Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Chairboy on May 24, 2006, 10:27:31 AM
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http://www.nypost.com/news/nationalnews/69045.htm
May 24, 2006 -- WASHINGTON - In a surprise move yesterday, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton called for "most of the country" to return to a speed limit of 55 mph in an effort to slash fuel consumption.
"The 55-mile speed limit really does lower gas usage. And wherever it can be required, and the people will accept it, we ought to do it," Clinton said at the National Press Club.
Before sounding off on the benefits of a lower speed limit, Clinton called for a combination of tax incentives, the use of more ethanol-based fuel and a $50 billion fund for new energy research to cut the consumption of foreign oil 50 percent by 2025.
She also pushed for half of all the nation's gas stations to have ethanol pumps by 2015, and for every gas station to have them by 2025
This is more of the nanny-state crap. This is a bad idea. Let the market forces work it out. It is not the role of the government to do this. The government should be limited to running the courts, running the military, and basic road infrastructure (maybe). Yet every day it seems that politicians (the democrats have no monopoly on this, the republicans do it just as much nowadays) are trying to make government bigger, more involved, and more controlling.
When are we going to stand up and say "Knock it off"? If you're not outraged, you're not paying attention.
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From the unending wellspring of truly bad ideas....another truly bad idea.
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all the old biddies and less proficient drivers will be gunning it along in 4th or even 3rd gear and wasting 60% more fuel than cruising in a high gear at 70mph.
stupid law.
i bet they will claim it has saved lives pretty soon, and pitty the fool who crashes above the speed limit, for an example will be made of what happens to people who drive at excesive speeds like....63mph...now thats dangerous.
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This was already tried in America from c1974 until 1981, when states started getting rid of it. Nevada was the first. What I found funny was the presence of all those 7½ litre V8 monsters, in a driving environment where the maximum speed was 55mph.
Still, when the price of crude is being driven ever skywards by demand, which in America is 13m barrels of imported oil daily, mostly from OPEC, what other choices do your politicians have to reduce dependence on foreign oil? If people won't make sacrifices on their own or change their driving habits, the govt. feels obliged to act. Kind of reminds me of the ENY side balancing debacle in the early days of AH2!
;)
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And, as usual, government intervention made it worse.
Far better, as Chair pointed out, to let the market work.
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So you think that the more rapid consumption of (imported OPEC) oil is a good thing or a bad thing? Will this lead to an increase or a decrease of the price of gasoline? Oh well, if the price goes up, demand will drop.
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Originally posted by B@tfinkV
all the old biddies and less proficient drivers will be gunning it along in 4th or even 3rd gear and wasting 60% more fuel than cruising in a high gear at 70mph.
stupid law.
i bet they will claim it has saved lives pretty soon, and pitty the fool who crashes above the speed limit, for an example will be made of what happens to people who drive at excesive speeds like....63mph...now thats dangerous.
Umm, of course they will claim that, since we had a federal 55mph law for a couple decades & that's the two selling points they used to cram it down our throat,
* it saves gas
* it saves lives
When they really meant, it generates revenue in the form of speeding tickets because 55 is a stupid speed. If you're going to set the speed limit, it should be 60mph if you used common sense as a guide. 60 seconds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour. Much easier to calculate on the fly.
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Looks like Hillary is reading "Common Reams" website again (Rolls eyes)
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0501-01.htm
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-----------"And wherever it can be required, and the people will accept it, we ought to do it,"----------
No problem then.. just dont accept it. :)
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Originally posted by beet1e
This was already tried in America from c1974 until 1981, when states started getting rid of it. Nevada was the first. What I found funny was the presence of all those 7½ litre V8 monsters, in a driving environment where the maximum speed was 55mph.
Still, when the price of crude is being driven ever skywards by demand, which in America is 13m barrels of imported oil daily, mostly from OPEC, what other choices do your politicians have to reduce dependence on foreign oil? If people won't make sacrifices on their own or change their driving habits, the govt. feels obliged to act. Kind of reminds me of the ENY side balancing debacle in the early days of AH2!
;)
55 speed limit doesn't work, Beet. Thats the point.
The speed limit was enacted by Congress in March 1974 as part of a package of measures dealing with the oil crisis mph, it was thought, was the most efficient use of an auto's engine and thus would save fuel. As it turned out, however, the energy actually saved was minimal-at best 1 percent of gasoline consumption or about the same amount a driver could realize by increasing the pressure of his radial tires from 24 to 26 pounds.And state officials feel .that the NMSL is an Yet the 55 mph limit Cruising at 55 In the face of this data, speed limit advocates shifted ground.
Source (http://www.heritage.org/Research/SmartGrowth/bg532.cfm)
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Makes me almost glad that Texas is going back to Mexico (thanks to people like Hillary) where there are no laws. Well, so long as you keep a few bucks in yer wallet.
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Originally posted by lukster
Makes me almost glad that Texas is going back to Mexico (thanks to people like Hillary) where there are no laws. Well, so long as you keep a few bucks in yer wallet.
Where "Tex Mex" food takes on a whole new meaning! :)
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Yet again they are tossing out time frames that will never happen. Like reducing dependency by 50% before 2025...Geez come on toss down a gaunlet of something attainable like 5-7 years and give the people in our nation something to shoot for other than outsourcing our research on these alternatives to India, China, Malaysia and Pakistan.
Lets push for something other than ethanol as a fuel...I don't know what but something other than corn.
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it's not the speeding that kills , it's the sudden stop;)
actually, cant remember where i read it but speeding does not cause more accidents, but does increase the likelyhood of a fatality
mtndog
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Originally posted by Ripsnort
55 speed limit doesn't work, Beet. Thats the point.
Yeah, I know. I was just tr..., er winding you guys up. ;)
At about that same time, we had a 50mph limit imposed on all roads - Dec.73, during the first OPEC crisis. That didn't work either. In fact one of the most spectacular motorway crashes ever known, involving all 6 lanes of the M1, 123 vehicles and 5 fatalities, occurred in Feb.74 while the limit was still 50. As fuel became more plentiful and the pumps began to flow again, more and more people began to ignore it, myself included.
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Geez, someone put a gag in this lunatics for cripes sakes (not you Beet, the Billary :)).
And how does she plan to pay for the production of all that ethanol? People say, once gas reaches a certain price, then ethanol production costs would make it cheaper than gas.
One thing about that whole scenario. You cannot produce ethanol without using crude oil. So, the higher the costs of crude, the higher the costs of producing ethanol. In other words, you are chasing your tail if you think it will balance out one day.
Now, it certainly does not take an equal amount of crude to produce ethanol, but gas would have to reach something like $20.00/gallon before it becomes economically feasible to priduce ethanol.
Also, as ethanol product relies on crude, we really are not cutting our dependency much. On the other hand, we could use coal to help offset how much crude is needed, but here we are again. Another resource to deplete and one that is just vile to the atmosphere and environment.
She is an idiot. Unfortunately, she will be President one day. ARRRRRGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!
By the way. My car actually gets worse gas mileage at 55MPH, than it does at 65MPH. Did I mention she is an idiot? It is a testimony to the stupidity of the people who elected her to an office and to our nation as a whole we give her any credence whatsoever.
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Originally posted by beet1e
Yeah, I know. I was just tr..., er winding you guys up. ;)
At about that same time, we had a 50mph limit imposed on all roads - Dec.73, during the first OPEC crisis. That didn't work either. In fact one of the most spectacular motorway crashes ever known, involving all 6 lanes of the M1, 123 vehicles and 5 fatalities, occurred in Feb.74 while the limit was still 50. As fuel became more plentiful and the pumps began to flow again, more and more people began to ignore it, myself included.
I expect to be opposed to anything Hillary says everytime she opens her mouth. So far I've yet to be disappointed. The only time I'll be "wound up" is if she and her ilk are able to actually enact anything that interferes with my personal liberty. For the last few years the democrats have done little but add to the effects of global warming. ;)
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65 is ridiculous enough. 55 is insane.
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I remember reading info about how Montana had no speed limit for a while, and fatalities went down. Does anyone know where I can find info on this, or was it just urban legend?
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I say the faster the speed limit the quicker you reach your destination and the less time you burn fuel getting there, saving oil for the future
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Originally posted by Gryffin
I remember reading info about how Montana had no speed limit for a while, and fatalities went down. Does anyone know where I can find info on this, or was it just urban legend?
http://www.ibiblio.org/rdu/sl-irrel.html (shrugs) Haven't read it, just did a gooble search on the interweb..
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Just say [SIZE=20]NO[/SIZE] to 55!
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Originally posted by Ripsnort
http://www.ibiblio.org/rdu/sl-irrel.html (shrugs) Haven't read it, just did a gooble search on the interweb..
Here's the bottom line:
"The primary conclusion of this research is that the majority of motorist on the nonlimited access rural and urban highways examined in this study did not decrease or increase their speed as a result of either lowering or raising the posted speed limit by 4, 10, or 15 mi/h (8, 16, or 24 km/h). In other words, this nationwide study confirms the results of numerous other observational studies which found that the majority or motorist do not alter their speed to conform to speed limits they perceive as unreasonable for prevailing conditions."
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The thing that kills gas mileage is accelerating. Once you get to the speed you want, assuming below 75mph here, you use less gas.
This should be the reason idiots in the left lane going slower than traffic in the right lanes should be ticketed, and repeat offenders left without a license. The left lane is for passing ******, not cruising!
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I can't drive 55!
Take it away Sammy......
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One foot on the brake and one on the gas, hey!
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from businessweek via yahoo
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=2632&ncid=2632&e=43&u=/bw/20060519/bs_bw/tc20060519225336
interesting read, suggests ethanol uses less energy to manufacture than gasoline...downside, will take to long to get a decent infrastucture to manufacture and dispense it
mtndog
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lol good ole hillary. i've had her motorcade pass me on the new york thruway doing better than 80mph. wonder if she'll slow down or did she buy up alot of corn farms.
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Originally posted by Chairboy
http://www.nypost.com/news/nationalnews/69045.htm
This is more of the nanny-state crap. This is a bad idea. Let the market forces work it out. It is not the role of the government to do this.
Well Hillary is an idiot. But..... if the goverment isn't going to do it who is? Should we just wait until oil peaks and we a have a 10 year deppression trying to bring such fuel sources to market?
Ya the market works well on it's own, it's dawinistic..... But nature doesn't forgive lack of forsight. We are the only species I know of that has imagination to see things coming..... just because we use the 'natural' tool of the market doesn't mean we should be dumb about it and wait around for oil to peak and our economy to crash.
So who's going to do it ..... the average consumer? (Rollseyes)
If an alternative infastructure isn't in place when oil peaks we will see a huge deppression. With China and India drinking the black stuff up too in modren times..... use your imagination...... Peak oil will be here soon if it isn't already.
Problem is you need a real economist and scientist to plan it .... not some idiot like Hillary Clinton.
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Thanks Ripsnort. I found another interesting article too:
http://www.hwysafety.com/hwy_montana_2001.htm
Basically when there is no speed limit, people don't go ridiculous speeds (surprise surprise, people aren't suicidal). What does happen is that people stay out of the left lane(s), and wear seatbelts.
This study suggests that when montana had no speed limits, the measured speeds were less than on california's 65 mph urban highways.
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i drove through MT a bunch of times in those days, but my four banger has a governor just over 100...i krpt it in the mid 90s. iirc the "safe & resonable" was ruined when MT's highways became a tourist destination & bunch of evolutionary biologist's study subjects commited suicide by porsche
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55...
:rofl
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While I am not fond of 55 I can see 65 as a federal mandate enforced by highway funding threats. I wouldn't be overly upset by 65 and I could tolerate that easiler than 60 and way better than 55.
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whats speed limit ?? *g*
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See Rule #7
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Originally posted by beet1e
This was already tried in America from c1974 until 1981, when states started getting rid of it.
;)
We know, we were there. You certainly have a firm grip on the obvious.
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I never understood 55. If 55 saves lives and gas, why not make the limit 45 or 35? It would save even more lives and gas.
As far as ethanol, it's already proven it can work in Brazil. The problem with it here is we have tied ethanol to corn (thank you Archer-Daniels-Midland:furious ) and not sugar beets. Sugar beets produce ethanol that's 5 times more efficient than corn based. It's also easier to make. We just need to corral the corn lobby and ADM's bought and paid for "Dukesters".
Here's a good LINK (http://www.distill.com/World-Fuel-Ethanol-A&O-2004.html) comparing the current (2004) costs, usage, ect.
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i think 70mph is a nice safe cruising speed.
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Originally posted by Dago
We know, we were there. You certainly have a firm grip on the obvious.
Who is this "We" you refer to in this thread? All the people who have posted thus far? I don't think so - I was talking to Batfink, who had posted just before me. He was not there, and probably did not know, especially as he hadn't been born by then. Sorry *THAT* wasn't obvious.
Now come back at me with an alcohol or woman joke. :lol
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Originally posted by Gh0stFT
whats speed limit ?? *g*
Yup, one of the reasons I'm still stuck in Germany. ;)
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Since they did eliminate the 55mph limit several years ago I wonder if they'll lift the warp 5 restriction in the future? ;)