Miscellaneous 161

1) "Prices on electric cars will continue to drop until they are within reach of the average family." The Washington Post, October 31, 1915.............2) "Electric cars are the next big thing and they always will be." Robert Bryce, "Power Hungry", 2010.............3) In that same volume, Mr. Bryce (a frequent critic of both Bush AND Obama) points out that gasoline has 80 times the energy density of the best lithium ion battery and that if we had to solely rely on the latter for transportation, world transportation as we know it would totally end.............4) “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” H.L. Mencken, date unknown. Hm, can you say, Bush on Iraq, Gore on global warming (and, no, I'm not saying that global warming is a hoax, just that there's been an element of alarmism to it), and pretty much everybody on the bailouts?............5) The price of natural gas in 2007 was $6 1/2 per MMbtu. Today it is $3 1/2 per MMbtu. That fact, more than anything, is what's keeping this economy afloat, in my opinion. And on this one I DO give Obama credit....At the very least he hasn't screwed it up.............6) The final fiscal cliff deal was one of $620 billion in revenues and $15 billion in spending cuts. Attaway to come up with a balanced approach there, fellas'.............7) Having said that, though, I do think that the tax compromise was a fair one. Yes, I would have probably negotiated the top rate down a tad to 37-38% but the threshold of $400,000 for an individual and $450,000 for a family is a decent one, I think. a) It hurts fewer people, b) it still raises a fair chunk of change, and c) it probably excludes 99.5% of all small businesses....There, now if we could only get to some spending cuts and entitlement reform.............8) Question. Why did those idiots at that newspaper (The Journal News out of White Plains) print the names and addresses of every single gun owner? I mean, really, do we want to be giving that type of information out; basically telling every crook in the county who does and DOESN'T have a firearm to defend themselves. That's insane.