Jogger Stroller Accessories

After all the hybrids, electrics, flex fuels, and alternative fueled vehicles have well passed their debut, what will the future of transportation really be? Right now researchers and engineers are no longer working on alternative fuels and electric models. They have already been created, it is just finding cheap enough materials to make them out of that the general public can afford to buy them. Solar cars are already on the market as a super expensive car as well, and soon we will see many solar cars as well as cars that you can plug into your garage outlet at night and charge up for the next day.

Corn crops are popping up all over the country to provide for rich environmentally friendly fuel alternatives, and emissions are being bumped to even worse curbs for older vehicles. After all that is said and done, what's next? The movies of yesterday show us that in 11 years we should have hover cars, and other vehicles that are not only able to drive, but leave the roads behind and fly.

Is it really possible that we are that close to the future that fantasy writers have set forth for us? Truth be told, we are not that far from it. Even within the last 20 years, there have already been several prototype models created from small time inventors. Perfecting the work is all that is really needed.

In the mean time, several vehicle manufactures are already beyond the alternative fuel crisis and are working on faster, sleeker, even more fuel efficient vehicles. Cars that look like the next phantom race car that can get 300 mpg and be solar powered, plus carry a battery to run off electricity for several hundred miles. With in the next 5 years, it is estimated that most of the cars between the years of 1981 and 2004 will be phased out. This is because none of those models will pass the emissions testing that will be required once hybrids and other alternative fueled cars are released more publicly. The only vehicles that will mostly likely stand the test of time will be classics before 1978, and truth be told, only to those who can afford the gas.

The price of gasoline will do nothing but go up as the world continues to wear out the oil resources, which means that any oil left over will not be cheap. Even many people who wish to keep their classic will be forced to give them up or convert them to run on hydrogen or other alternative sources.

From a mechanics point of view, the future of transportation is only limited by the imagination. We could see flying cars next year if someone gets the gumption to finish working out the bugs.

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Casey Martin
NoviceAdvice.com
http://www.noviceadvice.com

With 2008 having been an election year, it has been convenient to levy all blame for our country's current economic condition on our nation's presidential administration for the last eight years. However, a significant portion of the fiscal woes now plaguing both Wall Street and Main Street originated well before the current administration ever set foot in the White House. In fact, it was in 1999 that the previous administration openly urged the Federal National Mortgage Association (aka "Fannie Mae") to reduce down payment and credit requirements for sub-prime or "at risk" borrowers in what appeared to be a valiant attempt to increase home ownership rates among minorities and low-income consumers.

In an amazingly prophetic article written by Steven A. Holmes of The New York Times when Fannie Mae began purchasing sub-prime mortgages in 1999, Mr. Holmes explained that "Fannie Mae is taking on significantly more risk, which may not pose any difficulties during flush economic times. But . . . may run into trouble in an economic downturn prompting a government rescue." Holmes further explained "If they fail, the government will have to step up and bail them out."

Once the housing bubble began to burst in 2005 and 2006, home prices started declining and by late 2007 the United States' economy as a whole began to decline. With so much attention directed at slumping housing and stock values, it is easy to forget that this fiscal contraction began with the sub-prime mortgage crisis that has since turned Wall Street into a house of cards that seems to shed portions of its structure each week. By 2008, both of the government sponsored enterprises ("GSE") known as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac ultimately failed and were eventually rescued by the Federal Government as predicted.

Even enormous public investment houses and banks like Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, A.I.G., Washington Mutual and Wachovia have all required government intervention that has cost tax payers hundreds of billions of dollars to date. Despite continuous public outcries condemning the "Wall Street Fat Cats", it is difficult to blame these failed public corporations that either originated these sub-prime mortgages that conformed to GSE requirements or purchased or insured supposedly sound mortgage-backed securities from the GSEs.

Specifically, banks like Washington Mutual and Wachovia originated loans to sub-prime borrowers according to GSE conforming loan requirements before selling these mortgages on the secondary loan market to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Investment banks such as Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers then assisted the GSEs by pooling these mortgages together to attempt to diversify risk, thereby creating collateralized debt obligations called mortgage-backed securities that were sold to institutional investors. Companies like A.I.G. provided credit-default swaps ("CDS") that acted like insurance for institutional investors that purchased the mortgage-backed securities to protect them from defaults by the original borrowers.

It is critical to remember that before the sub-prime loan defaults escalated far beyond generally anticipated levels that caused the house of cards to start falling, the companies originating, purchasing and insuring these loans and securities were operating under the assumption that they were working with relatively safe loans that conformed to the requirements of government sponsored entities. It is unfortunate that it was these very requirements that had been relaxed in 1999, which in turn formed the unstable foundation upon which all of the cards ultimately fell.

About the Author:

Brian S. Icenhower, Esq., BS, JD, CRB, CRS, ABR is a broker, attorney, real estate expert witness, prosecution consultant for district attorney real estate fraud units, a real estate law instructor, and a Director for the California Association of Realtors.