Commuter benefit small token of real problem in bailout bill

Why does the LA Times think auto makers will face an either or demand situation for gas guzzling planet toasting SUV vehicles? Won't higher fuel prices, declined home value, reduced 401k, declined job markets, and other economic pressures put a damper on spending for larger items?

Instead of reading the front page they write: Falling oil prices could prove a blessing or a curse to automakers. When fuel costs were soaring, firms retooled their lineups to emphasize small and efficient vehicles. If prices continue declining, they could be unprepared for renewed demand for SUVs and trucks.

This nonsense reflects the conventional thinking mired in the age of dinosaurs, of drilling, of building with a wish-we-could-afford-green attitude, of nature as property to hand off to corporations. Going to a meeting on a bicycle should mean not spreading asthma and cancer for the kids of the other attendees. But more likely than not a homicidal attitude will pervade- knowing how I drive I think its crazy that you biked here.

Congress naturally is the place where the employees of the fossil fuel industry hand out the free market prerogatives for a toxic planet to burn and a motorcide intensive warfare state. The credit bill bailed out the fossil fuel industry. Here's how:

What sprawl did was extend the area where banks could function. The result was exponentially larger consumption of resources like water and wetlands and deterioration of both the commons and the resource basins (like air) and their ecological services. For example rice harvest in CA was delayed this year because smoke from the fires stunted growth. Even in sparsely populated areas fire departments were restricted by sprawl to "save lives" instead of keeping large tracts from burning.

Housing has collapsed on the outskirts of the driving economy, like Modesto, Merced and even the suburbs of Sacramento- the new ghettos. Gas prices by raising budgets 25% pushed stupid negatively amortized keeping-up-with-the-jones families over the edge on the outer rings of sprawl nation. And as these home compete in the foreclosure market, and future gas prices and related food and energy prices rise, the effect of increased poor quality inventory, will continue to be felt in declining home values.

So if a H.R. 1424 bailout is to occur it should change the way we get around in the fossil fools economy. The Senate Bailout Bill, signed by W, of W (MD) fame included a commuter benefit for Bikers of $20/mo. Instead of being seen as pork, $20 to bike makes sense since its a minor incentive (a penalty with a gas tax ladder for example would have been better) for connected communities via zero CO2 transport. With Bluemenauer and Obestar in the house who in the Senate found enough brains to put section 211 in? Hopefully the employer will cash out the $20/- to the employee. The reduced parking demand should (another incentive that could have been written in) reduce the parking ratio allowed employers to make higher uses of land.

$20 per biker per month is a small start to ridding us of a fossil fuel destroyed future because the time for solutions is now.