"Hey! Gas prices are high!"

The BBQ Pit
21

In humungo cars/trucks/SUVs/Hummers. Those fucks can’t even open their mouth about gas prices, they are the ones using it all up. Selfish, arrogant people who don’t care about anything but their own immediate needs and wants. Fuck the future! Who cares if we bleed the planet dry? Who cares that there are actually *real * problems going on all over the world? They are just going to keep pumping and carrying on as if their own insular world is all that matters.

Everytime the gas prices make front page news and the genocide in the Sudan is knocked back to page 10 or so, I wonder what bizarro world I’m living in where filling up our tanks trumps genocide or any number of horrifying world events.

GET OVER IT ASSHOLES (and try to get some perspective). If gas prices are your biggest bummer today then you’re doing pretty well. Just the fact that you have roads to drive on, homes to go to, food to eat whenever you want, etc., makes you vastly richer than the majority of the world. Take a second to think about that before you open your mouth to complain about something insignificant.

22

I thought that by using fossil fuels, we are accelerating global warming, thereby melting glaciers, raising sea level, and decreasing the size of our country (as well as other countries).

I’m doing my part.

23

so…are you saying gas prices didn’t go up? because I’m pretty sure they did, I mean just the other day I spent $30 on a fill up, and that’s more than I usually pay, so I’m pretty sure that gas prices have gone up.

24

What most people don’t realise is that the cost of fuel is a relatively small portion of the expense of owning a car.
A friend of mine added everything up (initial value of car, various road taxes, insurance, roadside assistance, regular and unexpected repairs, other expenses like modifications or car washing etc.) and it turned out that even if the gas price was raised at double of what it costs today, it would be still a small amount compared to the total cost of the car.

25

Gas prices are up? You don’t say…

On my way to work this morning, the gas prices at the station I usually go to went down 6 cents per gallon. Of course, even before the reduction the gas there wasn’t $3.00/gal… it was only $2.95[sup]9[/sup], now $2.89[sup]9[/sup]

26

I don’t think I have agreed with you before but HELL YEAH. Darfur should be much more of a concern then the bloody price we pay at the petrol station. Thousands of people dying while we grizzle about the price of petrol.

It makes the mind boggle. MANY people had a frigging awful time under Sadam. Many just got on with their lives. SOLUTION? Invade Iraq and make everyone equal/“democratic”. There was nothing else to do! They had the oil! He was MEAN! Now the Iraqis are “free”. They are all loved up on “democracy”. Everyday we see evidence of the gratitude Iraqi’s feel.

Democracy is taking the only path it can in a country that was repressed for so long…infighting and turmoil. Is Mr Plumber/Builder/Teacher Iraqi better off? YEAHHHHHHHHHH Right! Mr Plumber/Builder/Teacher MAY have ended up in Saddam’s torture chambers but it was more likely he just taught/built/plumbed. More likely he led an ordinary life.

Why was it sooooooooo important to save Iraqis when Sudan can be so ignored so easily?

Was it about oil??? Surely not!!

Darfur is a crime against humanity that Sadam couldn’t even think about. The world should be ashamed at the way it picks the bad guys.

Iran? Fuck! They are the bad kid in the corner making lots of noise just yearning for attention. Sudan is the neglected abused kid.

27

I think I agree with you on most of your post but I’m curious, we’ve been in Iraq for years now, just how much oil have we imported from them? Does anyone know? Because I keep hearing “it’s the oil!” but I don’t see any oil.

28

WHOOOSH?

Why did you quote the entire OP?

29

Nobody sees the oil, they just see the PRICE of the oil.

30

:smack:

Stop the presses!

People are more sensitive to their own pain and discomfort to that of other people half a world away who they’ve never met and often couldn’t find on a map?!

:eek:
You know, if I thought for a second that me giving up my car, my air conditioned home, my cable and health club membership would help someone in Africa… well, I’d seriously have to consider that over my $3.00 cup of coffee.

Or are you suggesting that our news programs are lacking in perspective? 'Cuz I’d agree with you there.

Keep in mind, complaining about gas prices costs nothing. And it’s worth even less. Complaining about Iraq, D’arfur and various other injustices around the world means we have to extend some level of compassion and empathy towards people whom we just can’t relate to. And that’s just icky and depressing.

31

So how much oil have we imported from Iraq since the war?

32

I’m still trying to decide whether Taber was whooshed, or whether his post was a meta-whoosh with the “quoting the whole OP” thing clevely added to throw us off the trail of his keen perception and wit.

By the way, I just drove home from work, and that used gas, which apparently costs more than it did at a time when it did not cost as much as it does right now. Would anyone care to talk about that for 45 minutes?

33

I spend $200/month on gas.

My car payment is $177. Insurance is $936 a year. It costs me about $40 a year to put brakes on my car, and maybe $80 a year for oil. Let’s say non-routine maintenance runs me another $200 a year (which is high end, since last year I spent way less than that. Could add in registration and still be well under $200) and I spend about $100 a year on tires. So the total annual costs are about $1356 every year. (I’m not including the car payments in this because the car is nearly paid off.)

Gas runs me $2400 a year. Even including the car payments for 12 months into what the car will cost me this year, the TCO will be approximately $5880. Of that, gas accounts for 40.8%.

‘Relatively small portion’?

34

Not a lot. They fucked it all up that bad.

35

Well my best guess would be BUGGER ALL. But the price sure went up. I love the fact that Iran rumbling put it up even more. Imagine how much petrol could be a litre if Iran was invaded!

If Iran is “liberated” I may exchange my only born child for stocks in Shell.

36

Well lucky you. I’m about to drive to work and it’s going to use a lot of gas which costs A LOT of money lately. I’m wondering if I should continue working to pay for my gas or stay home and save money.

37

Well, the good news is that it’s a short drive to Iran. It wouldn’t cost nearly as much as having to invade it all a-new by sending troops from the U.S. I think it makes economic sense.

38

catsix writes:

> I’m not including the car payments in this because the car is nearly paid off.

You have to include the original cost of the car (spread out over the life of the car), including the cost of financing. If your car cost you $20,000 (including financing), and you expect it to last ten years, the original cost of the car is $2,000 per year for you, and you have to add that into your total costs. Furthermore, if you spend $200 a week for gas, you are spending quite a bit more than average. Apparently you both have a long commute to work and a car that doesn’t get very good mileage.

39

HOORAY for sensible petrol savings!

I have had a thought. I have mulled it over. It appears to be FOOL PROOF.

Here goes…

People with facial hair are mean nasty petrol control freaks.

People with facial hair are bad leaders.
People with facial hair want to hurt other leaders.
People with facial hair should not be alllowed weapons of any kind.

Can someone please tell George this VERY important relevation?

40

A feeling I understand all too well, I assure you. I Pit not the sentiment, my friend, nor even its expression. No, I Pit only the thrice-damned hour-long bitchfests about it that everybody, everywhere, seems to feel compelled by some supernatural force to have at every opportunity. With the same person they just had it with yesterday. Or ten minutes ago. Most notably, I Pit those – and numerous they are – that are driven to do this right behind my damn head, as I am trying to fucking work, thank you very much…which, given that I’m a telephone banker, involves trying to listen to people with problems other than the very, immensely, exceedingly, EXRCRUTIATINGLY well-established fact that gas costs a lot of money these days.

Wait, strike that…that’s what the person on the phone wants to bitch about for an hour too.