mazda 3 – 40 miles per gallon

July 31, 2008

for 20 years i had driven nothing but nissan, the nissan sentra to be exact, because it was a small, reliable car that ran forever, almost 200,000 miles each one. i like silver cars because they don’t show the dirt as easily as others. nothing looks better than a white or black car, but only immediately after washing and waxing. in five minutes, the luster will start to fade because the contrast shows up the dirt too easily.

a little more than a year ago it was time for a new car, and of course i went straight for the sentra, and then i went straight for the bucket to throw up in. eww. it looked bad, really bad.

i did research, compared prices, listed what i wanted and didn’t want in my car:

stick shift, sunroof, mp3/ipod connection, cheap sticker price, good MPG, and an excellent review on http://www.edmunds.com/mazda/mazda3/2007/review.html.

when i boiled it all down, the answer was the 2007 mazda 3.

using Mobil 1 synthetic oil for each oil change at about 5,000 miles, i’m getting about 40 MPG.

the Smart Car isn’t worth the money for what it gets per mile.

i’m not about commercial endorsements, but i would like to know, during all this oil price through the roof thing, why isn’t the mazda 3 getting more attention?

1 Comment | gas prices, mazda 3, miles per gallon, mpg | Permalink
Posted by brainsnorts

out of gas

April 28, 2006
president bush makes me laugh.
recently he had to answer a question about regulating the price of gasoline and setting a price ceiling. he said that it would be a bad idea because, if we lower gas prices too much, then people will fill up a lot more and that would increase the great demand we already have for gas.

does anyone realize how stupid that answer is?

how would people possibly fill up with more gasoline? the car’s tank only holds a certain amount. where would we put it? does he think we have huge vats in our garages, and we’ll fill upu the car, then bring the gas home and siphon it into the vat, then go fill up again? does he think that we’ll fill up, then we’ll take the long, scenic route to work just to use more gas?

bush is experiencing the lowest approval rating of his career, possibly the lowest of any president every. he’s certainly in the running for the dumbest president ever. one question i’ve asked to republicans – a question they can’t answer – is this: tell me one, just one way that your life is better in direct cause of something that bush has done while in office? just tell me one thing that he did that has improved your life? and you can’t include tax breaks or anything that is basically “buying and bribing,” like when he sent everyone a check for about $300 a couple of years ago. in case nobody noticed, that check had to be deducted from your tax refund that year. so it was just a loan that had to be paid back.

all good presidents are remembered for something great. clinton created a $500 billion budget surplus and a flourishing economy. reagan influenced the changes in the soviet union. nixon made great strides with china and was a brilliant foreign policy maker, so much so that all presidents after him would regularly consult with him. kennedy, the space race.
all bad presidents are remembered for their folly. i’m no expert, but i think johnson had something to do with vietnam. king george I unfortunately is more remembered for breaking his “read my lips, no new taxes” promise.

if i had to find the folly with which to remember king george II, i would have too much to choose from.

Leave a Comment » | gas prices, president bush | Permalink
Posted by brainsnorts

bush’s answer to gas prices

April 26, 2006

big news – gas prices are climbing again. why? because the oil companies want them to. what’s the president going to do about it? more importantly, what is he not going to do about it?

things he’s doing:

1. first, he’s relaxing the environmental rules on cleaner fuel additives. by allowing oil companies to not use additives that help keep the air cleaner, bush thinks that the oil processing will be less expensive (and it will be) and that will translate to lower fuel prices (and it won’t make a difference).

2. he’s telling people to drive less. oh, as if we have a choice. as if we can suddenly change the location of our home or our workplace in order to drive less. brilliant so far, eh?

3. he’s dusting off that ” see, i told you we need to drill the hell out of alaska” plan.

4. he’s going to investigate price gouging by oil companies. who runs the oil companies? republicans. who paid big money into the republican campaigns? oil companies. where does the bush family make it’s billions? oil companies. here’s a transcript from the investigation:

bush: “did you guys raise prices unfairly?”
big oil: “nope.”
bush: “ok. let’s hit the buffet.”

all just plain brilliant.

now, things he’s not doing:

1. he’s not telling the auto industry that they must increase the average miles per gallon that cars are currently getting. keep in mind that president clinton had instituted higher miles per gallon standards. one of bush’s first actions in office was to trash that. mpg standards have not changed in more than 20 years. maybe it’s about time to do something about that.

2. he’s not doing anything to encourage the use of solar power. at this point, i’d even go for expanded use of nuclear power. seriously.

3. he’s not rolling back on the billions in tax cuts he gave to the oil companies under the guise that they needed those billions for research and develoopment of new fuels, and also to drill the hell out of alaska.

and now the summer approaches, and there’s the traditional raising of the prices for the summer driving season, another sham. did you know that there’s no such need for the summer price raising? it’s not as if there’s a sudden seasonal shortage. they raise the prices because they want to. they don’t have to. and why do they get away with it? because we let them.

Leave a Comment » | gas prices, president bush | Permalink
Posted by brainsnorts

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