During the interview it's mentioned several times that this should be more efficient than a conventional CVT. Conventional CVTs are already more efficient than automatic or even standard transmissions as they IC engine can be run at its most efficient RPM given the load, and even run at a more efficient cycle. I look forward to seeing it implemented in consumer automobiles, some time in the 2030's.

By the looks of it a good time was had by all involved. Playing air guitar on an automobile collision victim's leg is an appropriate response to combat post-traumatic distress disorder.

I have been pouring over the link you have here MH for about 30 minutes and keep having to slap myself to remind myself I am still awake...This shit is incredible-It reminds me how close we are to the next big one...i.e. as when we split the atom-
What we are seeing is the threshold of what will make nanotech as much a part of our lives in the very, very, near future as automobiles are to highways.

I get what you're saying, but a victim can and would sue for the court costs as part of their settlement. That's pretty routine.

It's routine in civil cases, not as much in criminal. If it's still innocent until proven guilty and shadow of a doubt, suddenly suing for costs is small consolation for the victim's worries about being stuck losing an honest case and being out both their innocence AND their cash. Child abuse cases are hard enough to prove already, making the victim pay actually creates more injustice.

The essentials are pretty clear.

You'd think so, but try and get a few million people to agree on it. I know here in Canada we already have removed taxes from 'essential' items. So there is no sales tax on milk, butter or flour, but there is on bread. I know for anyone living outside urban centres the only means of transportation available is automobiles, is it essential in those areas? Even if you say it isn't, what's done about the dissenting minority?


Is it a $30 million dollar home? Why not?

Tax shelter by any other name would sound as sweet?

How many times has Canada been invaded by foreign nations? Seriously. Think about that.

I certainly have. We survived the entire Cold War, and we were practically neighbouring the USSR and all we had was an army they could've defeated in 24 hours. It's almost as if there really were some other factor staying their hand against us, as we had also made it clear we were an active enemy of the USSR. You can chalk that up to some unknown force and declare that you don't need an army. I'm going to take the conventional and more mundane explanation that the USSR was pretty sure any invasion into Canada would've been met by more than just the Canadian armed forces. Take away America's army and my Russian would be better than my grandfather's was.

Now look at Afghanistan. It's a fraction the size of the US, and many nations have tried to occupy it. None have done it successfully. Now imagine a nation trying to take over this country where so many citizens are armed. First we have a sprawling land mass. Second we have an armed population. They'd never succeed. Never.

Yes, let's please take Afghanistan as an example. Afghanistan is a desolate waste land with no resources even worth taking, and nation after nation has invaded and occupied it over and over again. It is one the poorest, least educated places on the planet, with some of the highest infant mortality rates in the world as well. When they weren't being invaded by foreigners though, the civilians were being crushed between one warlord after another. Afghanistan is the perfect example of why any nation worth living in needs both a strong police force and army in order to stay that way. Does it really matter if the USSR could never have fully conquered the US without an army? Isn't the ability to turn it into a desolate, ravaged third world while trying incentive enough?

Tarrifs? Smoot–Hawley all over again? The issue is not the size of government but the embed corporate interests. An efficient and truly representative government would be flexible enough to grow and diminish to reflect economic dynamics. As it stands different corporate interests represent each party and there isn't so much as a legislative deliberation but stubborn grandstanding for conflicting interests and a back and forth with electoral cycles.

I'm not saying anything new here of course, but my point is, ideology in the grand scheme of things is irrelevant. The Democrats are firmly behind free market policies over any kind of long term nationalization, or anti-free trade policies. They will be rid of their corporate ownership of the automobile and financial services industries as fast as they can, and they will be forced or at least pressured into spending cuts, tax rises, raising the pension age and what have you to combat the deficit whether they like it or not.

The best thing in the short term is effective education reform. As much as anyone would like to say otherwise, the biggest factor that has led average middle income wages stagnate or fall in real terms over the last few decades has been technological innovation and automation replacing manual jobs. Competing at this level in trades that haven't been automated is obviously a fool's errand, emerging countries will easily out compete on wages. Educating people into higher skilled jobs should be the priority.

Effective campaign finance reform is the only way this and any meaningful reform will be possible though. When Massa went on his talk show tour, the focus shouldn't have been on his playful tickling or innuendo it shouldn't have been him saying on Beck's show: (a comment that is in a video in my PQ by the way!)

“Congressmen spend between five and seven hours a day on the phone begging for money ..."

If this isn't dealt with, the US will simply become Japan if it has not already. Growth will stagnate, but living standards will remain high though so no one will really notice. Rather than bureaucrats becoming more embedded with the government as in Japan it will be the corporate interests. Meanwhile problems will accumulate. As the government becomes less and less effective, voter apathy will takeover and feed the process.

As with Japan's current debt of 200% of GDP, the US's current 80% level will continue to rise until breaking point. Japan is lucky being a creditor nation and having plenty of domestic lenders willing to provide low yield rates, but even that will not last. Meanwhile the US's stupendous absolute debt in relative terms and being a debtor nation will probably not allow it to reach that level, with perhaps the saving grace being that the US dollar is still the world's reserve currency.

But anyway, tl;dr version: ideology is irrelevant, campaign financing and genuine representation is everything.

Oh perhaps I should make clear that this isn't really all directed at you, more a general response to the topic.
>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

We need to rethink our economy. The population is getting bigger, while at the same time employment is being lost to automation, 3rd world labor exploitation and corporate consolidation. It seems to me that this is a problem that can't be solved by a booming economy alone.
I'm not sure what could be done to halt this process, perhaps huge tariffs on corporations that use non-American labor, or limits on the size and power of corporations. I don't know. I'd love to hear ideas on this.

EDWARD R. MURROW

RTNDA Convention
Chicago
October 15, 1958

This just might do nobody any good. At the end of this discourse a few people may accuse this reporter of fouling his own comfortable nest, and your organization may be accused of having given hospitality to heretical and even dangerous thoughts. But the elaborate structure of networks, advertising agencies and sponsors will not be shaken or altered. It is my desire, if not my duty, to try to talk to you journeymen with some candor about what is happening to radio and television.

I have no technical advice or counsel to offer those of you who labor in this vineyard that produces words and pictures. You will forgive me for not telling you that instruments with which you work are miraculous, that your responsibility is unprecedented or that your aspirations are frequently frustrated. It is not necessary to remind you that the fact that your voice is amplified to the degree where it reaches from one end of the country to the other does not confer upon you greater wisdom or understanding than you possessed when your voice reached only from one end of the bar to the other. All of these things you know.

You should also know at the outset that, in the manner of witnesses before Congressional committees, I appear here voluntarily-by invitation-that I am an employee of the Columbia Broadcasting System, that I am neither an officer nor a director of that corporation and that these remarks are of a "do-it-yourself" nature. If what I have to say is responsible, then I alone am responsible for the saying of it. Seeking neither approbation from my employers, nor new sponsors, nor acclaim from the critics of radio and television, I cannot well be disappointed. Believing that potentially the commercial system of broadcasting as practiced in this country is the best and freest yet devised, I have decided to express my concern about what I believe to be happening to radio and television. These instruments have been good to me beyond my due. There exists in mind no reasonable grounds for personal complaint. I have no feud, either with my employers, any sponsors, or with the professional critics of radio and television. But I am seized with an abiding fear regarding what these two instruments are doing to our society, our culture and our heritage.

Our history will be what we make it. And if there are any historians about fifty or a hundred years from now, and there should be preserved the kinescopes for one week of all three networks, they will there find recorded in black and white, or color, evidence of decadence, escapism and insulation from the realities of the world in which we live. I invite your attention to the television schedules of all networks between the hours of 8 and 11 p.m., Eastern Time. Here you will find only fleeting and spasmodic reference to the fact that this nation is in mortal danger. There are, it is true, occasional informative programs presented in that intellectual ghetto on Sunday afternoons. But during the daily peak viewing periods, television in the main insulates us from the realities of the world in which we live. If this state of affairs continues, we may alter an advertising slogan to read: LOOK NOW, PAY LATER.

For surely we shall pay for using this most powerful instrument of communication to insulate the citizenry from the hard and demanding realities which must be faced if we are to survive. I mean the word survive literally. If there were to be a competition in indifference, or perhaps in insulation from reality, then Nero and his fiddle, Chamberlain and his umbrella, could not find a place on an early afternoon sustaining show. If Hollywood were to run out of Indians, the program schedules would be mangled beyond all recognition. Then some courageous soul with a small budget might be able to do a documentary telling what, in fact, we have done--and are still doing--to the Indians in this country. But that would be unpleasant. And we must at all costs shield the sensitive citizens from anything that is unpleasant.

I am entirely persuaded that the American public is more reasonable, restrained and more mature than most of our industry's program planners believe. Their fear of controversy is not warranted by the evidence. I have reason to know, as do many of you, that when the evidence on a controversial subject is fairly and calmly presented, the public recognizes it for what it is--an effort to illuminate rather than to agitate.

Several years ago, when we undertook to do a program on Egypt and Israel, well-meaning, experienced and intelligent friends shook their heads and said, "This you cannot do--you will be handed your head. It is an emotion-packed controversy, and there is no room for reason in it." We did the program. Zionists, anti-Zionists, the friends of the Middle East, Egyptian and Israeli officials said, with a faint tone of surprise, "It was a fair count. The information was there. We have no complaints."

Our experience was similar with two half-hour programs dealing with cigarette smoking and lung cancer. Both the medical profession and the tobacco industry cooperated in a rather wary fashion. But in the end of the day they were both reasonably content. The subject of radioactive fall-out and the banning of nuclear tests was, and is, highly controversial. But according to what little evidence there is, viewers were prepared to listen to both sides with reason and restraint. This is not said to claim any special or unusual competence in the presentation of controversial subjects, but rather to indicate that timidity in these areas is not warranted by the evidence.

Recently, network spokesmen have been disposed to complain that the professional critics of television have been "rather beastly." There have been hints that somehow competition for the advertising dollar has caused the critics of print to gang up on television and radio. This reporter has no desire to defend the critics. They have space in which to do that on their own behalf. But it remains a fact that the newspapers and magazines are the only instruments of mass communication which remain free from sustained and regular critical comment. If the network spokesmen are so anguished about what appears in print, let them come forth and engage in a little sustained and regular comment regarding newspapers and magazines. It is an ancient and sad fact that most people in network television, and radio, have an exaggerated regard for what appears in print. And there have been cases where executives have refused to make even private comment or on a program for which they were responsible until they heard'd the reviews in print. This is hardly an exhibition confidence.

The oldest excuse of the networks for their timidity is their youth. Their spokesmen say, "We are young; we have not developed the traditions nor acquired the experience of the older media." If they but knew it, they are building those traditions, creating those precedents everyday. Each time they yield to a voice from Washington or any political pressure, each time they eliminate something that might offend some section of the community, they are creating their own body of precedent and tradition. They are, in fact, not content to be "half safe."

Nowhere is this better illustrated than by the fact that the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission publicly prods broadcasters to engage in their legal right to editorialize. Of course, to undertake an editorial policy, overt and clearly labeled, and obviously unsponsored, requires a station or a network to be responsible. Most stations today probably do not have the manpower to assume this responsibility, but the manpower could be recruited. Editorials would not be profitable; if they had a cutting edge, they might even offend. It is much easier, much less troublesome, to use the money-making machine of television and radio merely as a conduit through which to channel anything that is not libelous, obscene or defamatory. In that way one has the illusion of power without responsibility.

So far as radio--that most satisfying and rewarding instrument--is concerned, the diagnosis of its difficulties is rather easy. And obviously I speak only of news and information. In order to progress, it need only go backward. To the time when singing commercials were not allowed on news reports, when there was no middle commercial in a 15-minute news report, when radio was rather proud, alert and fast. I recently asked a network official, "Why this great rash of five-minute news reports (including three commercials) on weekends?" He replied, "Because that seems to be the only thing we can sell."

In this kind of complex and confusing world, you can't tell very much about the why of the news in broadcasts where only three minutes is available for news. The only man who could do that was Elmer Davis, and his kind aren't about any more. If radio news is to be regarded as a commodity, only acceptable when saleable, then I don't care what you call it--I say it isn't news.

My memory also goes back to the time when the fear of a slight reduction in business did not result in an immediate cutback in bodies in the news and public affairs department, at a time when network profits had just reached an all-time high. We would all agree, I think, that whether on a station or a network, the stapling machine is a poor substitute for a newsroom typewriter.

One of the minor tragedies of television news and information is that the networks will not even defend their vital interests. When my employer, CBS, through a combination of enterprise and good luck, did an interview with Nikita Khrushchev, the President uttered a few ill-chosen, uninformed words on the subject, and the network practically apologized. This produced a rarity. Many newspapers defended the CBS right to produce the program and commended it for initiative. But the other networks remained silent.

Likewise, when John Foster Dulles, by personal decree, banned American journalists from going to Communist China, and subsequently offered contradictory explanations, for his fiat the networks entered only a mild protest. Then they apparently forgot the unpleasantness. Can it be that this national industry is content to serve the public interest only with the trickle of news that comes out of Hong Kong, to leave its viewers in ignorance of the cataclysmic changes that are occurring in a nation of six hundred million people? I have no illusions about the difficulties reporting from a dictatorship, but our British and French allies have been better served--in their public interest--with some very useful information from their reporters in Communist China.

One of the basic troubles with radio and television news is that both instruments have grown up as an incompatible combination of show business, advertising and news. Each of the three is a rather bizarre and demanding profession. And when you get all three under one roof, the dust never settles. The top management of the networks with a few notable exceptions, has been trained in advertising, research, sales or show business. But by the nature of the coporate structure, they also make the final and crucial decisions having to do with news and public affairs. Frequently they have neither the time nor the competence to do this. It is not easy for the same small group of men to decide whether to buy a new station for millions of dollars, build a new building, alter the rate card, buy a new Western, sell a soap opera, decide what defensive line to take in connection with the latest Congressional inquiry, how much money to spend on promoting a new program, what additions or deletions should be made in the existing covey or clutch of vice-presidents, and at the same time-- frequently on the same long day--to give mature, thoughtful consideration to the manifold problems that confront those who are charged with the responsibility for news and public affairs.

Sometimes there is a clash between the public interest and the corporate interest. A telephone call or a letter from the proper quarter in Washington is treated rather more seriously than a communication from an irate but not politically potent viewer. It is tempting enough to give away a little air time for frequently irresponsible and unwarranted utterances in an effort to temper the wind of criticism.

Upon occasion, economics and editorial judgment are in conflict. And there is no law which says that dollars will be defeated by duty. Not so long ago the President of the United States delivered a television address to the nation. He was discoursing on the possibility or probability of war between this nation and the Soviet Union and Communist China--a reasonably compelling subject. Two networks CBS and NBC, delayed that broadcast for an hour and fifteen minutes. If this decision was dictated by anything other than financial reasons, the networks didn't deign to explain those reasons. That hour-and-fifteen-minute delay, by the way, is about twice the time required for an ICBM to travel from the Soviet Union to major targets in the United States. It is difficult to believe that this decision was made by men who love, respect and understand news.

So far, I have been dealing largely with the deficit side of the ledger, and the items could be expanded. But I have said, and I believe, that potentially we have in this country a free enterprise system of radio and television which is superior to any other. But to achieve its promise, it must be both free and enterprising. There is no suggestion here that networks or individual stations should operate as philanthropies. But I can find nothing in the Bill of Rights or the Communications Act which says that they must increase their net profits each year, lest the Republic collapse. I do not suggest that news and information should be subsidized by foundations or private subscriptions. I am aware that the networks have expended, and are expending, very considerable sums of money on public affairs programs from which they cannot hope to receive any financial reward. I have had the privilege at CBS of presiding over a considerable number of such programs. I testify, and am able to stand here and say, that I have never had a program turned down by my superiors because of the money it would cost.

But we all know that you cannot reach the potential maximum audience in marginal time with a sustaining program. This is so because so many stations on the network--any network--will decline to carry it. Every licensee who applies for a grant to operate in the public interest, convenience and necessity makes certain promises as to what he will do in terms of program content. Many recipients of licenses have, in blunt language, welshed on those promises. The money-making machine somehow blunts their memories. The only remedy for this is closer inspection and punitive action by the F.C.C. But in the view of many this would come perilously close to supervision of program content by a federal agency.

So it seems that we cannot rely on philanthropic support or foundation subsidies; we cannot follow the "sustaining route"--the networks cannot pay all the freight--and the F.C.C. cannot or will not discipline those who abuse the facilities that belong to the public. What, then, is the answer? Do we merely stay in our comfortable nests, concluding that the obligation of these instruments has been discharged when we work at the job of informing the public for a minimum of time? Or do we believe that the preservation of the Republic is a seven-day-a-week job, demanding more awareness, better skills and more perseverance than we have yet contemplated.

I am frightened by the imbalance, the constant striving to reach the largest possible audience for everything; by the absence of a sustained study of the state of the nation. Heywood Broun once said, "No body politic is healthy until it begins to itch." I would like television to produce some itching pills rather than this endless outpouring of tranquilizers. It can be done. Maybe it won't be, but it could. Let us not shoot the wrong piano player. Do not be deluded into believing that the titular heads of the networks control what appears on their networks. They all have better taste. All are responsible to stockholders, and in my experience all are honorable men. But they must schedule what they can sell in the public market.

And this brings us to the nub of the question. In one sense it rather revolves around the phrase heard frequently along Madison Avenue: The Corporate Image. I am not precisely sure what this phrase means, but I would imagine that it reflects a desire on the part of the corporations who pay the advertising bills to have the public image, or believe that they are not merely bodies with no souls, panting in pursuit of elusive dollars. They would like us to believe that they can distinguish between the public good and the private or corporate gain. So the question is this: Are the big corporations who pay the freight for radio and television programs wise to use that time exclusively for the sale of goods and services? Is it in their own interest and that of the stockholders so to do? The sponsor of an hour's television program is not buying merely the six minutes devoted to commercial message. He is determining, within broad limits, the sum total of the impact of the entire hour. If he always, invariably, reaches for the largest possible audience, then this process of insulation, of escape from reality, will continue to be massively financed, and its apologist will continue to make winsome speeches about giving the public what it wants, or "letting the public decide."

I refuse to believe that the presidents and chairmen of the boards of these big corporations want their corporate image to consist exclusively of a solemn voice in an echo chamber, or a pretty girl opening the door of a refrigerator, or a horse that talks. They want something better, and on occasion some of them have demonstrated it. But most of the men whose legal and moral responsibility it is to spend the stockholders' money for advertising are removed from the realities of the mass media by five, six, or a dozen contraceptive layers of vice-presidents, public relations counsel and advertising agencies. Their business is to sell goods, and the competition is pretty tough.

But this nation is now in competition with malignant forces of evil who are using every instrument at their command to empty the minds of their subjects and fill those minds with slogans, determination and faith in the future. If we go on as we are, we are protecting the mind of the American public from any real contact with the menacing world that squeezes in upon us. We are engaged in a great experiment to discover whether a free public opinion can devise and direct methods of managing the affairs of the nation. We may fail. But we are handicapping ourselves needlessly.

Let us have a little competition. Not only in selling soap, cigarettes and automobiles, but in informing a troubled, apprehensive but receptive public. Why should not each of the 20 or 30 big corporations which dominate radio and television decide that they will give up one or two of their regularly scheduled programs each year, turn the time over to the networks and say in effect: "This is a tiny tithe, just a little bit of our profits. On this particular night we aren't going to try to sell cigarettes or automobiles; this is merely a gesture to indicate our belief in the importance of ideas." The networks should, and I think would, pay for the cost of producing the program. The advertiser, the sponsor, would get name credit but would have nothing to do with the content of the program. Would this blemish the corporate image? Would the stockholders object? I think not. For if the premise upon which our pluralistic society rests, which as I understand it is that if the people are given sufficient undiluted information, they will then somehow, even after long, sober second thoughts, reach the right decision--if that premise is wrong, then not only the corporate image but the corporations are done for.

There used to be an old phrase in this country, employed when someone talked too much. It was: "Go hire a hall." Under this proposal the sponsor would have hired the hall; he has bought the time; the local station operator, no matter how indifferent, is going to carry the program-he has to. Then it's up to the networks to fill the hall. I am not here talking about editorializing but about straightaway exposition as direct, unadorned and impartial as falliable human beings can make it. Just once in a while let us exalt the importance of ideas and information. Let us dream to the extent of saying that on a given Sunday night the time normally occupied by Ed Sullivan is given over to a clinical survey of the state of American education, and a week or two later the time normally used by Steve Allen is devoted to a thoroughgoing study of American policy in the Middle East. Would the corporate image of their respective sponsors be damaged? Would the stockholders rise up in their wrath and complain? Would anything happen other than that a few million people would have received a little illumination on subjects that may well determine the future of this country, and therefore the future of the corporations? This method would also provide real competition between the networks as to which could outdo the others in the palatable presentation of information. It would provide an outlet for the young men of skill, and there are some even of dedication, who would like to do something other than devise methods of insulating while selling.

There may be other and simpler methods of utilizing these instruments of radio and television in the interests of a free society. But I know of none that could be so easily accomplished inside the framework of the existing commercial system. I don't know how you would measure the success or failure of a given program. And it would be hard to prove the magnitude of the benefit accruing to the corporation which gave up one night of a variety or quiz show in order that the network might marshal its skills to do a thorough-going job on the present status of NATO, or plans for controlling nuclear tests. But I would reckon that the president, and indeed the majority of shareholders of the corporation who sponsored such a venture, would feel just a little bit better about the corporation and the country.

It may be that the present system, with no modifications and no experiments, can survive. Perhaps the money-making machine has some kind of built-in perpetual motion, but I do not think so. To a very considerable extent the media of mass communications in a given country reflect the political, economic and social climate in which they flourish. That is the reason ours differ from the British and French, or the Russian and Chinese. We are currently wealthy, fat, comfortable and complacent. We have currently a built-in allergy to unpleasant or disturbing information. Our mass media reflect this. But unless we get up off our fat surpluses and recognize that television in the main is being used to distract, delude, amuse and insulate us, then television and those who finance it, those who look at it and those who work at it, may see a totally different picture too late.

I do not advocate that we turn television into a 27-inch wailing wall, where longhairs constantly moan about the state of our culture and our defense. But I would just like to see it reflect occasionally the hard, unyielding realities of the world in which we live. I would like to see it done inside the existing framework, and I would like to see the doing of it redound to the credit of those who finance and program it. Measure the results by Nielsen, Trendex or Silex-it doesn't matter. The main thing is to try. The responsibility can be easily placed, in spite of all the mouthings about giving the public what it wants. It rests on big business, and on big television, and it rests at the top. Responsibility is not something that can be assigned or delegated. And it promises its own reward: good business and good television.

Perhaps no one will do anything about it. I have ventured to outline it against a background of criticism that may have been too harsh only because I could think of nothing better. Someone once said--I think it was Max Eastman--that "that publisher serves his advertiser best who best serves his readers." I cannot believe that radio and television, or the corporation that finance the programs, are serving well or truly their viewers or listeners, or themselves.

I began by saying that our history will be what we make it. If we go on as we are, then history will take its revenge, and retribution will not limp in catching up with us.

We are to a large extent an imitative society. If one or two or three corporations would undertake to devote just a small traction of their advertising appropriation along the lines that I have suggested, the procedure would grow by contagion; the economic burden would be bearable, and there might ensue a most exciting adventure--exposure to ideas and the bringing of reality into the homes of the nation.

To those who say people wouldn't look; they wouldn't be interested; they're too complacent, indifferent and insulated, I can only reply: There is, in one reporter's opinion, considerable evidence against that contention. But even if they are right, what have they got to lose? Because if they are right, and this instrument is good for nothing but to entertain, amuse and insulate, then the tube is flickering now and we will soon see that the whole struggle is lost.

This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and it can even inspire. But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise it is merely wires and lights in a box. There is a great and perhaps decisive battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance and indifference. This weapon of television could be useful.

Stonewall Jackson, who knew something about the use of weapons, is reported to have said, "When war comes, you must draw the sword and throw away the scabbard." The trouble with television is that it is rusting in the scabbard during a battle for survival.

And if I don't have a car bomb in my automobile when I stumble out, I'll be sorely disappointed.

/father was born in Belfast

>> ^rougy:
What about the joint of AK47 on top?
Piff!
This isn't Irish at all!

OK, I happen to be a Ramp Agent, not for United but, that's not the point, (I also happen to play guitar) and EVERY DAY I have to cringe because I see all these retards with their guitars in SOFT SHELL CASES/GIG BAGS trying to bring them on the plane when anybody will tell you, they're not gonna fit in the overhead. They have to go in the cargo bin with the rest of the luggage.

Even if it DID fit in the overhead, anybody that would put their guitar up there in a GIG BAG deserves to have their guitar smashed over their head.
My advice to any traveling guitarist, whether it's planes, trains or automobiles: Invest in a hard shell case, dude.

Why would any sensible guitarist travel with a soft shell case/gig bag?

^I don't understand what you mean by only a little below 45%. The highest number you cite is 13.86%, and the number I cited was 21%. These are much lower than 45%

Hmm... China surpassed the US as the world's largest automobile market in 2009,1 so it doesn't sound like the 45% number could be accurate even for vehicle pollution only.

I agree with their cause anyway, but a statistic should be accurate, and it sounds way off to me

Great video.

The IBM ad at the end claims US traffic creates 45% of the world's air pollution. I think a congestion tax makes economic sense, but that stat sounds like nonsense.

The entire US, including not just automobile transportion but also industry, generates 21% of the world's carbon dioxide,1 which is less than China. None of the most polluted cities are in the US.

*LMFAHS *QUALITY *LMFAHS

"
- An old man turned 98. He won the lottery and died the next day of a shock-induced heart attack.
- It's a black fly in your Chardonnay going to celebrate your apartment fumigation.
- It's a death row pardon 2 minutes too late because the Governor was busy watching Dead Man Walking.
- It's like rain at a dehydration victim's funeral.
- It's a free ride to your bankruptcy trial.
- It's good advice to never listen to me.
- ...as his plane crashed down he thought "Now I'll never make it to that Fear of Flying seminar."
- It's like rain flooding an umbrella factory.
- It's a free ride to an over-priced car dealership.
- It's the good advice from the guy who just got you fired.
- Traffic jam when you're already late to receive an award for reducing automobile congestion.
- A "No Smoking" sign on your cigarette break at the RJ Reynolds tobacco company.
- It's like 10,000 spoons when all you need is a knife from a soup kitchen.
- It's like meeting the man of my dreams and then meeting his beautiful wife who's also my relationship therapist.
- It's like rain on your wedding day to the Egyptian sun god Ra.
- It's a free ride when you've already paid for a stolen car.
- It's good advice someone advised you not to take.
- I have a funny way of defining rhetorical devices that I use in songs.
- I have a funny way of getting things wrong.
"

What is this strange and beautiful place? The buildings are so lovely, the clothes are brilliant, the men wear hats (and probably take them off indoors), the automobiles have so much character, the policemen look friendly and helpful, the workmen whistle and tip their caps to you, and it looks like one pence could buy you a nice snack lunch.

Oh nostalgia, you've deceived me yet again.

http://fora.tv/2009/10/26/Are_Healthcare_Purchase_Mandates_Constitutional#fullprogram

Buy state automobile, is good for country.

It's almost ten o clock see i got a ball of lifted property
so i slid my beenie hat on sloppily
and promenade out to take up a collection
i got game like i read the directions
i 'm wishing that i had an automobile
as i feel the cold wind rush past
but let me state that i am a hustler for real
so you know i got the stolen bus pass
just as the bus pulls up and i step to the rear
this ole lady look like she drank a forty of fear
i see my ole school partner said his brother got popped
pay my respects
can you ring the bell we came to my stop
the street light reflects off the piss on the ground
which reflects off the hamburger sign as it turns round
which reflects off the chrome of the bmw
which reflects off the fact that i am broke
now what the fuck is new
i need loot i sweat the motherfucka
in the tweed suit
and i'm on his ass quicker than a kick from a grease boot
eased up slow and discreet
could tell he was suspicious by the way he slid his feet
didn't wanna fuck up the come on
so i smiled with my eyes said hey how it's hanging guy
bumped into his shoulders but he passed with no reaction
damn this motherfucka had a hella of andrew jacksons
i'm a thief or pickpocket give a fuck what you call it
used to call em fat cats.
i just call them wallets getting federal aint just a klepto
master card or visa i'd gladly accept those
sneaky motherfucka with a scam know how to pull it
got a mirror in my pocket but that wont stop no bullets
story just begun but you already know
aint no need to get down shit i'm already low

My footsteps echo in the darkness
my teeth clenched tight like a fist in the cold sharp mist
i look down and i hear my somach growling
step to burger king to attack it like a shaolin
i never pay for shit that i can get by doing dirt
link up to the girl cashier and start to flirt
all up in her face and her breath was like murder
damn the shit i do for a free hamburger
(girl )"well you got my number you gonna call me tonite"
it depends is them burgers attached to a price
"sorry sorry"
im just kidding i'ma call you write you love letters
"it's all good"
thanks for the burgers emm hook me up with a dr pepper.
(girl)thats cool you want some ice
yeah and some fries will be hella nice
(girl) damn my managers coming play it off okay have a nice day
im up outta here anyway
i use peoples before they use me
cos you could get got by an uzi over an oz
thats what an og told me
gots to find someplace warm and cozy to eat the vittles that i just got
came to an underground parking lot
this place is good as any fuck its all good
walked in found a car hopped itself up on a hood
ate my burger threw back my cola
somebody said hey it was a rented pig i thought it was a roller
"want me to call the cops?"
i dont want them to see me
looked down and saw that i was sitting on a lamboughini
it was rollses ferraris and jags by the dozen
a building door opened
damn it was my cousin
getting offa work dressed up no lie
tux cummerband and a blackbow tie
i was like hey
"who is it"
me
"oh whats up man i just quit this company
they hella racist and the pay was too low "
i said arite what was up in there though
"a party with rich motherfuckas i dont know the situation
i know they got cabbage owning corporations
ibm chryslers and shit is what they seeing"
just then a light bulb went off in my head
they be thinking all black folks is resembling
gimme your tux and i'll do some pocket swindling
fit the change in the bathroom and i freeze off my nuts
lets take a short break
while i get into this tux
grunt zipp
alright i'm ready

Fresh dressed like a million bucks
i be the flyiest muthafucka in an afro and a tux
my arm is at a right angle up silver tray in my hand
may i interest you in some caviar mam
my eyes shoots round the room there and here
noticing the diamonds in the chandelier
background barry manilow copacobana
and a strong ass scent of stoagies from havana
what no place where a brother might been
snobby ole ladies drinking champagne with rich white men
allrite then lets begin this
nights like this is good for business
five minutes in the mix noticed several diffrent cliques
talking giggling and shit
well one mother fucka gave me twits
and everbody else jacking it throttling
found out later you know coca cola bottling
talking to a black man who he's confused
we looking hella bourgie
ass all tight and seditty
recognzed him as the mayor of my city
who treats young black man like frank nitty
mr coke said to mr mayor "you know we got a process like ice t's hair
we put up the fund for your election campaign
and oh um waiter can you bring the champagne"
a real estate fronts as opportunities arousing
to make some condos out of low income housing
immediately we need some media heat
to say that gangs run the street and then we bring in the police fleet
harrasing me everbody till they look inebriated
when we bought the land motherfuckas will appreciate it
dont worry about the urban league or jesse jackson
my man that owns marlboros
donated a fat sum
thats when i step back some to contemplate what few know
sat down wrestle with my thoughts like a sumo
aint no one player that could beat this lunancy
aint no hustler on the street could do a whole community
this is how deep shit can get
it reads macaroni on my birth certificate
poontang is my middle name but i cant hang
i'm getting hustled
only knowing half the game
shit how the fuck do i get out of this place.

A brief list I came across to jog your memory:
3/18/8 – Obama caught world-wide attention for his moving speech on race relations 7/24/8 - Obama lays the foundation for a new era of international relations and began inspiring renewed hope in American leadership during his campaign speech in Berlin 11/6/8 – Obama’s victory was hailed as a promise of hope for the world. 12/1/8 – Obama began plans to restore U.N. ambassador to cabinet rank. 1/22/9 - Appointed a Special Envoy for Middle East peace 1/22/9 – Ordered the closing of Guantanamo Bay 1/22/9 – Ordered comprehensive review of detention policies 1/22/9 – Prohibited use of torture 1/22/9 - Signed an executive order to close CIA secret prisons 1/23/9 – Lifted “Global Gag Rule” on international health groups 1/26/9 – Began to address climate change by increasing fuel standards for automobiles 1/26/9 – Appointed Special Envoy for Climate Change 1/27/9 - Signs Lily Ledbetter “Fair Pay” Act 2/1/9 – Expanded healthcare for children by signing SCHIP 2/5/9 - Again addressed energy conservation by increasing standards for appliances. 2/24/9 – Directed almost $1 billion for prevention and wellness to improve America’s health 2/25/9 - Initiated international efforts to reduce mercury emissions worldwide 2/27/9 – Committed to responsibly ending the war in Iraq 4/1/9 – Agreed to negotiation of a new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with Russia. 4/1/9 – Enhanced U.S. – China relations 4/2/9 - Led global response to the economic crisis through the G20, obtaining commitments of $1.1 trillion to safeguard the world’s most vulnerable economies 4/4/9 - Renewed dialog with NATO and other key allies 4/5/9 – Announced new strategy to responsible address international nuclear proliferation 4/13/9 – Began easing tension with Cuba through new policy stance 4/17/9 - Secured $5 billion in aid commitments "to bolster Pakistan's economy and help it fight terror and Islamic radicalism" 4/22/9 - Developed the renewable energy projects on the waters of our Outer Continental Shelf that produce electricity from wind, wave, and ocean currents. 5/8/9 – Proposed International Affaires budget that included funds to create a civilian response corps -- teams of civilian experts in rule of law, policing, transitional governance, economics, engineering, and other areas critical to helping rebuild war-torn societies; Provide $40 million for a "stabilization bridge fund," which would provide rapid response funds for the State Department to help stabilize a crisis situation. 6/4/9 - Gave historic address to the Muslim World in Cairo - "American is not at war with Islam" Foreign affairs experts insist that Obama's engagement with the Muslim world has been remarkable. "He has been able to dramatically change America's image in that region" 8/4/9 - Used DIPLOMACY to free 2 American journalists from a North Korea prison 9/18/9 - De-escalation of nuclear tension through repurposing of missile defense prompting Russia to withdraw its missile plan.

This doesn't even address the recent nuclear de-escalation of Iran (they have revealed a heartofore hidden nuclear facility, and agreed to sell their weapons-grade nuclear material to Russia) due to DIPLOMACY. Neither does it address his wise actions in the Somali pirate situation, saving american lives.