Bacon's Rebellion

Michael Hardy, Jeff Schapiro and the Richmond Times-Dispatch have outdone themselves with the headline and lead paragraph of their transportation story today:

Fees, fines for roads proposed
GOP plan relies on bonds, increased fees and fines, and $250 million from schools, police and the poor.

Republicans hope to finance Virginia transportation improvements with the government credit card, by siphoning significant dollars from schools, police and the poor and raising taxes and fees for drivers and homeowners.

Funny, I don’t recall the news reporters of the Times-Dispatch using the pejorative description “financing … with the government credit card” when characterizing Warner administration initiatives to issue bonds for parks and college construction projects. Apparently, issuing long-term bonds to underwrite acquisition/construction of long-term assets is prudent finance when executed by Democrats but reckless when proposed by Republicans.

As for “siphoning significant dollars from schools, police and the poor,” the charge may parrot Democratic Party talking points — “Sen. R. Edward Houck, D-Spotsylvania, a budget negotiator, emphasized, ‘We should not pave roads in Virginia at the expense of schoolchildren and frail, elderly nursing home patients’” — but it is never backed up in the story. The fact is, the Republican plan wouldn’t cut a dime from existing programs. A number of politicians are concerned that transportation would compete with schools, health care, etc. for future dollars, but that’s a very different story.

It’s bad enough that two experienced political writers would craft such a lede. It’s even worse that no one on the T-D copy desk failed to call them on it — and, worse, would replicate the offense in the headline. Tom Silvestri, read the treatment of this story by other Virginia newspapers. Then sit down with the editorial staff for a little chat explaining the difference between writing news stories and writing editorials.

Washington Post
Virginian-Pilot
Roanoke Times
Free Lance-Star
Washington Times

(For the record, I am not defending the Republican road-financing plan, which I regard as a horror and abomination and will criticize in a future post. I simply expect the Times-Dispatch to uphold the fundamental tenets of journalism.)

There’s nothing like reopening old emotional wounds to promote racial reconciliation. I feel so warm and fuzzy I’m ready to start singing Kumbaya… Not.

The rhetoric emanating from Del. Don McEachin’s resolution to exact an “apology” from the General Assembly for slavery, Jim Crow and other assorted wrongs is escalating. Now, reacting to comments by Del. Frank Hargrove (see “So Much for Racial Reconciliation“), the Virginia National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is calling for Hargrove’s censure.

Writes the Associated Press:

In often emotional and seething comments Thursday, state NAACP director King Salim Khalfani and four black religious leaders said nothing short of an apology by the Republican Party and a formal rebuke of Hargrove would satisfy them.

“The handwriting of the past is still riding upon the slaves today because we’ve never gotten our therapy, we’ve never dealt with it honestly because this is Virginia, this is the 51st state – the state of denial,” Khalfani said.

After the news conference, the group confronted Hargrove in his office. “We think that’s very insensitive for you to say blacks should just get over it when you haven’t walked in our shoes,” Khalfani told Hargrove.

I wouldn’t expect much else from Khalfani, who wouldn’t have much of a job if African-Americans didn’t perceive themselves as perpetual victims. It’s in his self interest to keep Africans seething with a sense of injury and injustice, even if the perceived offenses are getting so subtle, nuanced or hard to define than many people fail to see them at all. If the Khalfanis of the world can’t find any real racism to combat, they’ll manufacture some.

But I do expect better of elected legislators like McEachin, who ought to be working on constructive measures — such as improving the educational system, fighting crime, reviving inner city neighborhoods or promoting minority entrepreneurship — that will have a tangible benefit for their constituents.

Like it or loathe it, there is no other word to describe the General Assembly’s compromise on transportation and land use in Virginia: monumental.

The legislative package represents one of the most far-reaching overhauls of Virginia’s transportation and governance since the Depression-era organization of the modern-day transportation system in 1932. If a deal can be reached with Gov. Timothy M. Kaine — and given his previous rhetoric, it is difficult to see how he can do anything but tinker on the margins — Virginia state and local government will be sorting through the implications for years.

The press release issued by the General Assembly leadership can be viewed here.

The Governor’s reaction: “We have concerns about some elements of this proposal, but I recognize that this is an early – and significant – step in the legislative process.” Read his press release here.

The Attorney General’s office has issued a statement, which I will link to as soon as it is posted online.”

The grand compromise includes the following three elements: transportation funding; land use reform and a realignment of state and local responsibilities for road maintenance; and a radical overhaul of the Virginia Department of Transportation.

• Reform “linking transportation and land use.” The package includes all of the major governance reforms introduced by the House of Delegates in the September 2006 transportation special section and modified slightly for this session. These allow for (1) the creation of “urban development areas” in fast-growing counties, (2) the establishment of “urban transportation service districts” whereby Northern Virginia localities can take over responsibility for secondary roads, and (3) a ban on VDOT accepting any “local subdivision roads” into the state system for maintenance.
• Transportation funding. The transportation funding package would raise $500 million annually in recurring statewide revenues from the General Fund, the General Fund surplus and a variety of other sources. This would be supplemented by $2 billion in bonds issued over five years. Additionally, regional transportation authorities would be able to raise up to $383 million a year in Northern Virginia and $209 million a year in Hampton Roads to spend regionally.
• VDOT reform. The package envisions sweeping reforms for the way VDOT does business. It would (1) institute”quantifiable and achievable goals” relating to congestion and safety; (2) put VDOT functions for competitive bidding; (3) streamline the environmental review process; (4) require tolls to be electronically automated; (5) reclassify primary, secondary and urban roads to bring them in line with current function; and (6) allow the General Assembly to elect at-large members to the Commonwealth Transportation Board.

That’s just the highlights, folks. This is massive. I’ll follow up tomorrow with commentary on the package and a critique of the Mainstream Media presentation of it.

Let’s hope there’s money in the transportation compromise crafted by the General Assembly (to be announced at 4 p.m.) for one of the cooler initiatives in the Kaine administration’s proposed transportation package. Bacon’s Rebellion reporter Peter Galuszka sat down earlier this week with transportation secretary Pierce Homer and technology secretary Aneesh Chopra to get the skinny on their proposal to create a $20 million fund for Intelligent Transportation Systems. (Read the article, “ITS Wits.”)

The Kaine administration would use the money to spark ideas and public-private partnerships for applying information technology to congestion-mitigation projects in Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads. The top priority would be to put more real-time traffic information into the hands of commuters and businesses so they can alter their routes or travel schedules to side-step gridlocked roads. As I have stressed repeatedly, Virginia cannot build its way out of traffic congestion: We must address the demand side of the equation as well. Intelligent Transporation Systems are one potentially cost-effective way to do that.

The Virginian-Pilot is reporting that the leadership of the state Senate and House of Delegates have agreed to a compromise transportation plan that will include a combination of tolls and fee increases. The $2 billion package calls for issuing bonds and redirecting revenue from the General Fund. Additionally, the package calls for regional plans for Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads. The Hampton Roads plan would include $200 million a year for local projects, funded by an increase in the real estate for most businesses.

Details of the announcement will be forthcoming around 4 p.m. today.

I’ll never forget trying to help an old man and his wife try to find his way out of Richmond. He was heading north but had taken a wrong turn and ended up in a residential neighborhood. I explained how to get back on the Interstate, but I could tell he wasn’t absorbing my instructions. I was heading in the general direction of where he needed to go, so I offered to show him. Hopping in my car, I guided the old man onto the Powhite Parkway and then, when Interstate 95 North veered off to the right, pointed vigorously to the exit as I continued on my way.

Oooh. Tough luck. He got confused and took the I-95 South exit instead. As he sank into the distance in my rear-view mirror, I wonderered how long it took for the old guy — Petersburg, maybe? — to figure out he was heading in the wrong direction.

The moral of the story is that road markings — even roads as big as Interstates — can be confusing to people who aren’t intimately familiar with them. People take wrong turns, get disoriented and sometimes end up having accidents. Wrecks are bad in and of themselves — people get injured, even killed. Wrecks also tie up traffic, often causing back-ups and aggravating congestion. Anything we can do to reduce the incidence of automobile accidents is a good thing.

According to Tom Holden at the Virginian-Pilot, the Virginia Department of Transportation is using more reflective sign materials, putting bigger typefaces on signs and painting bolder highway markings to help make driving a little easier. Along some sections of interstates, VDOT is painting interstate shields directly onto the pavement so that drivers are clear about what road they’re on.

The changes should be helpful to motorists with poor eyesight and slow reaction times, a number that grows as the population ages. Better interstate signs certainly would have helped the old guy I tried to assist. The measure may be modest but it’s also relatively inexpensive. VDOT should be commended for a small but welcome change.

(Better signs and markings, incidentally, were on the list of reforms recommended last year by former VDOT Commissioner Philip Shucet shortly after leaving the post. They join the list of ideas on that list — outsourcing maintenance, soliciting design-build contracts, and creating access-management plans for road corridors — that have been implemented to a greater or lesser degree since then.)

If Del. Don McEachin, R-Richmond, hoped to initiate a “healing process” with his resolution apologizing for slavery, he didn’t get off to a very good start yesterday. Del. Frank Hargrove, R-Hanover, took exception to his resolution and made some remarks that some perceived as outrageous. Tempers flared and accusations were hurled.

The exchange was magnified by the media, of course, which loves nothing better than a good cat fight. “Hargrave offends blacks, Jews,” stated the front-page headline in the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

When it comes to symbolic issues like this, there’s a lot more raw emotion than common sense. Hargrave did use indelicate language to express himself. But the fact is, his words reflected the views of many Virginians. And if there is to be any “reconciliation,” as opposed to “capitulation,” the people who hold such views must be allowed to express themselves rather than being shouted down with cries of fiery indignation. Of course, as I wrote in my previous post, “How About a Resolution Atoning for the Welfare State?”, McEachin’s resolution isn’t really about “reconciliation” at all — it’s about imposing a politically correct interpretation of recent history that absolves a failed liberalism of any culpability for the plight of African-Americans in our society today.

Let’s examine Hargrove’s transgressions.

First, Hargrove made the following statement to the Charlottesville Daily Progress:

How far do these calls for apologies go, wondered Hargrove, a member of the House Rules Committee that could take up McEachin’s resolution as early as Wednesday.
“Are we going to force the Jews to apologize for killing Christ?”

Hargrove wondered. “Nobody living today had anything to do with it. It would be far more appropriate in my view to apologize to the Upper Mattaponi and the Pamunkey” Indians for the loss of their lands in eastern Virginia, he said.

Del. David Englin, D-Alexandria, took umbrage. One of three Jewish delegates in the House, Englin recalled how he was picked on when he was a child because of the misperception that Jews killed Jesus. “I want you all to understand,” he told the legislature, “what it means when people the respect and stature of a member of this body perpetuate the notion that Jews killed Christ.”

Excuse me. We can argue until the cows come home — and historians do — the extent to which the high priests of the Jerusalem temple did or did not force Pontius Pilate’s hand to crucify Jesus. But it is a historical fact that for the better part of 2,000 years, Christians did accuse “the Jews” of killing Jesus. It was not Hargrave’s intent to reanimate the view of Jews as Jesus killers. It was quite the opposite: He was saying that most Christians, who once embraced that view, got over it — and rightly so.

Hargrave also said the following, according to the Daily Progress:

“I personally think that our black citizens should get over it. … By golly, we’re living in 2007. Nobody can justify slavery today, but it’s counterproductive to dwell on that. … Political correctness has kind of gotten us into this area.”

Del. Dwight Jones, chairman of the Legislative Black Caucus, responded as follows: “When somebody tells me that I should just get over slavery, I can only express my emotion by suggesting that I am appalled.”

The point that Hargrave was raising, albeit in a clumsy way, was that nursing a cult of victimization does nothing to improve the lives of African-Americans or to better prepare them to prosper in a globally competitive economy. It’s a legitimate argument; indeed an increasing number of blacks are making it. But aggrieved and offended Democrats don’t want to engage that argument. Calling upon the unassailable moral force of the 19th- and 20th-century struggles to abolish slavery and enact Civil Rights, they want to delegitimize dissenting strategies for achieving black prosperity in the 21st century. They want to drive those views from the public sphere — and call it “healing.”

In Frank Hargrave’s case, I think they succeeded. It’ll be a long time, I wager, before he unfolds himself from his foetal position to speak on the topic again. But that doesn’t mean he’ll change his thinking.

One thing I’ve learned from my marriage: Sometimes the best way to get over an argument is just to stop talking about it. Sometimes you just have to agree to disagree, and move on with life. Resolutions like McEachin’s don’t reconcile anyone, they don’t heal anyone. If not time to “get over it,” it is indeed time to “move on.”

Del. Chris Peace, R-Mechanicsville, is forming a state task force to study textbook reform in Virginia.

The goal, as discussed in “A ‘Textbook’ Study of Knowledge-Wave Education Policy,” is to devise an end-run around monopolistic textbook manufacturers, who publish school books geared to the curricula of bigger states like California and Texas. Through use of shared texts and print-on-demand printing technology, Peace thinks he can save taxpayers millions of dollars each year and better align the content of textbooks with the Virginia Standards of Learning.

Peace is assembling a list of people who would like to participate in the study. If you have something to contribute, let him know your interests and your qualifications at [email protected].

The big cultural wedge issue in this year’s General Assembly session comes not from the right but from the left. Del. Don McEachin, D-Richmond, has submitted a bill that calls for “atoning for involuntary servitude of Africans and calling for the reconciliation of all Virginians.” It pays to read this bill carefully and to note what it says and does not say.

The bill commences by reciting the horrors of the Atlantic slave trade and the practice of slavery in the United States and Virginia, and then recounts the injustices of the Jim Crow era. If the bill stopped there, I wouldn’t find it terribly objectionable. (I say that with certain reservations. As Jim Bowden points out in his recent column, “Our Humblest Apologies,” the McEachin apology provides a lopsided, context-deficient account of history.)

But McEachin doesn’t stop there. He links the evils of slavery to the present time.

An apology for centuries of brutal dehumanization and injustices cannot erase the past, but confession of the wrongs can speed racial healing and reconciliation and help African American and white citizens confront the ghosts of their collective pasts together. … Racial reconciliation is impossible without some acknowledgment of the moral and legal injustices perpetrated upon African Americans. …

Throughout their existence in America and even in the decades after the Civil Rights Movement, African Americans have found the struggle to overcome the bitter legacy of slavery long and arduous, and for many African Americans the scars left behind are unbearable, haunting their psyches and clouding their vision of the future and of America’s many attributes. …

In the Commonwealth, home to the first African slaves, the vestiges of slavery are ever before African American citizens, from the overt racism of hate groups to the subtle racism encountered when requesting health care, transacting business, buying a home, seeking quality public education and college admission, and enduring pretextual traffic stops and other indignities.

This document does not merely ask Virginians merely to apologize for slavery — it asks that Virginianscollectively accept moral responsibility for the condition of African-Americans today. Further, it asks us to accept facts that are demonstrably untrue (that African-Americans are the victims of racism in college admissions) and facts that are arguably untrue (that African-Americans are discriminated against by mortgage lenders and providers of health care). And it does so without ever mentioning the devastation wreaked upon the African-American community by the modern welfare state. So, while Virginians apologize for the sins of long-dead ancestors, McEachin does not request anyone to apologize for the facts that:

• Great Society urban-clearing programs devastated African-American neighborhoods and disrupted the social cohesion of African-American communities in cities across the country.
• The problem of endemic African-American unemployment did not exist until after the introduction of Great Society welfare policies.
• Violent crime rates among African-Americans skyrocketed after the introduction of the welfare state and liberal attitudes towards law enforcement.
• The break-up of the nuclear African-American family and the surge in out-of-wedlock births occurred after the introduction of the welfare state.

Of course, acknowledging that the welfare state, not slavery or Jim Crow, is what created the African-American underclass, hence is responsible for most of the suffering of living African-Americans, would require McEachin to apologize policies that he endorsed and defended.

My sense is that McEachin really isn’t interested in apologizing himself. He’s looking for others to do the apologizing. McEachin isn’t interested in “racial reconciliation” — he’s just another liberal playing the racial blame game.

State government is plodding in its embrace of technology to deliver services to the public, but the fact that it is plodding suggests that it is moving forward. A case in point: As part of its outreach program, the Department of Business Assistance is holding a webinar tomorrow about the state’s eVa procurment system. States Director Louisa Strayhorn:

Think about it: no traveling, no traffic, no unfamiliar conference room seating. Just you, us, and an opportunity to help your business without leaving your business. Not only is it more convenient for you, our customer, but it will allow VDBA to reach more customers at less cost. As a taxpayer, you’ve got to love that!

Yes, as a taxpayer, I do.

Let us now praise the Daily Press, normally one of the more truculent voices for Business As Usual thinking in the Mainstream Media. Today’s editorial makes a key point that all too often goes missing from MSM reporting and punditry: that it matters not only how much money we raise for transportation maintenance and improvements, it matters who pays, and how.

The main thrust of the op-ed piece is to ask what ever happened to all the talk about privatization as an option for raising capital to invest in transportation improvements. That’s a worthwhile question. But more significant was a digression, towards the bottom of the piece, about the virtues of the gas tax (my italics):

It’s a simple concept: Them that use, pay. And they should pay according to demand, too. In Hampton Roads, you may have noticed, it’s pretty easy to get around the region from midnight to six in the morning. Logic suggests a system that discourages driving in peak demand periods.

“The growing stranglehold that congestion is placing on America’s transportation network calls for new ways of financing and maintaining our critical transportation infrastructure,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters said recently.

The DP deserves credit for moving beyond the simplistic mantra, heard so often elsewhere, that limits the debate to how much money is needed and where to get it. In other words, if you’ll permit me to elaborate, there are two sides to the equation: supply and demand. The debate in Virginia focuses almost exclusively on the supply side (how to increase the capacity of the transportation system) and has overlooked demand (how to reduce usage of the system) through congestion pricing, zoning reforms and the overhaul of governance structures.

Let us hope that the DP follows this new line of logic. The editorialistas there will find that it opens up new realms of inquiry.

I am probably the last blogger in Virginia to mention it, but there may be a few readers who haven’t seen Waldo Jaquith’s new “Richmond Sunlight” website yet. Waldo’s creation provides an interface to General Assembly information that’s far more user friendly than the G.A.’s own website. Plus, it has cool features such as lists of newest bills, most viewed bills and most discussed bills, along with easy access to legislator information.

The website has fun, dynamically updated charts that show, among other things, the Top 10 bill filers (Del. Bob Marshall is the most prolific). And the comments capability could prove interesting. As of today, the bill that has sponsored the most commentary is HB 1774, which would make it “unlawful for any person to keep, maintain or operate or to visit a disorderly house.”

Great job, Waldo! I’m book-marking this baby, and I’m going to use it.

An Associated Press article about childhood obesity this morning kicks off this way:

RICHMOND–At Chimborazo Elementary, apples aren’t just for teachers. The glossy fruit lined lunch trays on a recent Wednesday, alongside wheat rolls, low-fat sorbet and gobs of greens–healthy choices all happily scarfed by fourth graders.

“There’s a direct correlation between a healthy child and achievement,” said Richmond schools spokeswoman Felicia Cosby, smiling as students tore into string beans and low-fat milk.

State lawmakers hope this is the lunchroom of the future.

Tackling childhood obesity is one of those mom-and-apple pie issues. Absolutely no one is for childhood obesity. How, then, can anyone oppose a measure like the one submitted by Sen. John Edwards, D-Roanoke, that would require state educational and health officials to cooperate in targeting childhood obesity and other juvenile health problems?

Actually, I wouldn’t say that I oppose Edwards’ bill. It might do a small measure of good. What disturbs me is a quote the legislator used to justify the bill: “It’s a state responsibility.”

It’s everyone’s responsibility. Childhood obesity results from behaviors and forces deeply embedded in American popular culture. The state, by ensuring that the healthy foods are served in schools, is a necessary partner in combating obesity. But the problem extends so much farther than the school cafeteria.

Some people blame the giant food companies that peddle sugar cereals, snacks, deserts and junk foods. Yeah… I suppose so. But I remember seeing those commercials, and wanting those cereals (“Trix are for kids!”), when I was a kid more than 40 years ago — and childhood obesity was trivial a problem back then. I think the roots go deeper. For the sake of brevity, I will mention only two factors.

One is the time famine. Parents today, especially those in two-income families, are Running As Hard as They Can (to borrow Ed Risse’s phrase) and, though they know better, often take the easy way out when it comes to preparing food. It’s easier just for an exhausted mom to shove a pizza in the oven than to cook a proper meal. It’s easier to give in to the child who steadfastly refuses to eat his greens.

The other is our cultural proclivity for keeping kids cooped up inside. Four years ago, our family moved from Richmond to Henrico County so my little boy could have room to run and play outside. Does he, in fact, run in play outside? No. Do any of the other kids in the neighborhood run and play outside? Almost never. There are quiet streets for bicycling, and creeks to explore, and cul de sacs to play kickball in, but… you don’t see kids outdoors. They’re all inside.

Why? I think it’s because Americans live in a culture of fear. Mothers are terrified that a molester will snatch their child off the street. They’re terrified that their child will be run over by a car. Mothers don’t want to let children out of their sights (until they turn 16 and, equipped with cars and cell phones, they can go anywhere, do anything, they want). Little boys stay inside, watch TV and play video games. What physical activity they engage in — baseball, soccer, basketball, tae kwon do and other organized sports — is all structured and overseen by adults. Children don’t explore their neighborhoods like they used to. They don’t play spontaneous games of SPUD (anyone remember that game?) or hide-and-seek like they used to. Consequently, they don’t get nearly as much exercise as kids did when I was growing up.

Figure out how to change the time famine, teach kids good eating habits, quell the climate of fear and ensure that kids get more exercise, and we won’t have an obesity epidemic anymore.

Arthur Purves, president of the Fairfax County Taxpayers Alliance, has pinpointed a key player in the transportation debate — the teachers union — that I, for one, have not appreciated, relying as I do upon Mainstream Media reporting for insight into the political dynamics of the General Assembly.

Why, Purves asks, does the state Senate (and, it could be added, Gov. Timothy M. Kaine) insist that transportation improvements not be paid for with General Fund revenues? Why the insistence that transportation not compete with other needs like education and health care? Because of the Virginia Education Association. Writes Purves in testimony before the Fairfax County Delegation to the Virginia General Assembly, January 6, 2007:

Most General Fund revenue comes from income and most of the sales tax as well as lottery and ABC profits. Traditionally fifty percent of General Fund revenues goes to education. … Historically, General Fund revenues, which increase with income, have increased much faster than transportation revenues, which are largely based on gasoline taxes that do not increase with gasoline prices.

The result is a structural imbalance in which public schools dominate the fast-growing income and sales tax revenues while transportation is stuck with stagnant gasoline tax revenues. So while funding for new transportation construction is drying up, inflation-adjusted public-school spending in Virginia has been increasing ten times faster than enrollment.

The General Assembly’s debates on transportation are a turf war in which the Virginia Education Association and its allies in the Senate try to keep transportation out of the General Fund. They do not want funding for state-mandated elementary school guidance counselors to have to compete with widening and repairing interstate highways.

This analysis makes sense to me, although I would offer one note of caution: Purves offers no hard evidence in his letter — perhaps taking the truth of it for granted — that the VEA has lobbied actively to protect the General Fund from transportation funding. I can’t tell if he’s arguing from a logical deduction or from concrete knowledge.

School funding should have to compete with transportation funding, Purves argues. “Higher taxes would only reward mismanagement.”

Update: Purves cites the legislative reports on the VEA website as proof of its opposition to the GOP transportation plan. Says the VEA:

In 2004 we gained $700 million a year with the tax restructuring. The public supported the 2004 tax restructuring because they thought the money would go for education. Now we see these funds diverted to transportation when we are not adequately paying our teachers and not funding the SOQ in keeping with the recommendations of the Board of Education.

In my recent column, “The Oregon Solution,” I argued that the gasoline tax is doomed. As consumers shift to hybrid cars, fuel cell-powered cars and electric cars over the next 20 years, gasoline consumption will decline precipitously, and so will the gasoline tax — leaving the state of Virginia (and every other state in the union) looking for other sources of revenue to pay for road maintenance and construction.

The future is closer than I thought. I’d considered fuel-cell cars as the most remote of the alternate power technologies because they would require a parallel hydrogen manufacturing / distribution / retailing infrastructure to be built, posing a Catch 22. Why would anyone want to buy a fuel cell-powered car if hydrogen fuel stations were few and far between? And why would anyone invest in hydrogen fuel stations if there weren’t any fuel cell-powered cars on the road?

Now comes BMW with a vehicle that gets around that problem — a hybrid gasoline/hydrogen car. The”Hydrogen 7″ (displayed to the left) has two separate fuel tanks — one for gasoline and one for hydrogen. According to Business 2.0 magazine, that allows motorists to burn hydrogen when they can access it and gasoline when they can’t. Catch 22 problem solved!

It still will take time for a hydrogen-fuel infrastructure to develop. BMW is manufacturing only 100 Hydrogen 7s this year, and only 25 of those are coming to the United States. But that’s just Year One. Let’s see what Year Two looks like. Meanwhile, General Motors has announced its intention to unveil two fuel-cell vehicles in 2011. Other auto companies will follow.

The auto manufacturers are moving a lot faster than the politicians. The fuel-cell era could be here in a political blink of the eye. And unless Virginia starts thinking about the consequences, our dysfunctional transportation system could start unraveling a lot faster than anyone thinks.

(Thanks to Phil Rodokanakis for pointing me to the Business 2.0 story.)