Whatchama Column
By Jeb Bladine

All this talk about cars, gasoline and bailouts has heads spinning.

Should we let GM, Ford and Chrysler go Chapter 11, hoping they can start fresh with pared-down labor contracts that make them more competitive? Should we bolster the Big Three with taxpayer funds? Or should we just ride it out and see how this segment of the free market economy unfolds?

Is there some nefarious activity that keeps gasoline prices higher in McMinnville, or are we victims of pricing structures from gas distributors who don’t talk about that kind of thing?

Of course, it’s all just window dressing on the real issue: As a society, we are just a little bit stupid, greedy and self-indulgent. We love to point a finger at others while ignoring the four pointed back at ourselves.

Our Viewpoints cover today begins with the hybrids and electric cars that Americans suddenly started coveting when gasoline passed $4 per gallon. But guess which vehicles have been selling most briskly in the past couple of months while those gas prices were spiraling back down? Yup: trucks and SUVs.

Only in America. We write laws requiring manufacturers to produce more fuel-efficient cars, then maintain artificially low gas prices that encourage sales of gas-guzzlers. American manufacturers sell their small cars in Europe and elsewhere, and we line up to criticize them for producing the big rigs we demand in our marketplace. We complain about the high cost of roadway construction and maintenance, but we refuse even the smallest increase in gasoline taxes to pay for it.

We would be better off to hike gas taxes by $2 a gallon right now, producing a huge fund for job-creating projects on our transportation infrastructure. It could be coupled with low-income and business credits. It could be manipulated to keep fuel prices relatively constant by having taxes go down as underlying gas prices rise.

Consumers faced with the long-term prospects of $4-per-gallon gasoline would make some “enlightened” marketplace decisions. Alternative vehicle technology would come sooner, and our dependence on foreign oil would evaporate. Perhaps we would become the “green-seeking” society that so far we mostly just talk about.

Or we can avert our eyes, and maintain our love affair with the large-chassis rigs that so many of us drive. It’s working great so far, don’t you think?

Jeb Bladine is editor and publisher of the News-Register.