Fender bender, SUVs hot topics for dog days

A couple of random thoughts accumulated in the midst of the dog days of summer.

I desperately need to find someone to blame. Oh, how I wish the culprit had been one of those simpleton Springfield drivers who never met a red light he didn't run. Although so many certified, red-light-running, road-rage rogues are around, I can't put the blame there.

Shoot, I can't even blame some simpleton who has yet to have the concept of TURN SIGNALS installed in the memory bank. I would be ecstatic had such a simpleton pulled into my lane without signaling.

As much as I would like to blame my crumpled front fender on the irrational behavior of a simpleton, I can't. Paraphrasing the classic remark of onetime comic strip philosopher, Pogo, "We have met the enemy, and he is us," I say, "I have met the simpleton, and he is me."

Actually, it wasn't altogether my fault. I was turning in to a drive-in bank that shall remain nameless. I was minding my own business when this post maliciously leaped out into my path. In spite of a heroic effort on my part, I couldn't avoid that post.

No, no, that's not what happened. Let's see, oh yes, I suffer severe depth perception problems; I simply couldn't see the post. Hold on. That, too, is a bunch of bunk.

Truth be told, that post was doing what posts do. For reasons unknown to me, I hit that sucker a prodigious blow, doing no apparent damage to the post. I can't say the same for my fender. The post pitched a shut-out; the score: post 1, me 0.

As I write this, my car is in the collision hospital receiving a fender transplant. In the meantime, I'm experiencing severe auto-withdrawal symptoms. It is hoped my auto will return soon.

Another dog days of summer random thought also is an automotive one.

Attention sports utility vehicle owners: You have been singled out as being responsible for excessive consumption of gasoline and the resulting air pollution.

Like me looking for someone to blame for my crushed fender, the "blame police" have settled on SUVs as gas-guzzling, fume-belching decimators of air quality. The fury no longer comes from some soreheads who don't happen to drive SUVs soreheads who drive SUVs keep quiet. Media types have been quick to pick up on the "SUVs are to blame for everything" brouhaha. Media report the accusations against SUVs as news and gnash their collective teeth editorially.

I am not fond of SUVs; I'm strictly a car guy. But my wife has owned an SUV for several years.

As for gas guzzling, I don't know that it guzzles any more gas than my car (at this moment my car isn't guzzling any gas and won't as long as it's in the hospital) nor am I aware that it spews any more pollution into the air. Observe rush hour traffic in any city; count cars and SUVs.

It won't take long to figure out that there are a lot more cars out there guzzling gas and polluting the environment. The latest rap against SUVs is that they aren't being used in the way they are intended. That's right, SUVs are off-road vehicles; they are intended to be used for work or going out into the boondocks; otherwise SUVs are offensive, polluting monsters.

I will be the first to admit that my wife doesn't go off-road very often I wouldn't want to go with her if she did. If she doesn't do it, so what? She has things to haul around that wouldn't fit into a car. A pickup would meet her needs, if she didn't also need to haul people. The SUV is perfect for her.

The four-wheel drive SUV feature comes in handy when it snows. I know, we don't get as much snow in the Ozarks as in Minnesota, but when it does snow, it's the four-wheel drive vehicles that are out and about. I can tell you that my car is a sled. When the snow flies, even I become an SUV proponent.

SUV gas-guzzling polluters of the world, unite. With all the media fuss about your choice of vehicles, can special taxes on SUVs be far away?

Next winter if you pass a member of the "blame police" whose Yugo is stuck in a snowdrift, tell him to hang in there, the spring thaw can't be far away.

(Joe McAdoo is former chairman of the communication department at Drury University.)