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Originally Posted by ChicagoHCHII
Can the politicians really be blamed? If you believe they should be altruistic and held to a higher standard perhaps. But remember house members have to get elected every two years. Their constituencies may not be the smartest but even those with poor memories remember events less than two years out. They are merely following their incentives of being elected.
Perhaps if we cut congressional salaries to 50k/year it would weed out those people who are just in it for a posh life and hefty remuneration. Why is it that teachers/firemen/police and the military are the only public servants that aren't compensated much because as public officials we don't want to attract people to those careers who are focused solely on money?
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I dunno how much of an incentive salaries provide to get elected to US Congress. Their current salaries are ~$170K/yr, which a dual-income professional couple could bring home at quite few places with a lot less hassle. I think it's more about power and perhaps fame. Either way, your point about them focusing on being reelected certainly stands true.
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On the $6/gallon--its coming. It may be a few years out, but I don't see massive hybrid or plugin adoption in time for $200/barrel oil. I'd rather us get there gradually rather than suddenly to at least allow some time for R&D and preparation of alternatives.
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As best I can tell, US cars use up about 10% of the oil the world pulls out of the ground in a given year. Even if every driving American doubled their fuel economy, we'd only free up 5% of the total. If $6/gallon is coming due to emerging market demand or instability among producers or lack of new supplies, we don't have much control (congressional grandstanding about Exxon profits notwithstanding). Part of my incentive to pick up a Civic Hybrid was to hedge against a combination of events that could push us into crazy expensive fuel prices.