I find the discussion on government picking winners and losers interesting. 99.999999 percent of all Congressional actions are focused on using appropriations or tax code to pick winners and losers. That's the reason for K Street and the surrounding neighborhoods. The Iowa Primary exists in no small measure so politicians don't forget agricultural subsidies when they get back to Washington.
Full disclosure: I'm a modified flat tax guy with a strong belief in few deductions and very few tax credits. That has about as much chance of passing in Washington as a Dodo Bird does of walking down Park Avenue in New York this afternoon.
The government has an obligation to protect us. Part of that protection is to ensure that our environment is safe for us. That means law and regulations that arise from the law have to be focused on keeping our air clean and water pure. Encouraging electric automobiles is part of that responsibility, so long as one can prove the use of electricity as a motor vehicle fuel on an all-in basis, is a less ecologically threatening option for personal transport. The liberals in this room notwithstanding, I'm not sure the ecological benefits have been proven once electric powered automobiles become very widely used.
To Brother Skatastrophy, the Chicago El runs on a dedicated line with a third rail that would fry anyone who touched it in seconds. Amtrak in the Northeast also runs on electricity between Boston and Washington. The cost of wiring up the nation's rail network would be astronomical though it would be far easier to do high-speed rail once you did. Electric accelerates faster and is more efficient than traditional diesel. And, you don't dump the pollutants along the railroad right-of-way.
Maybe part of the answer with electric vehicles is to imbed power sources in trunk roadways that can be accessed by contact or by magnetic fields. There's a new tollway in Florida that's doing something like that but to do that universally would be cost prohibitive. It's also dangerous.
