"Because they want to?"
That is the problem; we cannot always do what we want, so that is not the answer.
I might not agree with the choices other people make, but that doesn't give me or you the right to dictate every aspect of other people's lives.
I'm more of an optimist, and believe that with American ingenuity, we can address whatever energy problems we have.
Just the other day was the 25th anniversary of the Anderson-Reagan debate, in which John Anderson said:
Mr. Greenberg, I think my opponent in this debate tonight is overlooking one other very important fact. And that is, that we cannot look at this as simply a national problem. Even though it's true that, perhaps, between now and the end of the decade, our total consumption of oil may not increase by more than, perhaps, a million or 2 million barrels of oil a day. The rest of the Western world, we are told, may see its consumption increase from 51 million barrels to about 66 million. And that additional 15 million barrels is going to cause scarcity. It is going to cause scarcity in world markets because there are at least five reputable studies, one even by the American Petroleum Institute itself, that, I think, clearly indicate that somewhere along around the end of the present decade, total world demand for oil is simply going to exceed total available supplies. I think that conservation - I think that a change in lifestyles - is necessary, and we had better begin to plan for that now rather than later.
That decade was the 1980s.
Oops.
Reagan was proven right.
"We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good.
- Hillary
"That is the problem; we cannot always do what we want, so that is not the answer."
I have another good idea, let's not allow anyone to buy luxury yachts or sports cars either. That ought to help the economy keep humming.