Horse and Buggy Time Again

I hate to say this, but necessity is necessity. State by state, our politicians effectively sabotaged a federal program to lay the foundations for a (nationwide) passenger rail network, which would have been developed to provide the mass of America's citizens with the benefit of a durable and efficient form of transportation, affordable and green, for our shared future. So now we face a very real and imminent deterioration of modern transportation. Oil prices are going to inevitably continue to rise, and the price of a motorized vehicle (economic trends being stubbornly what they are) is going to continue to outpace the wages we earn. This is a recipe for disaster, because our society is designed for people being able to get from various points A to various points B within very narrow cycles of time. Huge areas of our country are going to effectively suffer a "land-locked" situation. You may be grooving with your pick-up truck or your SUV now, but the days for such vehicles are numbered in their present form. And you might have to ask yourself: will I be making enough money in the future to afford an electric version of the automobile I am now driving? I am only being half-facetious when I now make the following recommendation: in light of the fact that our politicians and corporations have abandoned average Americans, we need to save ourselves, and that means HORSES! We need to stop misbreeding this precious species of mammal for horse-racing and pedigreed shows. We need to start breeding this animal en masse for practical duty. We need to create road-lanes reserved and protected for horse and wagon transportation. We do it already for the Amish, and in the future, we will need to do it for everyone who can't afford a hydrogen-powered limousine or sports car. We need to find craftspeople who understand and can reproduce the crafts of the cartwright and the wheelwright. We need horses that are strong and healthy and resilient. Towns need to build stables for the commuters. People will have to leave hours earlier to make it to work. It is neither crazy nor impossible. The Amish do it and they are flourishing. We have been left with little other choice. Our ferriers will no longer be poor. Our woodworkers will no longer be hard up. Our harness-makers will no longer starve. Carts and horses will not come cheap, but they will be far cheaper than using oil and the cars industries will produce in the future. The corporations already are catering more and more to a wealthier set. We who are not so wealthy need to stop looking to the politicians and the fat-cat companies to save our transportation future. We must take care of ourselves, and all of us have it in us to take care of horses to provide us with a means to meet the harsh demands of conquering distance in economically attenuated technologies of the future. The horse and humankind have been partners for many thousands of years. The automobile, on the other hand, has already nearly used up its friendship with most of humanity, and it is only a little over a century old.