I'm a genius, and I have proof! Today I had a second interview with a company for which I had to take some token aptitude test for some job. It had language, math, and analytical stuff on it, most of which I thought was pretty easy. Today they told me that I did better than anybody else they had ever seen. See? My brain is easily one of the top 20 million on the whole planet! If only I was doing something worthwhile with it…
So today I had yet another stunning insight.
"Aw Christ!" the moron in the back shouts. "Not ANOTHER one! My head already hurts!"
I continue, raising my voice to be heard over the savage clubbing my faithful goons are giving to the infidel.
Lately, Ford has been advertising that new electric car they call, ironically, "Think". As an electric car, it has room for exactly two people and is smaller than a subcompact. It probably has a top speed of forty miles per hour, too, and goes about 200 miles before it needs to be recharged for 8 hours…
Now I'm as much in favor of protecting the environment as the next granolavore, tie-dye-wearing, pot-smoking, hasn't-bathed-since-the-60's hippie, but I'm the furthest thing from a radical. In the past, I've ranted against the "carbon dioxide is cooking the planet so let's stick it to industry to satisfy our socialist wet dreams" movement and the "Let's force Detroit to make electric cars that nobody will buy just because we have too much free time" mentalities. I noted that most so-called environmental groups have more concern with hobbling industry than actually changing anything. My proof? The fact that NONE of them actually encourage people (read CONSUMERS) to quit driving their SUV's at 80 miles an hour down the highway or cranking the AC to 50 degrees (Fahrenheit, for my international audience) or throwing stuff away when the recycling bin is sitting right next to the trash bin. Actually, I bet there were groups like that, but they probably got run out of town buy the clueless radicals.
But this is not contemptuous diatribe against brain-dead nutcases who spend two years in a tree named LUNA. Nope, I determined a way in which those much vaunted electric cars are as bad as their gas-guzzling predecessors. Sure, they don't use gas, and therefore don't release any carbon dioxide. They run on electricity, and as we all know, electric motors don't release carbon dioxide. There is that sticky little problem, though, of the law of conservation of energy. The electricity has to come from somewhere. It comes from electricity plants, of course.
So what?
With the exception of less than 10% of all energy produced, electricity plants burn fossil fuels!! Coal mostly (VERY dirty) and then petroleum! Gee whiz, what the hell's the friggin' point? There isn't one! Now I can't be certain whether an internal combustion engine or an electric car of similar capability (if they can ever make one) will be ultimately responsible for more emissions, but it ain't exactly the blessed deliverance form evil corporate demagoguery they would have you think. There are cleaner alternatives such as nuclear power or hydroelectric power, but both of those are big environmental no-no's. Hybrid cars are the best bet, since they get about 50 miles per gallon and charge their own electricity. Of course, this is only an issue if you believe that carbon-dioxide is causing global warming bullshit.
While we're on the subject of the conservation of energy, I use that to scoff at any believers of telekinesis. The energy to move or heat things has to come from somewhere, so how does it get there?
DAMN I'm a genius.
