[Mb-hair] Jane Smiley's Prius

[reute]

Brilliant article by Jane Smiley. I shop @ costco too and buy  
organic. My next car will be fuel efficient also. xox, R

> Subject: Jane's Prius
>>
>> The Huffington Post:
>>
>>      _Jane  Smiley_ (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-smiley)   
>> _Bio_
>> (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/contributors/bio.php?nick=jane- 
>> smiley&name=Jane%20Smil
>> ey)    (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/index/)
>> (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/syndication/)
>>
>> (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB113332075479109882-search.html? 
>> KEYWORDS=holman+w.+jenkins&COLLECTION=wsjie/6month)
>
>>   in  the Wall Street Journal yesterday, only because it was about  
>> the
>> Prius -- a  car that I own. The photo of the author, Holman W.  
>> Jenkins,
>> Jr., had  that  sneering look that free-marketers often adopt  
>> before they
>> are indicted for  tax  fraud or accounting irregularities.
>> I have to say that Junior did not disappoint. He belittled Prius  
>> drivers
>> for   having fallen for Hybrid Synergy Drive hype, sneered at the
>> "emotional"   relationship Prius drivers seem to have with their  
>> vehicles,
>> and eventually got   around (toward the end of the piece) to  
>> calling Prius
>> drivers "suckers." Junior
>>  caused me to reflect upon my Prius, and to compare it to the  
>> other cars
>> I've  bought in the last eight years -- a Chevy diesel truck, a Mazda
>> van, a Saab,
>> a  Subaru Outback sedan, and, of course, the Prius. All of these  
>> cars cost
>>  between  twenty and twenty-five grand. I still have the truck. It  
>> once
>> had a  sudden  stopping problem that got fixed after the dealer  
>> rummaged
>> through the  paperwork  and found an old recall notice, but it's  
>> been fine
>> since. The Mazda  van gave me  serious back pain, so I bought the  
>> Saab.
>> The Saab rode very rough.  Every bump  was like a pothole, so I  
>> bought the
>> Outback, which had a very  smooth ride, but  only got about twenty  
>> miles
>> to the gallon. When I tried the  Prius, which rode  nearly as well  
>> as the
>> Outback, cost less, and had more cargo  room and leg room  in the
>> backseat, I decided that the two were comparable, as  cars go.
>> The Prius has been entirely reliable, comfortable, and useful.  
>> There have
>>  been recalls -- Toyota notified me and fixed the potential problems
>> during   regular servicing. As far as I can tell, the Prius's only
>> disadvantage is that  if  the dogs aren't looking at you when you are
>> backing up, they don't realize   that you are coming toward them  
>> (since it
>> backs up silently, on electric  power).  Since all my cars have  
>> seemed
>> comparable to me, I have not felt like a  "sucker"  in the Prius.  
>> And when
>> I am driving on the highway and the car tells me  it is  getting  
>> 53 or 54
>> miles to the gallon and when I am driving around my    
>> neighborhood, which
>> is hilly, and it tells me I am getting 41-43 miles to the    
>> gallon, and
>> when I was stuck in traffic in LA it told me I was getting 72   
>> miles  to
>> the gallon, it seems more like a bonus and a pleasure than the  
>> reason I
>> bought the Prius, which cost me more than the Saab and less than  
>> the Mazda
>>  and  the Subaru. I like how it looks, too -- I am tall, and it  
>> fits me.
>> Junior Jenkins doesn't say what sort of car he drives in his  
>> satire upon
>> Prius drivers, but no doubt his car reflects something about who  
>> he thinks
>> he   is, and if I am to go by the article he wrote, his only value is
>> money. He   writes as though he is a dedicated comparison shopper,  
>> never
>> settling for less   than the most he can get for his money. In  
>> that case,
>> I am sure he drives a   Dodge or a GM, which he probably bought  
>> when those
>> less than successful   companies lured some people that you might  
>> call
>> "suckers" into the showrooms  with big  rebates and financing  
>> deals. He
>> congratulates himself everyday on what  a  good deal he got, and  
>> no doubt
>> Junior keeps a running tab on how much he is   paying for gas in
>> comparison to how much he saved on the deal he made.  The problem  
>> with
>> Junior, though, is that he epitomizes more than just the   sneering,
>> know-it-all attitude of the free market conservatives who pride
>> themselves on gaming the system to their own advantage. He  
>> epitomizes the
>> greedy   egotism that is their only value and is the only value  
>> that they
>> attribute to   everyone else.
>> Personally, I'm in favor of government regulation of economic life. I
>> think   the deregulation fad of the 1980s was the beginning of the  
>> end of
>> American   democracy. One of my favorite injustices is a small one  
>> -- it's
>> the way that   economics professors at places like the University of
>> Chicago prescibe "creative
>>  destruction," economic insecurity, and low wages for others but  
>> reserve
>> special  treatment (tenure, for example) for themselves. At any  
>> rate, the
>> reason I  am in  favor of government regulation is that intellectual
>> leaders who  promote free  market orthodoxy, like Junior Jenkins,  
>> are so
>> shallow, and theorizing  about the  free market has made them that  
>> way.
>> Oh, those free marketers always give lip-service to actual freedom  
>> in the
>>  market -- the idea that people like me might be willing to pay a  
>> premium
>> for   some other value than getting the most for your money. I  
>> also pay a
>> premium for   free range chickens, grass-fed beef, and organically  
>> grown
>> produce. I pay the
>>  premium not only because I believe in genetic and environmental  
>> diversity,
>> good  flavor, and boosting my family's omega-3 fatty acids, but  
>> also so
>> that  those who  are doing the growing can make a living and  
>> refine their
>> techniques  on the  off-chance that in the future, such a large  
>> premium
>> will not have to be  paid. I  would prefer, in fact, that the  
>> government
>> had regulated the big  agricultural  companies so that they had never
>> contaminated the plant gene pool,  the water  systems, the soil,  
>> and our
>> own DNA to begin with, but it's too late  for that  now. In fact,  
>> every
>> free market correction comes after the fact. In  addition to   
>> "creative
>> destruction," of course, there is "destructive  destruction," but get
>> some orthodox free marketer to talk about that!  Likewise, I wish  
>> that
>> government regulation had preserved us from the melting
>>  Greenland ice cap, the freshening North Atlantic that is  
>> endangering the
>> Gulf  Stream, the melting permafrost in Siberia that is giving off  
>> extra
>> methane,  and  Dick Cheney's 2001 Energy Taskforce, which seems to  
>> have
>> made him think  that the  war in Iraq was a good idea. I wish we  
>> had used
>> less oil in the last  twenty  years. I once had another sucker car  
>> -- an
>> '86 Toyota Tercel wagon  that got 45  miles to the gallon on the  
>> highway
>> without hybrid synergy drive. It  was totally  reliable -- once I  
>> checked
>> the oil and left the cap off, then  drove 240 miles.  Five of the six
>> quarts of oil blew out of the engine, but it  was fine. "It's a   
>> Toyota,"
>> said the dealer. It was so obviously the car of the  future. But  
>> greed
>> (of the oil companies and the automakers) said otherwise.  At the  
>> very
>> most basic level, government regulation describes what sort of    
>> society
>> citizens want to live in, whether or not all the regulations work  
>> or  all
>> of them are wise ones. I would like to live in a society where the
>> government  says to the corporations, "first, do no harm":
>> "Don't sell poison and call it food"
>> "Don't pay your workers such a low  wage that they can't have both  
>> food
>> and  lodging"
>> "Don't leave millions of  citizens without elementary healthcare"
>> "Leave the natural world better than  you found it."
>> "Don't cheat on your taxes, your accounting, or your business   
>> practices."
>> "Don't steal elections."
>> "All citizens have basic human  worth."
>> Instead, thanks to the theorists of the free market, we live in a  
>> country
>>  where the corporations tell the government -- "We are going to do
>> whatever we   want, and you are going to do whatever we want, too.
>> Citizens will be valued   according to their financial assets. The  
>> natural
>> world will be ruthlessly mined
>>  for 'wealth creation.' And everyone is going pretend that this is  
>> not only
>> more  profitable for us, it is morally better."
>> What sort of people produce Wal-Mart? Why, people like Junior  
>> Jenkins, people
>>  for whom cheapness is all, no matter what the cost. Every time  
>> Junior
>> sees a  Prius (or a working stiff), he sees only a price tag. And  
>> even
>> though, in
>> the  absence of decent regulations, people like me, Prince  
>> Charles, and
>> Larry  David  have to actually fund new ideas (and shop at  
>> Costco), Junior
>> laughs at  us. He  points out that even though we aren't using as  
>> much
>> fuel or giving off  as many  emissions, the oil "is not saved."  
>> Well, no,
>> it isn't, right now. But  let's try  an analogous argument -- just  
>> because
>> Junior isn't as promiscuous  as he used to  be, that doesn't mean any
>> fewer girls (or guys) are having sex.  Junior Jenkins has only one  
>> value
>> (getting the most for his money) and one   fear (of getting  
>> suckered), but
>> he doesn't have to be our model citizen. Until   the glorious era of
>> re-regulation dawns, I am going to pretend, in spite of  the  Wall  
>> Street
>> Journal, that the free market is on my side. I am going to   drive my
>> Prius and eat my organic veggies and vote against the
>> Diebold/Republican axis of evil on, as long as I can procure it,  
>> my paper
>> ballot. Actually,  the free market has left me no  choice.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>


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