Somebody with a French-y sounding name – Bartleby Camembert or some other limp-noodle fake name – writing at Anti-Strib took yet another dork-fingered whack at bikers a few weeks ago.
Unusually for a “conservative”, writing on a “conservative” blog, Mr. Chablis’ piece borrows from that great conservative thinker, Vice President Joe Biden, and is entitled “Efficiency is Patriotic”
There is another problem I have with biking as a primary means of transportation, is that it is inefficient which I feel is un-American
Yeah, that’s right. “Life, liberty, and on-time trains”. It’s right there in the Declaration of Independence.
No, Mr. Brioche; “Efficiency’ is a market imperative. Since you are (or ape) French, we’ll have to explain that to you. That’ll come later.
I know that a few people are confused as what could be more patriotic than an individual pedaling alone to work?
Really, Mr. Cote-du-Rhone? “A few people” are “confused” about this?
Name them. Provide some cites.
Because…no. Nobody is confused about the “patriotism” of riding bikes. Nobody. Not one person in the entire world.
Seriously – when did Anti-Strib hire Grace Kelly?
One of the greatest assets of our economy has been its flexibility. Americans, much more then Europeans, have always been ready and willing to change. Liberals want us to become less flexible and more rigid. They want us all to live near LRT and bike paths.
Right. So what?
Some liberals would also like us to be vegetarians; that doesn’t mean enjoying a veggie burrito at Chipotle for lunch is “Unamerican”.
But since the subject is flexibility, let’s talk about how very, very hidebound and inflexible – which apparently means “Unpatriotic” – Mr. Pepe-le-pew is:
Biking is a big part of the liberal dream to restrict the freedoms of Americans. If you can only afford to bike or take mass transit to work, your job options are severely limited. This not only reduces the pay of the individual, it also reduces the productivity of our society.
Let’s stop right here.
Who says it’s a matter of affording to ride a bike?
I bike to work because I enjoy it. I drive it sometimes, I bus it others, and when weather permits, I bike it. In other words, I exercise flexibility. Something that apparently is beyond Mr. Blancmange’s comprehension. I have spent most of my career driving to work, because the drive was too far and the kids’ demands too great.
And now – after years of looking – I finally have a job in the city proper, an easy six miles or so from my house. And I can do anything I want to get to work…
…by Mr. MarieAntoinette’s leave, naturally.
My schedule this fall was this: up at 6:30 AM so I could be at the U of MN campus by 8:00 AM. Drive to client A north of St. Paul after class. Drive to client B in White Bear Township at 12:30. Leave WBT at 5:15 to go back to the U of MN campus, drive home at 9:00PM. Now try this scenario with LRT, buses or bicycles. It just doesn’t work.
Oh, waaaah.
I remember when I could be the kind of layabout slacker with a schedule like Mr. Passepartout’s. I’m up at 5:15 most every day, getting in an hour or so of blogging. Then I’m waking kids up, getting them up and on their way, and getting off to work -which, over the past fifteen years, has been anywhere from Chanhassen to Maple Grove to Eagan to Farmington to Eden Prairie to Minnetonka (and sometimes more than one; when I was a consultant, I’d sometimes work two or three gigs at a time) to, after 13 years in IT, Saint Paul. Then home, for making dinner, housework, kid stuff, finish work that I brought home, doctor appointments, grocery shopping – I rarely stop moving before 10PM.
And somewhere in that schedule I gotta find some time to try to stay in some kind of shape, so I hopefully don’t die of a heart attack before I’m 50. Some guys might go to the gym – but that’s pretty much wasted time. Inefficient, if you will.
So I bike. It’s fun. It’s just about the best cardio there is. I get between 40-60 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous cardio a day, including the brisk, humility-induciing climb up Cathedral Hill at the end of the day. It fits into time I’m already spending; it’s faster than the bus, and when you factor in parking and walking to work, not a whole lot slower than driving. It costs almost nothing (more financially efficient). It makes my work day more efficient, since the morning workout pumps up my energy to a level that – I guarantee this – you can not match, Froggy LeFroggue. And it is fun, which is more than you can say for plodding away on a treadmill or sitting in traffic in your Renault LeCar or puttering along on your “motorcycle”.
As you can see this level of productivity is only possible with roads and cars.
The level of productivity Mr. Baguette is yapping about is only possible if you have a stroke and a broken leg. Give me a break.
Look – seriously, for a moment? DUH. I mean, big D, small uh. As I’ve noted in this space for years, most of the transit snobs you read and run into may or may not have jobs, but the incomprehensibly vast majority seem to live alone, or with another able-bodied adult. And it might be possible to live a car-free life with kids, but who the hell wants to try? The transit snobs are screechingly myopic; anyone who thinks they can live and work and raise kids, even near a bus or train stop, and have a life that involves much of anything but planning how one is going to get places and earn the fare for it, obviously hasn’t tried.
Which doesn’t excuse the kind of “us against them” conceit that Mr. Gruyere wallows in.
So if you believe in freedom and want to leave your kids with a growing economy and a shot at a life at least as good as yours, you’ll stop supporting job killing ideas like LRT, mass transit and bike paths.
Whoah, Monseuir Andouilette! You changed the subject!
“Biking” is not the same as “bike paths”. One is a personal choice one makes with one’s own money, time, and effort, exercising the adult free will to decide how to live one’s own life, using streets he or she has paid for with taxes already. The other is a government program.
Do try to keep things straight, here?
Our country and economy are built in individual freedom, flexibility and efficiency. Anything that reduces that is a threat to our future and ultimately our country.
Whatever, Mr. Phroux-Phroux Authoritarian Scold Who Learned Everything He Knows About Blogging, Logic and apparently Politics From MNob and Grace Kelly (Who Have Never Been Seen In The Same Room). The future of this country depends not one limp froggy piddle on how we get to work. It depends on the job we do once we get there.
Jeez, Tracy Eberly; who’s checking the green cards at Anti-Strib these days?
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