The push for exchanging gas for electric in transportation is an idea that has ironically
placed the proverbial cart in front of the horse. While the problems of an inadequate
power grid, too few charging stations, short range, high costs, long recharging times and
battery fires are real, there are two gigantic issues looming that rival them all.

Current state and federal gas-tax regulation siphons off about 67 cents from every gallon
of gasoline purchased in New York State. In California, that amount is $1.18-per-gallon.
Nationally this equates to more than $53 billion a year in tax revenue. Those taxes
account for more than a quarter of the expense of road and highway costs around the
nation. No such system of taxation exists for electric vehicles. For every ten-percent
reduction in gas vehicles being replaced by electric, a resulting decrease of more than $5
billion in tax revenue will occur.

Add this to the long list of issues that the rush to electric crowd has failed to address but
the second concern is a direct threat to our freedom, our autonomy and our God given
right to be left alone, (the abuse of which fits nicely into the liberal wish-list of control.)
The electrical connection from charger-to-car doubles as a stealthy surveillance tool.
Every interaction records the time, date, location, mileage, etc. basically interfacing with
the extensive computing system of the vehicle to potentially deliver any and all of the
data contained in the vehicle, which is extensive. Even charging at home, with the advent
of “smart meters”, consumers can “program” their vehicles to charge at off-peak power
times in order to save money. This same smart meter of course is also recording the time,
date, duration of charge and potentially more data from your vehicle of which you won’t
even be aware.

Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer has got the ball rolling in taking advantage of not
only the surveillance aspects of the modern-electric vehicle, but to simultaneously solve
the lost-revenue problem as well. Whitmer proposes using GPS technology to track
vehicle-miles-driven data in order to tax driving based upon usage.

While most people don’t think of lost freedom when it comes to these technological
issues, it is time we did. Incrementalism is the hardest to identify poison because it kills
you so gradually and slowly while providing what seems to be a nice service or that
makes your life easier and better.

Is it really a stretch to believe that if you can summons “Siri” or Google on your smart-speaker
that perhaps they might be capable of eavesdropping on you? If electronics in
your car can call 911 after sensing a crash, is it really a stretch to believe that same
technology might be able to know how long you were parked in a bar parking lot to the
interest of the local police? If you show up between charging stations and your speed
was above that posted, is it a stretch for you to see yourself getting a ticket by mail a day
later? Is it hard to fathom a jilted police Captain searching license plate camera databases
to identify his wife’s lover?

Every time you link your phone to a vehicles blue-tooth connection in order to use hands-free
cell service, that vehicle “infotainment system” dumps the entire content of that
device; call logs, list of phone numbers, texts, pictures, all of it. Think of that the next
time you rent a car or sell yours to a stranger. You’re unwittingly leaving your digital
DNA all over the place.

The final piece of this tech-driven plan to eliminate personal freedom completely will be
the replacement of our currency with a digital version. Once this happens, (God-literally
forbid), the oversight will be complete. Not only do we know where you are, how long
you were there and how fast you were going; now we know if you eat too much junkfood.
(Expect a call from your health-care-provider.) You drink too much alcohol.
(Time for some counseling or your insurance goes up.) Didn’t show at the gym again?
(Report to the doctor.) Expect “social scoring” type schemes to develop, of course for
your own good, just like the Chinese system.

Those who seek to control people will suggest that you write this off as a dystopian,
hyper-paranoid tale of things to come. The Covid era was a Beta-test on our reactions to
authoritarianism and fear-mongering and we failed miserably. This has emboldened
those who seek to control us. That good-old incrementalism isn’t noticeable until it’s too
late. Don’t say you weren’t warned.

What a cruelly-ironic harbinger of thing-to-come to know that that iconic symbol of
freedom and mobility, the automobile, might well serve as the intrusive and unrelenting
sentinel of the beginning of that next era in American life that sees the sun-setting on
what it means to be free.