| |
|
Americans Threatened by Gas Prices
 |
Vanessa Shelden
Opinion Editor |
Photos:
|
 |
|
Twenty-four hours after Hurricane
Katrina shook the Gulf Coast, gas prices in Bloomington shot up
from $2.69/gal to $3.19/gal. Thank you, Captain Obvious. Unless
you are Lara Hamburger and the seven other people who bike to
school or the five people who walk, you most certainly drive to
school every day. Maybe it wasn’t you, per se, maybe it was your
lovely mother or the “dashing and daring” bus driver. Either
way, getting around town in a car, and thus paying for gas, is
now much like checking for head lice: quite necessary but quite
unpleasant.
There are two basic problems in this issue. Exhibit A:
we need cars. We really do. Even if you ride a bike, there are
still another 191 million drivers in the US who refuse to trade
in their BMW for a BMX. We need ambulances, we need police cars,
we need trucks, and we need to heat our homes.
The other problem is that four times a year
Exxon-Mobil, the largest gas company in America, makes $33
billion dollars in profit. That’s enough money to give each
student at South $18 million. Keep in mind that after a year,
each Panther boy and girl would have four times that amount.
With that kind of money, we could fix the infamous COMMS problem
(imagine that!) and still have plenty of money left. Something
is wrong here.
We have better things to complain about, like not
getting our $18 million a year and losing access to nine oil
refineries in Louisiana and Mississippi. Because of the Katrina
destruction, 10 percent of the oil that we should have around
right now isn’t here. But here’s the biggest problem: getting
that oil can’t bring back the people who were lost…the homes,
the jobs, the pets, the schools, and the material possessions
that disappeared in Hurricane Katrina. Gas prices just aren’t
worthy of complaints. The people in the gulf have been left
without any sort of comfort.
So here’s what should happen. If gas prices are too
offensive, people should buy fuel-efficient cars. A car that
gets more than 30 miles per gallon on the highway is a good
start. The second and better approach involves acquiring a car
that uses an alternative source for fuel or a hybrid car.
Best-case scenario: we get rid of long-haul trucks and move back
to freight trains. Trains are less harmful to the environment
and can carry more cargo. Trucks cause damage to the roads, not
to mention, they can be blamed for the increase in automobile
causalities. Schlepping humans around costs less than schlepping
around all our stuff (and here in America, we do love stuff).
In the end, there’s very little we can do about gas
prices. Sorry. We are literally held captive by the countries
that export petroleum. They determine the unfair prices. What we
must do is move away from being dependent on foreign oil. No,
you don’t have to give up your car, but trading in your Hummer
for a Toyota Prius Hybrid wouldn’t hurt (for every gallon of gas
a Prius uses, a Hummer H2 uses six). As your parents said when
they bought you a rusty ’88 Buick complete with an 8-track and
pee smells, “it’s just something to get you from point A to
point B.”
|
| |