Sometimes you wish you lived in Russia, where they only make one kind of car.

Before you get on my case, this only comes to mind when its time to buy gas. When you’re on the highway, you know what to expect. Everybody keeps right.

But pull into a gas station and bang - the laws of civilization no longer apply. Your gas filler is on the driver’s side of your Chevy - you need to put the pumps on your left - except there’s somebody facing the wrong way on the side you need to pull into. Her filler cap is on the passenger side, which puts the two of you head to head.

What we want to know is, who’s responsible for creating this situation?

If you ask me, its a conspiracy spawned by the metric people, and I intend to prove it here and now.

Metricers! They measure things in centimeters and pour in milliliters. They drive on the left side of the road. Even their steering wheels are on the wrong side. EVERYTHING they do is designed to frustrate Americans. Hey, we invented cars. Steering wheels go on the LEFT. 

America's slide started in the seventies. What a decade. Nothing went right. First, we had the imperial presidency (tricky Dick), and then we elected Mr. Peanut. Peanut man’s take on things? “Things are bad, and there’s nuthin’ we can do." His brother Billy did manage to sell lots of Billy beer.

When they realized how weak we were, OPEC put a squeeze on oil. The price went up to $1.37 a gallon. You couldn’t buy the stuff cause there was no way to get near a gas station without waiting in line three hours.

Next, the Shah of Iran was overthrown and Iyatolah Khomeni took all our diplomats (spies) hostage. We tried to rescue them but our best attack helicopters couldn’t fly that far without crashing. Our military? Their motto was, “You pretend to pay us, and we pretend to defend you.”

And then, right when we were feeling hopeless, came the push to metric-ize America.

Well, let me tell you: that, we *could* do something about. We put the kibosh on the idea by refusing to buy or use anything with funny calibrations. The decimal system was good enough to make us #1, and the way we saw it no change was needed.

The Metric War is now thirty years old, but you get this sinking feeling it’s no use. Gone forever are the days when the traffic laws at the pumps were the same as on the road. Stay right, no fight.

What us Americans wanted means nothing. Big money wants cheap labor, and that means the US is out. The coolies that make things now all live in countries that operate on the metric system.

Asian-made cars did make a concession to the steering wheels. Moving Americans from the right side of the road to the left wasn’t gonna happen overnight. But gas filler caps were another matter. Maybe they figured if the battle could be won at the pumps, how much further a leap to put the wheels on the wrong side and start us driving in the left lane instead of the right?

How much longer would it be after that before you couldn’t find a 5/16” socket in your local hardware store?

Something is really out of control when an industry can’t pull itself together enough to agree on one standard and then adhere to it. American manufacturers resisted. Gas fillers belong on the driver's side, and that's final. No, on the passenger side, the Euros said, and that's final too.

Ever wonder what the, “trade deficit” all those incoming cars created really means?

It’s “new speak” for how much of  our national *wealth* just melted away, pardner. Thanks to American ingenuity, there is a mammoth bedrock of wealth here. So much wealth it will take generations before we start to notice its gone. But when it is, and it will be, when our national capital is gone, we will find ourselves in the kind of situation you’re seeing in Zimbabwe.

Where do *you* come down?

Manufacturing is the basis of real wealth. We know this well. You've got to wonder why we no longer allow our own citizens to share in it through honest work.

We're in the midst of a battle for our minds. It's time to draw a line in the dirt and dance with the one who brung us.

Here's how you can do your part: next time you look for a new car, make sure the filler cap isn't on the wrong side.

“Wind, waves, and current would quickly dissipate normal dyes,” said Rhea L. Ziel, official spokesperson. “Fortunately, our two-year $166 million study identified a group of long chain polymers that will allow the dye to remain substantially in place for a minimum of one hour before sinking. This 'hang time', as we call it, will permit an hourly schedule of over-flights to maintain the presence of the line.”

An example of what the line will look like from space. Helicopters will be based in Watertown and Buffalo.

The plan is seen as a response to vocal criticism of the recent DHS announcement that it intended to begin enforcing passport reporting requirements for charter fishing vessels operating out of New York State.

Ziel defended the need to strictly enforce Border policy. “If we let US citizens go out and come back in without reporting, how can we expect foreigners not to think they can do the same,” she said. “We do have monitoring satellites in place over the lake, but until we're fully deployed in 2015, it will be impossible to observe every boat all the time. For all we know, the fishing derbies they hold might be little more than cover schemes for Canadian fishermen to collude with Americans and smuggle in cheap Chinese laborers while sending tax free cigarettes to Canada. Why do you think they call those boxes on their boats “live” wells, anyway?
“Our concerns are anything from terrorists and terrorist weapons to polluters, drugs and undocumented aliens,” said Ziel.
Charter captain Randy Randell, who fishes out of Oswego, NY, could only shake his head. "This proves that the only thing worse than a zealot is a zealous bureaucrat," he said. "So what if we stray over the line? There's no way they'll be able to keep track of everyone.”

"That's what you think," Ziel responded during the question and answer period. "We didn't spend $166 million on nothing. The new dyes have special molecules designed to be absorbed by fiberglass. Any boat that passes through the line will be dyed pink. The pink dyes also function as reflectors, which the satellites are programmed to home in on."
Customs officials will patrol dock areas, looking for pink boats. Chemicals required to remove the dye will be available exclusively at Customs offices. The introductory price will be $49.95 per ounce and will be sold only in 12 oz bottles.

Ziel did not think the price excessive. “Now that pink is the official DHS color, it will be illegal to paint an entire boat pink to circumvent the dye. We mean business. As of next month, we’re putting a stop to all illegal activities out there. The data will show very quickly if we’re successful or not.”

Ziel would not reveal the number of charter fishing customers arrested over the last five years, but said the number exceeded ten, with public urination a prominent offense. When asked how the dye will affect the habitat, she said, “Environmental impact fades to insignificance when compared to the very strong and visible benefits. For the first time ever, we'll have a clearly visible border on the surface of the lake. Before, it was very difficult to establish whether a boat was in American or Canadian waters. Now, it no longer will. Just think, we will now be able to identify everyone who illegally leaves the country. We see that as a major advance toward the future security of all our citizens.”

The govenrment of Canada was quick to respond. Prime Minister Sue Yu issued a terse statement. "We fully support and endorse the actions of the US Government in its attempt to secure its borders. However, we strongly object to the red and white striped colours of the proposed line. Red and white are our national colours. Any government with the resources to establish a line in the first place should be capable of adding a third colour, blue, to make the line distinct from the line we will no doubt be establishing ourselves in near future."

If the Lake Ontario deployment is a success DHS plans to immediately expand the program to include the other three great lakes sharing borders with Canada.

Note:

This has been an April fool’s story. The dye line is a fabrication, but they are watching.

For the past year NYPA Chairman Richard Kessel has been promoting the idea that New York needs to get 30% of its electricity from renewable sources and to reach that goal we need wind power. When you consider the state already gets 25% from renewable, the idea doesn’t seem far-fetched at all.

New York is energy rich. There are the big hydro plants on the Niagara River, a half interest in the huge Moses-Saunders dam on the St. Lawrence River, and privately owned hydro facilities on every river of any size in the state. The fact is, New York produces more clean power than any state east of the Rocky Mountains, and in 2007, made 17% of its electricity at hydro stations. Add 8% from sources described as “other,” and all that's needed is another 5% by 2015 to meet the goal. Sounds great, until you figure up exactly how big that 5% actually is and then the claims emanating from Albany begin to get…scaly.

According to the U. S. Energy Information Administration (USEISA), in 2005, New York sources produced 141,470 billion KWH of electricity. Five percent works out to 7,073 billion KWH.  

Only seven thousand billion kilowatt hours? They’re gonna do it with wind.

Is that so? Let’s say we put those towers out in Lake Ontario. How many will we end up with? The newest GE turbines (the same ones destined for Lake Erie) will be capable of producing 4 megawatts (4000KW per hour). Multiply the 8,760 hours in a year by 4000 and you peg maximum output of one turbine at 35,040,000 KWH.

With one turbine at 35 million, and a goal of 7 thousand billion, do you sense there might be some difficulty arriving at the needed number?

Um, we’re afraid you're right. 200,000. That’s how many towers it’s gonna take in the lake to meet Governor Patterson’s goal. To make matters worse, we arrived at our number using a capacity factor of 100%. Wind companies do handsprings when their plants hit 40%, and the average installation comes in between 20-35%.

Can you smell fish yet?

OK, so what if it is fishy? Building wind towers will never put New York State over the top. But just because they won't doesn’t mean SOMETHING shouldn’t be done.

When production is settled and in full swing, offshore wind is projected to cost $4000 per installed kilowatt. In the case of the GE turbines, that’s $16,000,000 each. If each turbine operated at 30% capacity factor over a life of 20 years with zero maintenance needed, the raw cost of a kilowatt hour would be 13.14 cents, or roughly three times the cost of a kilowatt hour purchased from National Grid today. Keep in mind that maintenance costs, which will be higher for offshore wind, could add 50% or more to that number.

One, they aren’t economical, and two, we can’t build enough of them to do the job. So, why the push?

Widen your focus a bit. It’s the economy, stupid, (Thanks, Bill). The federal government is pushing wind generation programs mostly because as ventures they have the potential to re-stimulate “manufacturing activity” within our borders. We designed our government to legislate, not usurp the function of the entrepreneur in society, but face it, we’ve legislated so thoroughly and in such excruciating detail that even the dullest of would-be entrepreneurs now understand that it's impossible to navigate the maze of permits, restrictions, regulations, and guarantees, and still bring a competitive new product to the marketplace.

Thus, while the US economy is looking cadaverous, everywhere else in the world where a thriving economy exists, growth and creation of new wealth is taking place. That good old American know-how and entrepreneurial spirit isn’t dead, it’s simply relocated itself to friendlier territory.

Truly, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Sadly – laughably even – our biggest problem now turns out to be devising ways of circumventing generations of legislation designed to protect us from ourselves.

The very sad conclusion the above situation thrusts to the forefront is this: within the existing US regulatory matrix, only government itself can navigate well enough to achieve forward momentum in any new manufacturing activity involving raw materials. Hence, if we hope to stave off complete collapse, the unprecedented use of public space to support privately owned industrial development seems not only logical, but necessary.

Narrowing focus again. New York State is a net exporter of energy, and could meet its energy goal without ever constructing a single wind tower. 18% of all electricity generated in the state in 2007 was produced by coal-fired plants. In 2007, the state’s coal plants also produced most of the 53,262,343 metric tons of carbon dioxide, 123,475 tons of Sulfur dioxide, and 60,419 tons of Nitrous Oxides the state caused to be spewed into the air.  The state ranks in the top third on the list of worst greenhouse gas producers.

By shuttering its coal burning plants, New York State would do more to slow global warming in one year than a hundred thousand windmills would in their lifetime.

Certainly, wind power should become an important component in our generation plans, but amidst the urgency to do something…anything…we should not lose sight of the quality of life issues that accompany this new source of energy. Even in a populous state like New York, abundant unpopulated areas exist. The Adirondacks and Catskills seem tailor made for wind power, and it has been documented to be far less expensive to site them there than out in the water. If we must have them, let’s put them where they will have the least impact on the fewest number of people.

We have the Coast Guard, the Border Patrol, the NYS DEC, the NY State Police, the INS, and even the US Army, all ready, willing, and eager to protect us from...

from...

Actually, we don’t know from what. They say revealing it would compromise their efforts to protects us from it.

At Oswego NY's International Marina (OIM), situated in Oswego Harbor on the east side of a former coal loading pier, they’re used to hearing these words from prospective tenants.

And there’s no comeback, ‘cause at OIM, it does get bumpy when the wind comes from the north, …northwest, …west, and sometimes west-southwest - which in case you aren't familiar with the area - pretty much boxes the compass when it comes to Oswego and its position on Lake Ontario.

Why, is another story.