VIDEO: Ad for a Bubba's birthright

Yesterday afternoon, as I was watching the Cowboys fall just short of a hyuge comeback, I got to thinking of what happens on TV when there's nothing happening on the gridiron. When there's no action on the field, viewers are treated to -- what else -- commercial after commercial after commercial. 

So, since there's nothing going on in American politics at the moment [Well, is there? Ed.] we feel no shame in filling this space with an ad [a parody, OK? Ed.] for that great American institution, the tank-like American SUV. 

This ad parody is mentioned in Rogue Nation: American Unilateralism and the Failure of Good Intentions, by Clyde Prestowitz (Basic Books, 2003). In the chapter entitled "Running on Empty", the author has this to say about

Bubba's birthright

The standard definition of a "Bubba" is a man who feels it's his God-given right to drive his pickup truck down the highway at 80 miles an hour with the windows open, the CD payer and air-conditioning both at full blast, and an open can of beer in his lap. While he's generally thought of as a white man from the South, the truth is that Bubbas can be found from Connecticut to California among all races and both genders....

Leave aside the stereotype's nonessentials for a moment -- the music, the beer can, the large dog in the passenger seat, the hunting rifle in a gun rack behind the rear window, the patriotic bumper stickers -- and pay attention to the overpowered and over-accessorized vehicle (mostly provided by American industry), the road (provided by American government), and the sense of entitlement (provided by American history). Where do these things come from, and where are they taking us?

Mr Prestowitz's answer is the waste of fuel required to power the cars which we think we deserve has led us to a serious dependence on oil imported from countries that hate us (like Iraq) and countries which merely dislike us (like Canada). He writes:

If U.S. vehicles got the same fuel economy as European and Japanese vehicles, the United States would need to import no Persian Gulf oil at all.

He isn't arguing for the replacement of internal combustion engins by sparky cars. The fad for EVs hadn't begun in 2003, and the idea of a Biden-Harris-style EV mandate would have been dismissesd out of hand as insane. Besides, the same criticism appliesa to the American waste of electric power. 

The Japanese [Mr Prestowitz again] have put such emphasis on energy efficiency that they can produce a dollar of GDP with less than half the energy of the United States.... To create the equivalent of $1 of GDP, Europeans use only about two thirds as much energy as the Americans.

If America had the same energy efficience as the EU, it could not only do without oil imports from the Persian Gulf, it could do without oil imports period.

Let us hope (and vote!) that the new Trump administration will feature Elon Musk as Czar of Energy Efficiency, in charge of making America a powerhouse again... in every possible meaning of the word!