Unfortunately for your argument, my imagination is incredibly accurate. If you don’t fit the stereotype, you would be the first one ever, and I would congratulate you on being the first ever.

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This is not happening, based on life expectancies compared to years before people used cars on a widespread basis.

See, this is where your basic understanding of scientific logic fails again. You would have a point if car usage were the ONLY variable in play, and clearly this is not the case. If you don’t already understand simple principles like this, it becomes pretty clear that just about everything else you base your worldview is similarly irrational.

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If you don’t can’t counter the point, just admit it and, as one group on your side of the ideological aisle says, “move on.”

I just want to note that I never dodge points because I never make them unless I can humiliate possible counter-points. The only challenge is to do so in a possibly amusing way. I believe we’ve been through this before where you make this accusation and then are unable to produce any evidence of it when pushed. History repeats itself.

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As someone once said, charges of bigotry are dragged out when the liberal is losing the argument. Thank you for proving that point nicely.

Apparently bigotry now means pointing out the facts – that illegal immigrants present a public health challenge for the U.S.

No, I believe the record of posts above quite clearly show you were the one to bring this up. A great portion of traditionalist’s phobias reflect back to scapegoating outside, often minority, groups (Jews/Blacks, now Mexicans/Muslims/gays or really anybody “different”).

The black welfare queen I guess turned into the illegal mexican, both overblown caricatures to rile up the base.

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A sugestion here, agenthex – I would suggest losing the snark and stop calling people “morons” (as you did in the other thread to another poster), because you don’t know as much as you think you do.

Here’s the real difference. I know exactly how much I know, and the vast world of knowledge out there I don’t. In fact I know exactly how much you know and don’t. This is why I always win these little silly debates.

You’ll have more credibility if you stop referring to the conservatives that exist largely your imagination.

You have complained – with justification – about caricatures of liberal views and President Obama’s actions regarding the automobile industry.

I would suggest not engaging in the same sins yourself.

agenthex: Notice the absolutely appalling logic.

Notice that you didn’t read the entire thread before making a comment, which makes you look completely clueless.

Let’s review here – dex3703 made the comment that cars are making us unhealthier. One measure of health is life expectancy. (Healthier people tend to live longer.)

One would conclude that we would die earlier if we were really unhealthier. This is not happening, based on life expectancies compared to years before people used cars on a widespread basis.

agenthex: I guess by independent thinking you must mean outside the usual bounds of logic.

If you don’t can’t counter the point, just admit it and, as one group on your side of the ideological aisle says, “move on.”

agenthex: And now the bigotry bubbles to the surface after all else fails.

As someone once said, charges of bigotry are dragged out when the liberal is losing the argument. Thank you for proving that point nicely.

Apparently bigotry now means pointing out the facts – that illegal immigrants present a public health challenge for the U.S.

(I don’t know how old you are agenthex, but the same charges of bigotry were dragged out whenever anyone noticed that minorities were more likely to commit crimes in urban areas in the 1960s and 1970s. Eventually, the facts became too obvious for all but the dumbest of leftists to ignore, as even the Reverend Jesse Jackson and others were forced to admit the truth. We can only hope and pray that you will admit the obvious regarding the challenges presented by illegal aliens around 2020.)

If you can’t accept this, I would suggest keeping quiet and leaving the discussion to those who are better informed.

agenthex: Is there anything conservatives can’t blame on brown people?

Is there any time a liberal won’t bring out the tired charges of racism and bigotry to cover for ignorance or not wanting to the face the facts?

In your case, apparently, not.

A sugestion here, agenthex – I would suggest losing the snark and stop calling people “morons” (as you did in the other thread to another poster), because you don’t know as much as you think you do.

You can start by learning something about the auto industry, so you will stop believing, for example, that pairing Chrysler with Fiat will produce a viable company, given that Europeans aren’t lining up to buy most Fiats.

What’s next on your agenda to bring back Chrysler – reviving DeSoto?

No, there’s absolutely no outside evident to support their point of view. It’s all internally generated in the conservative movement that was hatched and then abandon by the main party a while back, right after open racism was no longer consider a populist enough primary stance for the party.

For example:
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You claimed that cars are making Americans unhealthier. This is not borne out by increased life expectancies in this country.

Notice the absolutely appalling logic. Cars can make people unhealthier -> life expectancy must decrease. I guess by independent thinking you must mean outside the usual bounds of logic.

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They have fewer poor illegal immigrants, which drag down life expectancies (and virtually all other measures of public health).

They also have lots of cars in Europe.

And now the bigotry bubbles to the surface after all else fails. Is there anything conservatives can’t blame on brown people? Or unions in case they’re not even peripherally involved?

Your mixing apples and oranges. There is no proof that these federal funds are being used for roads. Most of the transferred federal funds are for Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare payments and disaster relief.

Revenues from the federal motor fuels tax are used to pay for the federal portion of highway constrution; as johnthacker proved, it has been used to subsidize non-highway projects for years, and this is slated to increase if Secretary LaHood’s suggestions are implemented as official policy.

skor: BTW, the original NYC subway lines were all privately built(funded). The rail tunnels connecting NYC to Jersey were privately built. I don’t know of any interstate highway system that was built with private funds.

So were many roads in earlier times. They were privately owned and operated. They weren’t interstate highways because most goods transported in interstate commerce were carried by either waterways or railroads at that time.

In my hometown, the entrance via the main street is still informally referred to as Tollgate Hill because, in the 19th century (when those private subways were being built in New York City), the main road was privately owned, and users had to pay a toll to enter town.

dex3703: Those comments relating to free individuals making free choices are, probably unavoidably and unconsciously, parroting the free market mantra that’s been carefully crafted over the last 30 years or so.

No, it’s because they can think for themselves. What really upsets you is that they have reached different decisions on where and how to live.

The idea that they are being deluded or tricked by corporations or free-market rhetoric is an old ploy by those who can’t stand the fact that people, thinking on their own, have reached different conclusions as to what constitutes the good life.

I don’t care if you live in the city and never drive a car, or live on a commune and bicycle everywhere. That is your choice. It is no more or less valid than the choices I have made.

dex3703: Speaking to our current car-centric society and development model, this has been carefully constructed with government policy, which was bought by private influence.

This may come as a surprise, but, over the long haul, voters in the United States generally get what they want.

dex3703: Why is there a home mortgage interest deduction?

Because both of the major political parties have agreed that promoting home ownership is a good thing.

Incidentally, someone who owns a rowhouse in the city can claim the home mortgage interest deduction, too. And there is no requirement that they own a car to claim it.

This deduction isn’t restricted to owners of McMansions in the suburbs.

dex3703: The point here is that the society we live in has been designed, even if only in a de-facto way.

Which is good, because completely designed areas tend to be pretty awful and sterile.

dex3703: A hundred years ago none of this existed.

A century ago, there were suburbs. The Main Line suburbs on the western side of Philadelphia existed at that time. They developed around the street car lines. In the 1950s, suburbs developed around the interstate exchanges (King of Prussia outside of Philadelphia, for example, where the Pennsylvania Turnpike and the Schuylkill Expressway meet).

Cities have been sprawling for centuries; as long as the people have been able to live outside the city, they have done so. How far outside of the city they live depends on the available transportation technology at that time.

dex3703: – 20th century life expectancy increased in some places, didn’t change and got worse in others.

Not in the United States, which is relevant to the discussion. You claimed that cars are making Americans unhealthier. This is not borne out by increased life expectancies in this country.

dex3703: Europeans live longer than North Americans and consume half the energy.

They have fewer poor illegal immigrants, which drag down life expectancies (and virtually all other measures of public health).

They also have lots of cars in Europe.

dex3703: – Public transportation makes you more active because it’s not door to door. I ride the bus and walk at least a quarter mile every day from stops to destinations, so I get some exercise every day even if I don’t do anything else.

There are very few places that offer door-to-door service for drivers. I certainly haven’t run into them. I have to walk lots of places, too. So I get exercise whether I go to the gym or not.

dex3703: I am sure this would be heresy to many Americans, but I guess they enjoy their spare tires, expensive maintenance medications and all their side effects, and impaired sexual function, among other things. (That last is a jibe but it is also true.)

Unfortunately, there is no proof that those are related to driving a car. You ignore diet, for example.

dx3703: – American cities after WWII were disintegrating, but as a society we followed the Levittown model instead of rebuilding the cities. I think this had a lot more to do with racism than anything.

You need to tell this to the minorities who have been moving to the suburbs in increasing numbers for well over two decades. They apparently didn’t get the memo that the main reason to move to the suburbs is to avoid living in close proximity to minorities.

dex3703: – On that point, how much opposition to public transportation is racism? When I listen to people complain about it, I always hear a subtext of not wanting to be next to all the subhuman races.

Because you prefer to ignore the large number of minorities who drive and who are moving the suburbs. It doesn’t fit your narrative.

Utility’s prices/profits are fixed in exchange for granted monopoly, so really it’s just a matter of convenience for the gov and does not support the original author’s point at all.

It’s true that most of the electrical/water infrastructure was built with private capital — in large towns and cities — the first subways and and almost all the railroads were built with private capital as well.

The fact remains that almost all rural electrical service was paid for by the feds. Fact is that happy motoring, and suburban Mcliving, would be impossible in almost all Western states, but for federal water projects.

For all the breast beating that “independent” Americans do about freedom of choice, and living on what was, until recently, marginal farmland, or even waste land, it’s all just a Rush Limpblow delusion. Almost all of the postwar infrastructure that was built to allow our motoring lifestyle was subsidized by the feds. This is why I find all the hysterics that accompany any call for mass trans funding to be so amusing. Apparently it’s OK for x-burb inhabitants to be welfare queens, but it’s not OK for urban residents to be welfare queens.

At the same time, my wife had two part time jobs in different parts of the city, 7 and 12 miles from home. Commuting to them by bus would have taken her 6 to 8 hours each day.

An acquaintance worked in New York City and lived in Connecticut. His commute, by train and bus, took 3 hours each way. Moving to New Jersey saved him an hour a day.

I live in a medium sized midwestern city. The metropolitan area is 250 square miles and the aggregate population is two thirds of a million. Most of the time, I can drive across town in no more than half an hour.

A friend of mine, who lived in Pasadena, California, had a girl friend in Orange County. A date involved picking her up, dinner in San Pedro, a movie in Westwood, some time at his apartment in Pasadena, taking her home and returning to Pasadena. The evening used up two tanks of gas in his Buick.

I wish the people who complain about the private automobile would try to design a public transportation system to replace it. Requirements are availability within a quarter of a mile of any two arbitrary points at 15 minute intervals 24/7 and, at least in my city, no more than one hour travel time between those points. If public transportation is so much better than the private automobile, it should be able to provide at least comparable service.

Public transportation advocates don’t want to talk about the sacrifice in quality of life needed to make public transportation viable. It needs a high population density. Say goodbye to the single family home. The only way to get the necessary density is to stack people on top of each other in high rise apartment buildings.

Because housing costs are moderate in the midwest, I can afford to live outside city limits on an acre of land. The nearest bus stop is more than 3 miles away. Some of my colleagues like living even farther out even though doing so requires a 50 to 100 mile commute. Are you going to provide public transportation for them?

Another colleague recently retired to a home in the country 80 miles from the nearest city. The closest civilization is a village of 300 people five miles away. The closest real town, population 6,000, is 15 miles away via county road. It’s very inviting. Dark skies at night instead of light pollution. Enough space for a couple of horses. No damn noisy neighbors and their ill mannered brats. Of course, it won’t work if I have to depend on public transportation.

This the governmental equivalent of a little girl writing a letter to Santa for a pony.

a nation which is spending almost a trillion bucks a year on war related stuff is not going get a new transport system of any sort.

Utilities in general are so heavily regulated they might as well be government agencies.

Some folks a while back also the bright idea to deregulate them.

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What’s interesting is that the drive to privatize roads in the US is coming from big government types.

Generally how it works is that some people want to make money like off red light cameras, then lobby the gov to give them that right. The “revenue” is bait. Win-win for everyone, right? As long as you believe “private” always means better.

While the government has been involved in some electrification, most notably the TVA and some big dams out west, most of the electrical grid in the US is the result of private investment, not government. Water supplies, outside of the west, were the product of local governments, not the federal government.

As for roads, before the interstate commerce clause was interpreted into meaninglessness, Congress had to justify the Interstate Highway system on national defense grounds in order to provide the original funding.

What’s interesting is that the drive to privatize roads in the US is coming from big government types. They want to sell or lease roads paid for by the taxpayers to private businesses who, like red light and speeding camera companies, will provide a revenue stream back to government.

Way to go, libs!

I’ve commuted to work on a bike and regularly use a bicycle for transportation. It’s a feasible commuting solution with some caveats. Weather is an issue. I live near Detroit, this means using a bike isn’t really practical from November to March. Getting wet isn’t a real problem as long as your regular clothes and personal items are packed to stay dry and as long as the temperature is above 50-55. Cold isn’t a problem since you’re generating heat with your exercise. Wet isn’t a problem, because you’re going to be soaking wet with sweat when you get there anyway. Cold and wet, though, is a problem.

You’ll need shower facilities at work as well as a safe place to lock your bike. You’ll also need to carry spare tubes, a patch kit and a pump or CO2 inflater. Ride a properly fitted bike and be sure to wear bike shorts. Bike shorts will keep your sensitive parts from getting chafed.

So commuting by bike is a bit of a pain, but it can be done if you’re serious about it. It’s also significantly more dangerous than driving.

Environmentally, increased CO2 output from riding a bike means that four people riding bikes to work may actually put out more CO2 than if they carpooled in a small sedan.

They are just admitting that.

So the cycle is: steal the gas tax money, traffic gets worse, offer an unworkable LRT system and claim you need to steal even more gas tax money to pay for it.

In that future, when running your car costs $10/gallon, and there are endless arguments about WHO will pay for the roads, someone might remark that starting the structural change in transport NOW was a really clever idea.

My guess is there must be 5 “sky-is-falling” whiners for every 1 pragmatic person in the USA. (Maybe the ratio is even worse).

The entire point is that while living out in the burbs is great for the earlier adopters, the system gets worse with time, and becomes untenable in the long run.

It’s sad really because people were given the freedom to make choices that can turn out to be more expensive in the long run for society and their children, and they took it.

If I use public transport, it takes 65 minutes to get to work.

If I take the car it’s only 20 :P.

Detroit would empty out even faster?

That is utter rubbish. If it was true everybody would have stayed in the old parish or neighborhood. Fact is, everybody who could get out, did. It continues.

My father’s old neighborhood in Chicago and my mother’s in Fort Worth were awful when they lived there, well before WW2 and I am a happy native Texan who did have to grow up in old Chicago or Fort Worth, because they relocated to a then new area Dallas.

BTW, electric trolleys, even in New Orleans are/were prone to constant breakdowns, are loud, are impediments to resurfacing and infrastrucure inmprovements and as are not cost effective except as tourist entertainment and barely useful in a place like NOLA where car ownership is low. Computer ownership is low too and crime is high in NOLA. Might be a connection there. Hard to ride the bus out of town when a hurricane is coming.

If Seattle is so mass transit friendly, why was there such a hue and cry this winter when a mild snowstorm caused many days of havoc? Turns out the Roads people were hamstrung by the environmental wackos on how they could deal with the snow. It turned to ice. Bad problem caused by concern salt would leach into Puget Sound. That is a salt water bay interestingly enough.

I have driven in Boston twice. If I had the luck to live there. I would use mass transit at every opportunity if I could not afford a taxi or radio car. Crazy stuff goes on routinely. You can get run over my a funeral procession if you are not careful.

I’m sure you find it hard to believe that there are legitimate arguments that you don’t agree with. Those arguments are not racist… unless of course you say they are, in which case they must be, huh?

What garbage.

Those comments relating to free individuals making free choices are, probably unavoidably and unconsciously, parroting the free market mantra that’s been carefully crafted over the last 30 years or so. The libertarian fantasy that we live in a ‘free market’ is patently false. Speaking to our current car-centric society and development model, this has been carefully constructed with government policy, which was bought by private influence. State-by-state and locality-by-locality incoherent land development policies and building codes: did these come from The People, or were they instead the result of incessant, carefully designed and deeply funded interests in tract-home building and other land ‘developers’? Why is there a home mortgage interest deduction? Isn’t such a credit an interference in the free market?

The point here is that the society we live in has been designed, even if only in a de-facto way. I don’t mean this in the kind of Trilaterial Commission conspiracy sort of way, but just that a bunch of independent actions designed to get certain people rich have led to the way we live and think is normal today. A hundred years ago none of this existed. In a hundred years, I would guess none of what we take for granted will exist either (though saying anything more than that is only good for entertainment value).

Instead of cleaving to a juvenile fantasy that the free market solves all our problems by magic and we don’t have to do anything but sit back and watch advertising and bash the government, we need to grow up collectively and take responsibility for designing the kind of future world we want to live in. Assessing the limits imposed upon us by physics, the natural world, and our reckless use of the past century, only certain sorts of futures are possible. None really include the car at any extent like they exist today.

Some other random and unsubstantiated points because I’m at work and shouldn’t be writing this:
- 20th century life expectancy increased in some places, didn’t change and got worse in others. Europeans live longer than North Americans and consume half the energy.
- Public transportation makes you more active because it’s not door to door. I ride the bus and walk at least a quarter mile every day from stops to destinations, so I get some exercise every day even if I don’t do anything else. I am sure this would be heresy to many Americans, but I guess they enjoy their spare tires, expensive maintenance medications and all their side effects, and impaired sexual function, among other things. (That last is a jibe but it is also true.)
- American cities after WWII were disintegrating, but as a society we followed the Levittown model instead of rebuilding the cities. I think this had a lot more to do with racism than anything.
- On that point, how much opposition to public transportation is racism? When I listen to people complain about it, I always hear a subtext of not wanting to be next to all the subhuman races.

Notice how few people stop to ask this very basic question…..

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Neither.

Government = A collection of individuals compromising freedom for stability

Of course, the individuals don’t compromise the same amount.

If an individual thinks the stability he receives outweigh the compromised freedom, he stays put and maybe complains verbally. Otherwise, he rebels.