The U.S.A. has had massive opportunities to formulate an intelligent energy policy during the last 30 years when we could more than afford to do it, but greed and short-term thinking got in the way. Big surprise. The last straw, IMO, was abandoning CAFE standards in the '80s by classifying all SUVs as "trucks" instead of simply passenger vehicles, but hey, the auto companies made a killing, right? Got to get while the getting is good.
Now that oil prices have taken off, (and it's not the $2.50 @ gal. regular that scares me, it's the 10 cents a gallon weekly rise/instability), consumers and vehicle suppliers are going to prove that we could have burned 1/2 as much the whole time w/o any significant reduction in quality of life. Americans waste energy for the same reason that dogs lick their balls, because we can. I mean could.
A quick trip to Europe will show anyone that using a Suburban as a one person car is not necessary for happiness to be achieved, in fact it may be the opposite. Out of control consumerism is great for GM and the ad industry, but not the human psyche, IMO at least.
In the words of the late Frank Zappa, "The difference between humans and other animals is our ignorance, arrogance, laziness and stupidity".
