The Road To Hell

Here's to a better 2012, maybe the geniuses that know better than everyone else, the ones that rely on "science" will get a clue.

How about that ethanol, folks? It's led to huge spikes in food prices as corn has been redirected to making ineffective combustion products, leading to corn price hikes, hikes in things that use corn, and hikes due to shortages in other products because growers switched to gubmint-subsidized corn. Not to mention the engine-destroying factor or the reduced fuel economy (weren't we supposed to be increasing fuel economy?).

This, of course, followed on the heels of the disastrous decision to force the addition of MTBE to fuel, which also led to reduced fuel efficiency (I 'fondly' recall how I could drive one way back/forth to college on a tank of MTBE-less fuel whereas I needed to refill going the other way with MTBE-laden gas) and the terrible health effects and environmental destruction wrought by MTBE that was forced on us by the government. Again, weren't we supposed to be improving fuel efficiency and saving the environment?

Which, naturally, brings to mind the hysteria over hydraulic fracturing to extract the cleanest burning fossil fuel available - natural gas, because of an unproven and unlikely fear of aquifer contamination. Where were these people when the government was forcing MTBE on us, a highly mobile contaminant now found in drinking water in all 50 states, a man-made, man-added contaminant the government practically dumped into drinking water aquifers?

Where does it end with these geniuses?