Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Violent Hummer Reaction
A 32 year old man in the D.C. area had his Hummer destroyed by local vandals in his Prius loving neighborhood. Many neighbors who were upset by his ride taking up a couple parking spaces did say that they did not condone the actions.
To play Devil's Advocate, why shouldn't people do this? Let's skip property rights for a second, and move on to another part of the issue. What responsibilty do we have to our neighbors, and by that I mean our fellow Americans, when it comes to the environment, the economy, taxation, and our foreign policy.
The Hummer is a symbol about how these areas intersect. It is because of our "addiction to oil" as the President puts it, that we are involved in a bloody quagmire in the middle east right now. Global Warming is gaining a strong consensus amongst scientists, our economy is being saddled with huge debts accrued during the fighting of this war, and for the military costs related to the war. We also befriend some not so nice rulers, such as the royal family of Saudi Arabia, in order to make sure that our fix continues flowing.
Not to single out this fellow, but it is conspicuous consumption that is the root cause of many of our problems. I have been around too many people who haul nothing heavier than a few sacks of groceries in these monsters and it does upset me. You multiply the suburbanite who drives to work alone each day in a Suburban by several million and before you know it, we are in Iraq on a crazy adventure.
I drove a Humvee in the Army. It was fun to drive to be honest, going up hillsides at steep angles was pretty cool stuff for a 20 year old. It's also tempting to sit in bumper to bumper traffic listening to the latest casualty reports on the radio as you are styling and averaging 15 miles per hour and polluting the air.
The person who vandalized this man's vehicle should be found, prosecuted, convicted and serve a lengthy prison sentence. But perhaps we should vandalize the campaign checks that are handed to our members of congress and the executive branch that makes it attractive to people to be wasteful as a show of status. If you haul things you need a truck. If you have a family of seven, a Suburban isn't that bad of a choice.
If you are driving to 7-11 in your Hummer to impress the ladies, shame on you. People are dying to secure that oil you are wasting.
(Photo By Lois Raimondo -- The Washington Post)
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