\nThere is another problem I have with biking as a primary means of transportation, is that it is inefficient which I feel is un-American<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nYeah, that’s right.\u00a0 “Life, liberty, and on-time trains”.\u00a0 It’s right there in the Declaration of Independence.<\/p>\n
No, Mr. Brioche; “Efficiency’ is a market imperative.\u00a0 Since you are (or ape) French, we’ll have to explain that to you.\u00a0 That’ll come later.<\/p>\n
\nI know that a few people are confused as what could be more patriotic than an individual pedaling alone to work? <\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nReally, Mr. Cote-du-Rhone?\u00a0 “A few people” are “confused” about this?<\/p>\n
Name them. Provide some cites.<\/p>\n
Because…no.\u00a0 Nobody is confused about the “patriotism” of riding bikes.\u00a0 Nobody.\u00a0 Not one person in the entire world.<\/p>\n
Seriously – when did Anti-Strib <\/em>hire Grace Kelly?<\/p>\n\nOne 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.<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nRight.\u00a0 So what?<\/p>\n
Some liberals would also like us to be vegetarians; that doesn’t mean enjoying a veggie burrito at Chipotle for lunch is “Unamerican”.<\/p>\n
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:<\/p>\n
\nBiking 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.<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nLet’s stop right here.<\/p>\n
Who says it’s a matter of affording<\/em> to ride a bike?<\/p>\nI bike to work because I enjoy <\/em>it.\u00a0 I drive it sometimes, I bus it others, and when weather permits, I bike it.\u00a0 In other words, I exercise flexibility<\/em>.\u00a0 Something that apparently is beyond Mr. Blancmange’s comprehension.\u00a0 I have spent most of my career driving to work, because the drive was too far and the kids’ demands too great.<\/p>\nAnd now – after years of looking – I finally have a job in the city proper, an easy six miles or so from my house.\u00a0 And I can do anything I want<\/em> to get to work…<\/p>\n…by Mr. MarieAntoinette’s leave, naturally.<\/p>\n
\nMy 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\u2019t work.<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nOh, waaaah.<\/p>\n
I remember when I could be the kind of layabout slacker <\/em>with a schedule like Mr. Passepartout’s.\u00a0 I’m up at 5:15 most every day, getting in an hour or so of blogging.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 Then home, for making dinner, housework, kid stuff, finish work that I brought home, doctor appointments, grocery shopping – I rarely stop moving before 10PM.<\/p>\nAnd somewhere <\/em>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.\u00a0 Some guys might go to the gym – but that’s pretty much wasted time.\u00a0 Inefficient<\/em>, if you will.<\/p>\nSo I bike.\u00a0 It’s fun.\u00a0 It’s just about the best cardio there is.\u00a0 I get between 40-60 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous cardio a day, including the brisk<\/em>, 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.\u00a0 It costs almost nothing (more financially efficient).\u00a0 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<\/em>, 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”.<\/p>\n\nAs you can see this level of productivity is only possible with roads and cars.<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nThe level of productivity Mr. Baguette is yapping about is only possible if you have a stroke and a broken leg.\u00a0 Give me a break.<\/p>\n
Look – seriously, for a moment?\u00a0 DUH.\u00a0 I mean, big D, small uh.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 And it might be possible to live a car-free life with kids, but who the hell wants to try?\u00a0 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.<\/p>\n
Which doesn’t excuse the kind of “us against them” conceit that Mr. Gruyere wallows in.<\/p>\n
\nSo 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\u2019ll stop supporting job killing ideas like LRT, mass transit and bike paths. <\/em><\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nWhoah, Monseuir Andouilette!\u00a0 You changed the subject!<\/p>\n
“Biking” is not the same as “bike paths”.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 The other is a government program.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Do try to keep things straight, here?<\/p>\n
\nOur 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.<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nWhatever, 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).\u00a0 The future of this country depends not one limp froggy piddle on how we get to work.\u00a0 It depends on the job we do once we get there.<\/p>\n
Jeez, Tracy Eberly; who’s checking the green cards at Anti-Strib these days?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[75],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5068","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biking"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5068","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5068"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5068\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}