Author: Eric Peters

Bad enough that we are required by law to present our “papers” – government-issued ID cards, egregiously mislabelled as driver’s licenses – whenever a government bullyboy so demands. Just as in the former East Germany, just as in the former Soviet Union – and in another place whose name it’s hardly necessary to mention. But in those places – in those times – tyranny was limited somewhat by technology. In our time, the technology available to tyranny is almost limitless – and the laws which used to at least somewhat protect us have become the means by which technology tyrannizes us. Corporations, which give a damn … Continue reading →

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Diesels are at the top of the Dead Pool – on account of their particularly diesel exhaust byproducts, specifically particulates (aka, soot) and oxides of nitrogen (aka NOx). But diesels are much more fuel-efficient than gas-burning engines because they are compression ignition engines. Well, compression and heat. Instead of a spark to set off the explosion, the air/fuel charge is progressively squeezed (and thereby, heated) as the pistons ascends within its cylinder until – boom! – it ignites spontaneously. More of the potential energy contained in the fuel is translated into useful mechanical energy. This is why diesels go farther on a gallon of … Continue reading →

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The really top-drawer dystopian novels end up like news accounts that got published a couple of decades before the events they describe. Orwell’s 1984 came to mid the other day as I rolled up to a pump at an Exxon station and found myself being pestered by a TeeVee built into the gas pump. It came to life – loudly – as soon as I fed my credit card into the reader. Pushy sales pitches masquerading – as online – as “content,” the euphemism for ads from which you will “learn” more as opposed to merely being the object of a sales pitch. Time to buy … Continue reading →

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In a strange take on William Burrough’s famous quip about gun control advocates – who want to take guns away from people who haven’t shot anyone – lawyers for explode-in-your-face air bag manufacturer Takata are trying to convince a federal judge to suspend victim’s lawsuits against the car manufacturers who unwittingly installed the defective, deadly air bags in their vehicles. News story here. This is generating a tsunami of outrage – against the car manufacturers. Which is exactly like being outraged by your peaceful neighbor who has a rifle  . . .  because some guy in Ohio went on a rampage with one. It’s weirder, … Continue reading →

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The Celebration of Diversity is a non-stop party, except when it comes to cars – which wax homogenous with each passing year. Bars of soap with different grilles, in different sizes and colors but as uniformly the same as the cheering masses at a Nuremburg partei rally. This extends even to what’s under the hood. It’s is a function of the regulatory template imposed by Washington, which designs cars nowadays. Not officially, but might as well be. For instance: There is a reason every new car has a rear end that looks like the mighty cheeks of a Budweiser Clydesdale  . . . or a person … Continue reading →

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Maybe you remember Disco Fever. Mid-70s, United States. For no apparent reason, suddenly everyone seemed to be singing in a high-pitched falsetto voice and wearing skin-tight lycra with open collared shirts displaying chest hair and gold medallions. It was fun for awhile but got old fast. Electric Car Fever is now upon us. Laws are being passed – the Brits being the latest – mandating the production of electric cars by outlawing the production of cars powered by internal combustion. This will get old fast, too. King Canute could decree that the tide not come back – and politicians can … Continue reading →

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Yes, really. They are working on a gadget that can tell the polizei whether you’ve been texting while driving. For your saaaaaaaaaaaaaaafety – as depressingly always. An Israeli company called Cellebrite – which sounds like the latest “ask your doctor about” pill to cure your ills – has ginned up this altogether different pill. Real-time and probable cause-free dragnet monitoring of people’s cell phone use and driving, so as to roust people who dare to ignore no-texting-while-driving statutes. Automatically, furtively. Everyone. The cops in collusion with your sail fawn “provider,” as they are styled. You won’t know – until they let you know they know. A police state technology from a police state … Continue reading →

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OJ – who almost certainly killed two people and definitely got away with it – didn’t get away with participating in an armed robbery and kidnapping. He got 33 years, served about 9 – and is scheduled to be released this fall. Oliver Schmidt – the VW engineer who “cheated” Uncle – is looking at 169 years. He didn’t kill anyone or even trip them up. Yet if convicted, he will be taken out of circulation for life. Several of them. Who would you rather have running loose? OJ? Or Schmidt? It gives you a sense of the government’s priorities. Time to buy old … Continue reading →

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Maybe the worst thing about this electric car business is the way it will – if it succeeds – homogenize cars, make one just like another in every meaningful way. Think about bumper cars. You pick a different body or color – but the cars are all exactly the same. So it is with electric cars. A motor is, after all, a motor. One spins the same as the others. Unlike engines – which reciprocate. Pistons, up and down. Valves opening and closing. And which can be (and have been) made in an almost infinite variety of ways: Fours and sixes and eights and tens and twelves; in-line, 90 and 60 degree … Continue reading →

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Most people know they’re paying a lot of taxes every time they buy a gallon of gasoline. Proportionately, few taxes are more regressive than motor fuels taxes – which currently amount to about 35 percent of the per gallon cost of gas (roughly, 50 cents in federal and state taxes on each gallon, which currently sells for a little over $2). But there is a another tax on motor fuels which very few people even know exists that also dips deep into their pockets. It is the federal mandate that each gallon of gas sold contain a certain percentage (currently, 10 percent) … Continue reading →

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Cadillac’s Vehicle-to-Vehicle communications technology shares vehicles’ locations, speeds, directions and traffic conditions up to nearly 1,000 feet away. For automated – note, not “autonomous” – cars to become other than a technocratic curiosity, to make the concept functionally viable on a mass scale, it will be necessary to eliminate cars that aren’t automated. That’s because the whole point of automated (not autonomous – which means independent) cars is to collectivize transportation. To regiment and control it. Time to buy old US gold coins Cars that are still entirely under the control of the person behind the wheel do not fit into this matrix. They are … Continue reading →

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You may be aware that cops can simply steal – yes, that’s exactly the correct word – cash found on your person or in your vehicle, in the course of a traffic stop, say – solely on account of it being an “excessive” amount. “Excessive” being entirely up to them to define. It could be $10,000 – or $1,000. There is no specific amount of cash defined by statute that crosses a legal threshold. Thus, one cannot know ahead of time not to carry, say, $5,000 – but $500 is ok. It is enough that a government worker with a gun considers whatever cash you … Continue reading →

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Technology never makes mistakes – unlike the humans who design it. Who never fail to anticipate the unanticipated. Perfection issuing from imperfection, reversing the usual order of things. Sarcasm, in case you didn’t pick up on it. This 190 proof moonshine – distilled by arrogant technocrats like Elon Musk – is going to get people hurt as automated-driving technology comes online. I recently test drove a 2018 VW Atlas (review here) which has what several other new cars also have: The ability to partially steer itself, without you doing a thing. Time to buy old US gold coins There are hi-res cameras built into the … Continue reading →

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With gas cheaper than it has been in at least 50 years – strongly suggestive that there is plenty of it available and will be for some time to come – Volvo has announced its decision to build nothing but expensive plug-in hybrid and full-on electric cars beginning after the 2019 model year. Cue the falling of rose petals. “This announcement marks the end of the solely combustion engine-powered car,” saith Volvo’s CEO Hakan Samuelsson. Buy Gold at Discounted Prices No, it marks the end of sanity – and very possibly of Volvo as a manufacturer of cars. Well, as a manufacturer of cars that people … Continue reading →

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Did you know that the penalty for speeding is death? It is something to think about as we head into the Farce of July and the sickly celebration of the freedoms we lost a long time ago. Among these, the right to not be shot to death in the streets over traffic offenses. Yes, really. A couple of years ago, the nine Judge Dredds who quite literally are the law – by dint of decreeing what the law is, as opposed to what the Constitution actually says –  ruled (a most appropriate term) that if a speeding motorist flees from … Continue reading →

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