I don’t know about you, but the reason I’m making so many changes in my life to live more authentically is due to our climate change. Much more than weather, I’m talking about all of it, government, economy, religion, family relationships, the whole enchilada has changed. Everything we believed in just 12 months ago looks, tastes, or smells very different to me.
Today we lost General Motors. How are you feeling?
100 years ago this year, the founders of General Motors convinced the world to give up their horses and saddles and buggy whips to try a new form of transportation. We enjoyed the car hops at the A&W. We made out in the front — and the back — seat. We watched movies on large outdoor screens, went to the races at NASCAR tracks across the country, and saw the Pacific Ocean for the first time through the window down Hwy. 1. And now it’s over. It’s a new day and a new century. The President — and the UAW — must seize this moment and create a big batch of lemonade from this very sour and sad lemon.
Oh I’m not bitter, only some questions for GM.
Didn’t you refuse to build automobiles that the public wanted, cars that got great gas mileage, were as safe as they could be, and were exceedingly comfortable to drive?
GM, didn’t you stubbornly fight environmental and safety regulations?
If we allow the shutting down and tearing down of our auto plants, we will sorely wish we still had them when we realize that those factories could have built the alternative energy systems we now desperately need. And when we realize that the best way to transport ourselves is on light rail and bullet trains and cleaner buses, how will we do this if we’ve allowed our industrial capacity and its skilled workforce to disappear?
And now questions for our President.
Shouldn’t we immediately convert our auto factories to factories that build mass transit vehicles and alternative energy devices?
President Roosevelt did after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Within months in Flint in 1942, GM halted all car production and immediately used the assembly lines to build planes, tanks and machine guns. The conversion took no time at all. Everyone pitched in. The fascists were defeated.
Since I’m the newbie to the green world here, I say this without having done a ton of homework on how toxic our American cars can be. The things we call “cars” may have been fun to drive, but they are like a million daggers into the heart of Mother Nature. To continue to build them would only lead to the ruin of our species and much of the planet.
Solutions Mr. President.
- Japan is celebrating the 45th anniversary of its first bullet train this year. Now they have dozens of them. Average speed: 165 mph. Average time a train is late: under 30 seconds. They have had these high speed trains for nearly five decades — and we don’t even have one! The fact that the technology already exists for us to go from New York to L.A. in 17 hours by train, and that we haven’t used it, is criminal. Let’s hire the unemployed to build the new high speed lines all over the country. Chicago to Detroit in less than two hours. Miami to DC in under 7 hours. Denver to Dallas in five and a half. This can be done and done now.
- Have the GM plants produce energy efficient clean buses.
- Start making those electric cars - lots of them (do not believe anyone who tells you it will take years to retool the factories — that simply isn’t true).
- Tax credits for being green. Also, credits for those who convert their home to alternative energy.
I’m tired now from this post… filled with so many feelings. Oh, one more question
How will we be a green America if we’ve allowed our industrial capacity and its skilled workforce to disappear?
