Aug 06 2008
The Obidiot Speaks Again
Over the years I have learned that some Ivy League degrees are not so much a representation of intelligence, but more a training program for the elite to hide how dumb they are. Barrack Obama seems to fall into this category because there are times when he makes statements I would expect out of a 4th grader, not a alumni of Harvard.
For example today we have the tire inflation issue. Obama is out trying to defend is ridiculous claim that America can save up to 4% on our oil imports by inflating our tires. How stupid can this be? Well, let me do a simple analysis to assess the potential for savings and explain why folks who rely on C+ HS math skills should stay away from numbers to make their case.
4% is the maximum potential savings in mileage an individual can obtain through correct tire pressure. That assumes the tires are so far away from their optimal pressure fixing the problem will generate the maximum result. However, most people are not driving tires massively off in their tire pressure. So let’s makes some ridiculously pessimistic assumptions on the nation’s tire inflation status and determine the maximum potential benefit regarding our oil consumption.
Realize a vast majority of cars are serviced regularly, and all commercial transportation systems are highly regulated and checked. If I was to draw the worst case scenario I would say 50% of the nation’s cars and trucks do not have properly inflated tires (I will avoid the math the discusses how many tires of a potential number, which varies from cars to commercial transportation vehicles like semi-trucks).
In addition, not all of those out of spec will be 100% out of spec. So let’s assume 25% are only half out of spec, with a potential to increase mileage by 2%, while the other 25% can benefit at the maximum level possible. This means instead of saving 4% across the nation, we only save (.25*.02) + (.25*.04) = 0.015, or 1.5%. That is the realistic potential maximum savings the NATION could expect from the tire pressure magical cure due to gasoline used for driving.
Obama and his liberal media math-challenged groupies keep claiming it is 4% and they just take that off the entire national oil consumption numbers. But of course, as anyone with more than 2 IQ digits to rub together knows, gasoline is not all this nation uses oil for. We use it for heating and other oil-based products. But again, let’s just assume 80% of the oil in this nation is used for transportation (this is a complete WAG BTW). This drops the 1.5% maximum potential savings from Obama’s tire inflation ‘program’ towards energy independence to a national maxim potential savings of 1.2%.
And I am fairly confident I am over estimating this by at least 50%. So all Obama’s anger at being called out this ‘issue’ is his own ignorant fault. The fact someone with a Harvard degree failed to do a simple sanity check such as this on his silly claim is just another indicator Obama is fairly clueless and simply packages up juvenile sound bites in response to polls.
Of course, I am now an evil, anti-American, rabid conservative for actually applying my brain and knowledge to a serious issue. OK, fine with me. I am not an Obama fan because when the man speaks I see someone struggling to grasp the basics of reality. Folks, the lesson in all this is don’t let the school system ruin your kids’ future. Math is important to discern reality from the hucksters (who typically avoided math because it was ‘too hard’). Don’t let your kids grow up to be an Obidiot.
AJ it is not what the brain can think, calculate, reason or substantiate, it’s how you FEEL about the subject. If you feel that inflating your tires will make the planet better, oil less necessary, then it will be so. If you can feel someone’s pain then surely you are the one that we have all been waiting for, you will lift up the poor, put all in homes and the waters will recede. You are the symbol of all that is good that Americans aspire to but can’t quit grasp. My hope is that Americans are smarter then Obama feels they are.
Yeah but even if you’re right, that’s 1.5% on EVERY vehicle :-))
No Ray,
It is 1.5% averaged over all vehicles. Most don’t have an inflation issue. In my model 25% have half a problem and 25% have sufficient problems to gain the maximum benefit.
This is a rough order of magnitude, best case. Refinements in model fidelity will drop this average. For example, my guess is 80% have proper inflation. Those who are the worst off drive the least, etc.
AJStrata
ray, it’s sure not 1.5% on my vehicles since I check my tires monthly. So do many other people – and have you seen the dashboard pressure check systems that warn you if air is low?
This “problem” is ridiculously overstated, and even AJ (trying to give the benefit of the doubt) far overstates the problem. He’s left out the fact that this is also dependant on the type of car usage. A car that is driven at slower speeds in a city will not see much improvement in mileage since it is operating at less then optimal mileage most of the time. (lower gears, etc) Also, the extra rolling resistance which comes from an underinflated tire increases dramatically with speed. To see the most theoretical improvement, the vehicle must be doing long stretches on an interstate where efficiency is maximized. Taking that into accout, I think even AJ’s numbers overstate the theoretical improvement greatly.
This is a word game for parlor liberals that exists mainly to support the meme that we don’t need any more supply. It falls apart on even the most cursory analysis.
Just out of curiousity, and because you are often a stickler for details, AJ:
Do you have any data to back up the assumptions you make above, about how many tires are properly inflated, how many are “half out of spec”, etc?
Because it would seem a bit presumptous to berate other people “who rely on C+ HS math skills”, based upon a mathematical equation with numbers that you just made up.
It’s not that checking your tires is a bad idea… [actually, it is an excellent suggestion]… but in the original remark Sen. O can’t keep his mouth shut and adds on to makes the dumb statement about how much it will save… [“all the oil that they’re talking about getting off drilling.” That assertion was, and remains, false.”
I play a little poker and Sen. O would do well to heed the old saying on this one… Ya gotta know when to hold-em and know when to fold-em
Then he doubles down on a losing horse with the 4% argument. Powerline has the same argument as Aj. [and me] Great minds you know.
Breschau… I imagine Aj’s numbers will be fairly correct. There is a theory that when one makes a bunch of estimates based on what one reasonably thinks [the individual estimates will be off both ways] that the end result is very close to the right answer.
It looks like a better number for US motor fuel consumption would be 45% of US oil consumption, not 80% as you WAG’ed. From the website:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/basics/quickoil.html
we find US Motor Gasoline consumption of 9,286,000 barrels/day and US Petroleum consumption of 20,680,000 barrels/day for a percentage of 45%. The final savings using your other assumptions would then be 0.675%.
[…] AJ Strata: Obama is out trying to defend is ridiculous claim that America can save up to 4% on our oil imports by inflating our tires. How stupid can this be? Well, let me do a simple analysis to assess the potential for savings and explain why folks who rely on C+ HS math skills should stay away from numbers to make their case. […]
It is ABSURD THAT WE ARE TALKING ABOUT THIS!
Inflating tires won’t put cheap gas in the airplanes. Or in people’s heaters. Or in our shipping fleet. Sheeze. This is ridiculous!
Drill here. Drill now. And go to the devil radical leftists.
Damn, breschau, re-read AJ’s post. All the numbers he used, except for the original 4%, are ASSUMPTIONS!!!! They are logical assumptions based on his criteria. For Barack Hussein Obama to use the 4% max number per vehicle across the entire oil usage of America is so far from logical, only irrational liberals and true simpletons would stick with it.
AJ’s assumptions are off-the-cuff, but completely logical. I found a study by doing a Google search from the NHTSA, http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pubs/809-317.pdf, that did a study on 2001, and found about 27% of cars on the road had ONE tire that was down on tire pressure by 8 psi or more. Click and Clack, at Cartalk.com, have posted since 2005 that a car will lose 0.4% fuel mileage for every 1 psi of tire pressure below recommend pressure (ballpark figure). To get to Barack Hussein Obama’s 4%, you need all four tires to get to 10 psi below recommended pressure.
AJ is right on point for this one.
AJStrata wrote:
“No Ray,
It is 1.5% averaged over all vehicles”
.
My “1.5% for EVERY car” was just a very slack joke that didn’t work out.
When I saw you good calculations and then looked at the Obama 4% quote again, I was reminded of those TV ads where they say “You save 10% on EVERY item you purchase!” I figured there would be people who buy 6 items and think they saved 60%.
You know – 1.5% x 20 million cars = ??
Obama’s figures contain a lot of assumptions, which have been outlined. Another issue, though is that only about 70% of oil is used for transportation in the U.S. (http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/pecss_diagram.html) How does that affect his figures? Also, that figure includes jet fuel. It also includes gasoline used in mass transit, moving vans, delivery trucks etc. Do these vehicles have the same likelihood of being underinflated?
Ray(tard)
“My “1.5% for EVERY car†was just a very slack joke that didn’t work out.”
Oh, it worked out. It displayed your normal brilliance.
Partagus,
As I said, my assumptions bounded the best wildly possible result. This is how engineers assess cost-benefit. We do a back of the envelope check with reasonable and highly conservative assumptions to bound the problem.
Cheers, AJStrata
Phil-351,
Thanks for doing the research. I know I was wildly conservative. But at some point the saving runs into the estimation noise and becomes moot. What you (and all the others who refined my guesstimates) are proving is there will be ZERO detectable savings when all is said and done because we cannot track fuel consumption (let alone tire pressures) to that fine of a number. Once you get under 3-5% it is statistically zero.
Cheers, AJStrata
AJ,
Check it out – it looks like McCain is an idiot as well and he didn’t even go to an Ivy League school (or graduate in the top 90% of his class)! MCCAIN HAS NOW BACKED OFF HIS INITIAL CRITICISM OF OBAMA’S COMMENTS AND AGREES WITH OBAMA. Here is what McCain said yesterday during a telephone town hall meeting with voters in Pennsylvania:
“Obama said a couple of days ago says we all should inflate our tires. I don’t disagree with that. The American Automobile Association strongly recommends it.”
Here is the link – look it up yourself. http://blogs.reuters.com/trail08/2008/08/05/mccain-takes-air-out-of-tire-pressure-debate/. Too funny!
Now all McCain can say about this issue is that “I … don’t think that that (inflating tires) is a way to become energy independent.†The problem with this approach is that the tire pressure issue is only a minor part of Obama’s overall energy independence proposal, which includes many more significant programs.
So AJ, what do we do now that we discovered that both our presidential candidates are idiots? Vote for Nadar or Barr?
On a related note, what do you all think McCain should do in response to the Gang of 10 Senators floating the compromise for off-shore drilling? Obama signaled an openness to it, but McCain has not yet officially committed. Obama will be attacked as flip-flopping (even though both Obama and McCain were against off-shore drilling prior to June 2008 when it became politically convenient to support it), but I think it will help him given that the majority of Americans currently support off-shore drilling and it will reinforce the image he wants to create as someone who can reach across the aisle and get things done on a a bi-partisan basis. Pelosi will try to kill any bi-partisan deal, but I think she will get out-flanked if Obama and the DNC Senators want to make the deal happen. If McCain doesn’t signal an openess to such a compromise, it will make him look more partisan and like he is only interested in more drilling and helping out the oil companies without pursuing alternative energy sources. It will be interesting to see how it plays out.
But, Conguy
McCain didn’t claim that properly inflating tires would solve the problems of the world, he just said he agreed inflating tires correctly would be a good idea. Obaidiot said it would solve all the world’s energy problems. quite a difference.
And no one is allowing for all those people that ‘overinflate’ their tires. I know I run all mine 2 psi high, because it does improve mileage and improves tire wear.
And what in the hell does grades, when you are a young person, have to do with anything? I flunked out of hi school, mainly because I rarely went and when I did it was only to be ‘cool’. But I later went to college and grad in top 2% of that class, so it all has to do with maturity.
It’s not clear to me that our affirmative action candidate learned a damn thing. Not even how many states in the US.
conman:
Oh come on. No one is saying it is a bad idea to inflate your freaking tires. But it will not replace increased production.
Obama and his fan club is basing this on old assumptions they found in some government study done a couple of years ago when there was no plan to drill offshore and oil cost about half what it does today. That changes things.
Obama did not even publish to get tenure. He did not publish when he was on the Law Review. He did not do any original scholarly work. So how do we know he is all that smart anyway?
No Conman,
We have learned your the biggest Obidiot of them all! Thanks for showing by example what a wasted education can result in.
Cheers, AJStrata