The government is in the car business. To sell cars people have to have a need to buy. So the government has a two prong approach. Divert the corn from food to fuel and claim they have to do it to reduce oil imports, destroy the cars already on the road by increasing the ethanol and the price of fuel and then force us to buy thier electric cars.
Look at the clunkers for cash program. The goverment had the citizens believe that a high fuel usage car uses more fossil fuels then the building of a new car and putting it on the road. Really? The mining of raw materials, the creation or rather importation of the steel and aluminum used in a car, all the copper, plastic and so on and so on is a better "carbon footprint" then a well running car already on the road?
While I'm at it how about light bulbs? A little sand and a piece of glowing wire is worse than a florescent bulb with mercury in it and all the copper mining to produce the wires for the transformer and how about all the chemicals for the plastics used. LED lamps use transformers, plastics, aluminum heat sinks, with all the mining for the raw materials. They take longer to produce so more lighting, heating, cooling, electricity, for the plants and the workers of all the sub assemblies. But it is better than a regular bulb?
Did you know that the state of vermont banned the sale of neon lights because of the "all the mercury that was being dumped into landfills" but say nothing about CFL's?
Do you think the public would buy it if they were told there was a way to reduce their household energy bill by 99% but they had to spend millons of dollars to do it, would it be a good deal? Then why does the public think cash for clunkers, CFL bulbs, ethanol etc is a good deal?
And for those that are wondering how all this relates to our cars, we joke about how our cars "make their territory" but one drop of oil can render how hany gallons of water? Is it really so far fetched that "oil polluters" be given a fine, required to be repaired or taken off the road forever? That all vehicles used for transportation have a minimum MPG or be removed from the road or destroyed to prevent them from being used?