» Jake Severns

With fuel prices at a national average of $3.65 per gallon, many drivers will be happy to know that a new federal government regulation will require all auto manufacturers to increase emissions standards.

The federal government obviously has a lot of power, but does it ever abuse power by making examples of some companies as a means to intimidate? The federal raid on Gibson Guitar factories is the most recent example.

Over the last year, it seems that a person can’t drive completely through any of our local cities without being inconvenienced by some kind of road construction. So many of these projects have popped up that it is almost impossible to travel from one city to another without a major delay or detour.

The AIDS pandemic, the beginning of the Iran-Iraq War, the Chrysler Lebaron, cocaine, famine in Ethiopia, headbands, assassinations, acid-wash jeans, Mount St. Helens erupted and mullets were in — Oh, the 80’s.

In a lot of ways many of us think we are much cooler than our parents ever were, until we remember the cars they used to drive. Camaros, GTOs, Mustangs, Barracudas, Challengers, Chargers, the kind of cars people will always talk about.

Every generation of young people have an inherent desire to claim that it is greater than generations that preceded it. But an important measuring stick of every generation is its personality projected through rock music, an area where our generation has fallen short.