If I had a car, I'd give it up. Way too much blood in the gasoline.

[No Elephants]

I admit that is easy for me to say as I live in Boston, a great walking city; and my vision does not permit me to drive anyway.

But our national highway system was a mixed blessing. Families went from having Dad and, if she worked, Mom walk home for lunch to having working parents spending hours in traffic each day, driving to and from the office.

All is not well in northern Iraq's oilfields
Iraq's Kurdish region has grown closer to Turkey and begun exporting oil to world markets, angering Baghdad.

In northern Iraq, ethnic Kurdish security forces called peshmerga patrol the poorly defined border of the country's Kurdish region, with clear orders to keep Iraqi army troops out.

"Everyone here is on alert," Al Jazeera's Omar al-Saleh reported from near the internal border on January 17. With both sides fully armed, he said, "any mistake could lead to a violent conflict".

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki claims the right to freely move soldiers anywhere in the country, but the country's semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) says this is unconstitutional.

As in so many other conflicts around the world, the presence of oil is raising the stakes and the tensions. Iraq's ethnic Kurdish region is so oil-rich that in some places, the stuff literally oozes out of the ground.

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2013/01/201312171046175913.html

[Enthusiast]

1. Right again.

There are many reasons to transition from fossil fuel and blood is one of the best.

[Divine Discontent]

2. +1 that thought. It is a really good point. Unfortunately, it's a necessity for us.

[Enthusiast]

4. We're like gasoline junkies, DD.........nt

[Enthusiast]

3. Sorry to hear of your vision problem, No Elephants.

You can't see well enough to drive at all?

A close friend has had to give up driving due to his vision loss. He is only 59. Last eye check the doc told me I have cataracts. I was alarmed but she said, "Not to worry, most people over 50 have detectable cataracts." Holy crap!

The nation should have jumped on the high speed rail thing. But there are too many "special interests" protecting their turf. Like the oil industry.

I'm waiting for Cleveland to Cincinnati 200 mph mag lev. This would generate an incredible number of jobs. Problem is, the PTB would want us old blind cripples to do the construction for minimum wage. That's not going to happen. We went to the grocery store yesterday. I am officially ruined for at least the next 24 hours.

[No Elephants]

5. I gave up driving while in my 20s. It was far too dangerous.