CAFE Standards: Going at It the Wrong Way?

Many of you probably know about the fight over CAFE standards in automobiles. CAFE stands for Corporate Average Fuel Economy, and basically it's the average fuel economy rating in miles per gallon for all the cars in a company's lineup. A great explanation of it can be found here.

If you read this, you can see that the standards are sort of flawed - they only count cars up to a certain weight, which most certainly doesn't account for ALL the cars on the road, only the more fuel-efficient smaller models. SUVs, trucks, etc. all get ignored.

But that's neither here nor there for the purposes of this post. My thought is this: instead of trying to govern the mileage of various car companies, but not do anything to improve road safety, why not kill two birds with one stone by installing some sort of mechanism that would set a maximum speed at which motorized vehicles can travel?

This would do a couple of things: 1) people wouldn't be able to waste gas by going too fast, and 2) roads would be safer because people would be going at a more reasonable speed.

I know that many people will say that this is fascist rubbish, but is it really? I would say that the greater evil is continuing to allow for (and even subsidize) a road system that allows 43,000 deaths per year for the sake of going faster.

Obviously, emergency vehicles would be allowed to go faster, but if no one else could go faster then you wouldn't have many of the issues that emergency vehicles have when trying to get to the scene of an incident quickly.

Anyway, it's a thought, what do you think?

Amazon.com's Mental Leaps

Here's the text of one of those "if you liked this, you'll like..." messages I got today.

James Fellrath,

As someone who has purchased or rated books by Alexandre Dumas, you might like to know that Finance for Sport and Leisure Managers: An Introduction will be released on September 21, 2007. You can pre-order yours by following the link below.

Finance for Sport and Leisure Managers: An Introduction Robert Wilson Price: $48.95 Release Date: September 21, 2007

Book Description

Sport and leisure managers need to understand the financial side of their industry in order to offer the most cost-effective facilities and to make sound business decisions. However, to the non-expert the language and practice of finance is often bewildering and perceived as complicated, difficult and impenetrable. This textbook guides the reader through the maze of financial terms and concepts, illustrating theory with examples drawn specifically from sport-based contexts to make this the most relevant, transparent and helpful handbook for students of leisure management available.

Written by experts in accounting and sport management, this book enables readers to work through the subject at their own pace, with case studies, ... Read more

Um...

Ah...

Er...

What exactly does my appreciation for The Count of Monte Cristo have to do with managing sports? I suppose there's some sword-fighting in it, which is sort of like fencing... which is a sport... no, even that's too much.

iPhone Jonesing

I'm not generally a person who HAS TO HAVE the latest technology. If something works for me, I generally like to use it until it's no longer functional, then go for the next item. There are a few exceptions: TiVo, for one. But I drove my old '87 Mercury Lynx wagon for years until I was told to buy a new car (with heat) or I was being dumped. And then I drove my Mercury Mystique until it basically died, and now I ride the bus or my bike.

That being said, I am currently frothing at the mouth over the demos I've seen for Apple's new iPhone.

Great. Googly. Moogly.

Have you seen this thing? It's absolutely amazing! I mean, basically it does everything that my Motorola SLVR L7 phone does with the music and the calling people, but with the Apple-ed interface and the most unique touch-screen I've ever seen. I am SO getting one of these when they come out. Cingular - please make sure you support this!

It will be mine. Oh yes, it will be mine.