Let’s Ban Every SUV on the Planet!

The banking meltdown and the residual credit crunch and the world recession have been
blamed on the lack of “Risk Managers for Hedge Funds and Derivatives”. It is sort of
“who was watching the store?” argument. This is a typical government operation: “Hey
it was alright when I left…” mentality. Well, now the Legislators at every level are scrambling to come up with reasonable arguments they can sell the constituents
– that will suave their pain at the gas pump. “Look..we lowered the Fed interest rate
to 2%…whad’ya want?”

Hey, your ex-husband thought it would be nice for you to have this Lexus SUV or this
Lincoln Navigator to take all the kids to soccer or baseball practice. Or maybe just
before your divorce…the guy buys this big four door, four wheel drive smokin’ Dodge or Tundra….with the big engine. King of Road…you are…..and people better pay attention to whatever you do on the road. OK, so there are few Hummer guys…that
can slam your door around a little….but not many! Hey, you have made a statement
and people better pay attention! Well now, we are the ones that are starting to pay
attention. Every time we fill up….we are looking at over $100 bucks. Every time
we put your hard earned cash into the tank..we start to wonder: is this “statement”
really worth the $600 a month in gas alone? The sad story is that the price of a
gallon of gas will probably be closer to $5 or $6 bucks a gallon…making those fill
ups around $150 dollars to drive 250 miles!

We remember so well the 1976 year of the Carter…..”The American people will have to
live with pain!”….and soon we were every other day…odd and even and waiting in
gas lines for hours upon hours! Those signs on the gas stations abounded: “Out of Gas”. The term “Gas Guzzlers” became part of the American parlance. Our “Muscle Cars” that got 9 to 10 miles per gallon ….got expensive to accelerate around those
Volkswagen Bugs. The old Lincoln Continentals, Cadillacs and Dodge Chargers….all
soon became: “persona non grata”. People would look at you drive those monsters on
the highway or street and just shake their heads. You see; gasoline is an expendable
product. You buy it and use it…much as you do paper towels. This is not a great
product to save for a rainy day. The greatest part of this story is the rising cost of Diesel Fuel. Diesel is up to 30 cents more a gallon that high test gasoline! How about those frugal types that bought those Diesel Mercedes cars…or how about all our Truckers, Buses and Farm Equipment? We are all – Paying the price!

Now this brings us to the Arrowhead Water bill issue: Yes folks, the end times will
soon to be here. Arrowhead will be raising the price of delivery! We got the letter
yesterday. Beginning next month…the delivery cost will go up a buck plus! They call it a “delivery surcharge” that will be added. They are sort of following what
the Airlines are doing. How about the cost of delivering all our food products? What about the cost of delivering anything for that matter? Someone is going to have
to pay…and we can bet our buttons….it will not be the producers or farmers or
manufacturers of these products.

So, we propose this Environmental edict: Ban all SUV’s and Big Pick-ups every other
month! They can drive them based on the last number of their license plate. Odd
would mean they could drive January, March, May…et cetera. License plates that end in Even and Letters could be used in February, April, June….et cetera! Park those “Gas Guzzlers” and lower the demand for both high test and Diesel. We can even do it…just in certain Urban areas or States. California for example in the cities of San Francisco, Los Angeles – Orange County and San Diego! New York, Miami, Chicago…the same idea! Hey it might even lower the demand to the point…that the price in Summer may not approach $6 dollars a gallon.

If you think you have a better idea…..bring it on! If you think you have what
it takes to be a great “Risk Manager” we will surely find out – and lord knows we need that!