Nobody is going to be able to afford any these things you speak of, and the dollar will be worthless.

Heh, speak for yourself. I'm already investing on my secured future.

The only way the deficit will ever deflate is if we adopt a new form of government that doesn't spend tax dollars on useless programs, doesn't spend $30,000 on a toilet seat, and isn't run by corrupt politicians looking out for number one.

As I have said before, as much as it would pain me to see it happen, if we stopped funding groups like NASA for about 10 years and put the money into paying off the deficit, we could take a huge chunk out of it, if not completely get rid of it. This is considering how many billions of dollars we put into the space program every year. Don't get me wrong, I do believe we should still be funding the needed groups such as those who watch for things that have a possibility of coming into the Earths atmosphere, but how many billions of dollars are we spending trying to get people on to Mars? How many billions are we spending on getting people ready for another trip to the moon? Mind you, I don't believe NASA is useless, much the opposite as a fellow astronomer, but these things are unneeded programs and could afford a 10 year pause. After all, we didn't send anyone up there for millions of years previous to the first launch. I doubt in 10 years much would change.

CJ

 

[ACougar]

Guess we'll simply have to hop the fence into Mexico then.

In a hundred years, if you dont stop immigration, and if you dont stop deficit spending, and if you dont stop balance of trade deficits, the US will have over a billion people, no factories, and hundreds of trillions of dollars more in debt. We probably will be quadrillions of dollars in debt by then with hyperinflation.

Nobody is going to be able to afford any these things you speak of, and the dollar will be worthless.

 

[benjdm]

As I have said before, as much as it would pain me to see it happen, if we stopped funding groups like NASA for about 10 years and put the money into paying off the deficit, we could take a huge chunk out of it, if not completely get rid of it.

NASA's budget is ~$15 billion. If you cut them off for ten years that's ~$150 billion. The deficit adds more than that to the debt in one year.

 

[peanutbutter12]

As I have said before, as much as it would pain me to see it happen, if we stopped funding groups like NASA for about 10 years and put the money into paying off the deficit, we could take a huge chunk out of it, if not completely get rid of it.

Plural, not singular.
I was only using one example of a way to majorly cut costs.

CJ

 

[benjdm]

Plural, not singular.
I was only using one example of a way to majorly cut costs.

CJ

No, you provided 0 examples. The 2005 budget deficit was roughly $500 billion according to here. Look here to see what kind of spending you have to cut to balance that budget. The entire Department of Defense budget was roughly $500 billion, entire Department of Health and Human Services was $580 billion.

 

[ONEGod]

Lets really cut legitimate spending and waste like the BILLIONS given away to China, Indochina, Japan, Mexico, various Muslim terrorist groups and radical domestic groups here !
Now theres some real cost savings and we don't have to regress to frontier days primitive society to do it ! ! !
Of course that nullifies the real intent, doesn't it ?

 

[benjdm]

Lets really cut legitimate spending and waste like the BILLIONS given away to China, Indochina, Japan, Mexico, various Muslim terrorist groups and radical domestic groups here !
Now theres some real cost savings and we don't have to regress to frontier days primitive society to do it ! ! !
Of course that nullifies the real intent, doesn't it ?

Not at all. I would happily support cutting off almost all foreign aid. You tell me: How much does all that foreign aid add up to ?

 

[susanann]

No, you provided 0 examples. The 2005 budget deficit was roughly $500 billion according to here. Look here to see what kind of spending you have to cut to balance that budget. The entire Department of Defense budget was roughly $500 billion, entire Department of Health and Human Services was $580 billion.

It is extremely easy to cut the spending, eliminate the deficit, and run huge budget surpluses.

All we have to do is to stop being so selfish!!!!

Why do so many people want so much more from the government?

Why cant we, temporarily at least, just settle for the amount of government that we had with president Reagan? Personally, I would not miss anything if government spending went back down to the highest level of spending by Reagan.

I personally dont mind sacrificing and giving up all the new government benefits that were added since Reagan.

IF we cut spending back to Reagans highest budget, about a trillion, that would cut back spending by 1.8 trillion from bush's spending - which means that we would have annual surpluses of 1.4 trillion dollars, enough to pay off the entire federal "on-budget" debt in less than 5 years. This would then give us an immediate savings of $360 billion dollars each year just from the interest that we would no longer have to pay.

IF everyone would just cut back to allow our government to spend as it did with the Reagan administration, our entire country would turn rightside up again.

As soon as the federal debt is totally paid off, then we would have lots of extra money for reducing or eliminating the personal income tax, or finding new energy sources, helping the poor, and/or whatever. We just dont want to continue to have 1.4 trillion dollar surpluses forever, because then we would be getting interest instead of paying it, and it would be come 2 trillion dollar surpluses before long.

IF we returned, temporarily, to Reagans budget, we could still have NASA, foreign aid, social security, medicaid, medicare, highways, a very strong military, student loans, and everything else that we had back in 1989.

I want to hear from all those who will not want to sacrifice and who refuse to go back to the level of gov spending and services that we had in Reagans last year.

Just what of the additional 1.8 trillion dollars in new spending since Reagan do you feel you cannot live without?

 

[ONEGod]

It's not that we can't live without all the new spending, its that the illegals, radicals and terrorist won't be able to live without the new spending. Neither will the millions of illegal aliens feeding on the public welfare dole.
You want these privileged elitist to die on the vine ?

 

[peanutbutter12]

Personally, I think welfare should be abolished except to people who can prove they are actively looking for work and there should be a time line on how long you can be on it. While I was working in Michigan, I would see so many of these welfare folk who are fully capible of working, yet choose not to because they get a pay check every month. Or they choose to get a 15 hour a week job because it's less work and they can still get a check at the end of each month. It's a waste of our tax dollars to be supporting these fools who want free money and little or no work. If you can't find a job within 2 months, any job that will get you a start, than something is seriously wrong.

CJ

 

[benjdm]

It is extremely easy to cut the spending, eliminate the deficit, and run huge budget surpluses.

It should be done and needs to be done.

IF we returned, temporarily, to Reagans budget, we could still have NASA, foreign aid, social security, medicaid, medicare, highways, a very strong military, student loans, and everything else that we had back in 1989.

I think we're basically on the same page. The cuts have to be made everywhere.

Just what of the additional 1.8 trillion dollars in new spending since Reagan do you feel you cannot live without?

Just my G.I. bill.