2008: Goodbye, farewell, good riddance

Here it is the last day of 2008. I almost feel obligated to reflect on the past year.Then again, I’d rather not.There’s not a lot to look back on and smile. The economy went down the proverbial toilet and took a lot of truckers with it. While the brain trusts had to wait until almost year’s end to call it a full-blown recession, we knew it months before.Scandal on Wall Street. Mortgage meltdown.

2008’s Top 10 Truckin’ Headlines

With the end of the year comes a natural impulse to reflect on the past 52 weeks, on the highs and lows that flickered by like yardsticks, and ask “How did I make it through all that?”What follows is my totally arbitrary list, in no hard-and-fast order of importance:The Rise and Fall of Diesel Prices: As Land Line Senior Technical Editor Paul Abelson sometimes says, “I’m doing fine, but I’ll get

Blog: 'Illinois: Where our governors make our license plates'

I read last night in The New York Times that Gov. Rod Blagojevich plans to ask that he be permitted to use campaign funds to defend himself against federal corruption charges. The governor’s campaign fund – chaired by Blago’s brother Robert – is known as the Friends of Blagojevich.This developed after the Illinois state attorney general rejected a request by the governor to use state funds to

Heroes in the flesh

Cartoon heroes are as much a part of childhood as grilled cheese sandwiches and crayons. But real, live heroes in this day and age seem to be hard to come by. Unless you look at life through the eyes of a child.It wasn’t that long ago I was on yet another road trip with my kids. They are hardy travelers; 400-500 miles hardly fazes them. On stops for gas and such, they mobilize like a military

Thanks a billion (five actually)

Land Line subscribers have been reading about California’s proposed on-road in-use rule for more than a year and, believe it or not, the proposed rule’s time is approaching.The first public vote is scheduled for this Thursday, Dec. 11.The rule would essentially require trucks to meet 2007 and 2010 emissions standards between 2012 and 2022, though it allows for a series of compliance options. The

EPA to tax farm animal ‘exhaust’

It is most likely a sign of noxious things to come: The Environmental Protection Agency is moving toward taxing cows, hogs and possibly other gas-emitting barnyard critters.The EPA is proposing to impose levies on farms or ranches with more than 25 dairy cows, 50 beef cattle or 200 hogs at the rate of about $175 for each dairy cow, $87.50 per head of beef, and $20 per hog.It’s a plan farmers say

Eye in the sky

After the recent terrorist attack in Mumbai, India, investigators said the assailants used Google Earth maps to plot and carry out their attack. Here’s a link to an article on the terrorists’ use of technology.You can read Land Line’s previous reporting on intelligence vehicle systems – and the concerns truckers have about the technology – here.As you can tell from the article, many truckers are

Back pain? Need a ‘walletectomy’?

The average guy’s wallet is thicker than the armor on one of the military’s new bomb-proof fighting vehicles. Cash (though not usually very much, and less these days), photos, credit cards, driver’s license, receipts, business cards, ID cards of various kinds, stamps, tiny keepsakes and mementos – we guys make fun of a woman’s purse, but it’s amazing the amount of stuff pressed like a paper

How do we get un-stupid?

I guess it’s pretty apparent that our economy is a blasted disaster. All day, all night the media expound on what is wrong and why. Panels of pundits weigh in and try to out-yell each other in the process. The arguing makes me nuts. I have to turn the channel.Funny, while so many can’t come up with answers, my mom – who just turned 90 – explained it all to me last week as we were grinding

Thumbs up for transparency

Mike Goldberg couldn’t decide if he was more disgusted at the federal government or at his broker.Goldberg – an OOIDA member who runs a fleet out of Cincinnati, OH – had recently booked a load to haul about 1,500 pounds of landing gear from Maryland with stops in Arizona, ending up in California. The shipper – the Department of Defense – was paying a broker, who in turn paid Goldberg’s 247

Right Reorge

Would you cede control of your car or big truck if the government virtually guaranteed (I know, an oxymoron) safety, and possibly lower insurance costs?Your vehicle would stop on a dime, talk to other cars and trucks and wheel around under layers of “crash-avoidance” systems. Maybe you’d decide to put your car on autopilot and let the state’s automatic highway systems guide your vehicle while you

Extraordinary Bette

The legendary truck photographer Bette Garber died last week. She had been ill for some time, but kept it quiet, close. That was Bette – she never liked a lot of fuss about herself, was always more concerned with how others were doing.Bette was a friend of mine, during more than 15 years of my hanging out with truckers and writing about their lives. I met her at the 1994 Mid-America Trucking

Gasp – sleep study market growth slows!

Land Line Magazine and Land Line Now have focused a good deal on sleep apnea the past several months, and for good reason.As more Americans have learned and been diagnosed with sleep disorders like apnea, powerful medical regulators within FMCSA are kicking around the merits of requiring CDL-holders with body mass indexes of 30 or greater from having mandatory sleep labs performed.You can read

Locking loads

Cargo security experts estimate that between $20 billion and $30 billion of commercial goods are stolen annually from big trucks.Of course we don’t know an exact figure.Because retailers aren’t interested in pointing to the value of their highest-priced loads, and due to the relative ease by which some thieves take trailers and occasionally $40 million in pharmaceuticals, we may never know how

House divided

People feel so passionately about this presidential election;I hope that after it’s over, we can reunite behind one administration. I say this with the most personal of experience. Right now, I am living in one of those homes divided by political allegiances.I hope that after the election, my husband and I can get back to being married people instead of complete and total foes. How the heck do

Warning: doughnuts, alcohol don’t mix

OK, so I must admit, I have this fascination with doughnuts. Besides my love for eating them, my co-workers also send me news stories involving the sugary treats.So, for nearly a year now, I have been watching with interest the case of the man who led police on a high-speed chase in a stolen Krispy Kreme doughnut truck.Warren G. Whitelighting – yes, that’s his last name – was sentenced this week

CYA and know your PSA

I’m watching my behind these days, because something may be sneaking up on me in a blind spot.That something could be a problem with my prostate, a walnut-sized gland in my abdomen just below the bladder and in front of the rectum. It helps control urination and helps in sexual activity.You guys know that gnarly test the doc does with his finger when you have your physical, the one he apologizes

Hey, there’s a human in here

Have you noticed how often someone comes up with a “brilliant” idea to solve the problems in the trucking industry and forgets that people, human beings, actually drive those trucks?We’ve been down this road with hours of service regs and idling restrictions, and now the California Air Resources Board is moving toward mandating fuel-efficient retrofits.The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers

In my humble opinion

If you haven’t registered to vote by now, you just may be too late, even if you know someone from ACORN, the community activist group that’s been in the news because of alleged voter registration fraud. You may still be spouting hot air about the candidates and the issues, but when it comes to making a difference, you’ve blown it for the next four years. Remember: The trucking industry is

Our truck is better than yours

For quite a while now, there’s been a bit of a tit for tat going on between two OEMs in the trucking industry – Daimler Trucks and Navistar International.The two companies have waged an advertising-public relations war about which company has the most aerodynamic truck in the industry – the Freightliner Cascadia or the International ProStar.I would be lying if I didn’t say that it’s been a bit

Pulp fiction

This is a short post but a point I really wanted to make.Reading news headlines here Friday, Oct. 10, oil prices have dipped below $80 a barrel, settling lower than we’ve seen oil at since September 2007.It’s hard not to remember June and July, when Goldman Sachs analysts and others were quoted saying oil would likely hit $200, and that $500 per barrel wasn’t out of the question.I won’t pretend

Programmable speed limiters for cars

Let’s face it, if there was technology out there to help encourage teens to be safer drivers, truckers would likely be among those in favor of it.Ford Motor Co. has introduced new technology called MyKey that includes a speed limiter setting for the engine of certain models. MyKey can be programmed to limit the top road speed of the Focus model to a maximum of 80 mph.They say it will curb road

Sorting reality from pie-in-the-sky

Last week, HQ was buzzing like a beehive. From Oct. 1-4 the OOIDA Board of Directors convened, and it was nonstop meetings. I’ve always been a fly on the wall at these affairs, covering the whole enchilada for Land Line Magazine.Last year, I was elected to serve as an alternate to our employee board member, so now I’m at the table. It’s a different perspective. I’ve been here for 21 years and I

There really is ‘power in one’

Just how important are you? Odds are that a loved one would say you are mighty important. No argument here. There’s also no argument that your importance carries a great deal of significance for politicians and advocates/opponents of ballot initiatives./p>While the statement on voting might seem to be a pie-in-the-sky notion, there have been countless occasions when it has proven to be true. A

Let them eat doughnuts

New Jersey Transportation Commissioner Kris Kolluri says that increasing the toll rates on the New Jersey Turnpike and Garden State Parkway in 2009 will cost the average highway user less than half the price of a strawberry doughnut.Speaking at a public hearing on proposed toll increases for two of the nation’s busiest toll roads, Kolluri compared the increase to a doughnut he recently bought

Don’t follow the hammer

I read in last week’s news that corporate India is in disbelief after a nutted-out mob of laid-off workers lost their minds and bludgeoned their CEO to death.The boss – head of the Indian operations of Graziano Transmissioni, an Italian-headquartered manufacturer of car parts – died of “severe head wounds.” Other managers were beaten, but survived.According to news reports, the attack followed a

Gaslessville

From spotty shortages preceding Hurricane Ike to region-wide outages, Middle Tennessee where I live has become a gasless desert. I visited the Soviet Union in the mid-’80s, and lived through the Arab oil embargo of the ’70s, and the scene here reminds me of those two experiences.The lines at gas stations are not as long as they were in California’s Bay area when I lived there in the ’70s, but

Bienvenido a Miami

Major cargo theft from commercial trucks in the United States is on pace to double this past year’s estimated $1.2 billion haul.A bad economy and relatively low risk, high reward means criminals are stealing more from commercial trucks than ever before.I was in Miami this week, interviewing members of the Tactical Operations Multi-Agency Cargo Anti-Theft Squad, also known as TOMCATS. Housed in

Voting records can be had ... for the inquiring voter

On Nov. 4, voters across the country will cast ballots on many important races and issues.At the federal level, all of the 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives are up for election, while 35 – or about one-third – of the 100 U.S. Senate seats are up for grabs. At the state level, 11 governors’ seats are on ballots, while 80 percent of state legislators’ positions across America are on

Tracking Ike online

A number of truckers have contacted Land Line and recommended weather Web sites, official and unofficial. Online weather sites, if you haven’t checked them out, are nothing short of amazing.OOIDA member Kenneth Becker, Montgomery, TX, likes wunderground.com, the Weather Underground site. Ken was in North Dakota Friday and called me from some oil field. He was getting ready to see how his hometown

A meeting of non-partisan minds

“Hot fuel” came under the spotlight before two members of the Tennessee General Assembly recently at a town hall to discuss energy use and conservation.Yours truly jumped at the chance to bring up the topic in a public forum, and, although passing legislation is always a crapshoot, at least one of the representatives said she was considering legislation for 2009 to address the issue.Hot fuel is

Update for you Hammer heads

After a healthy dose of mugging for the crowd and the cameras, Jason McCoy dashed back to the microphone to deliver his band’s trademark chorus line.“I’m a road hammer,” he and his band mates proclaimed. “A white-knuckled steel gear jammer, Rig jockey highway slammer – I’m just doin’ what I gotta do.”The Road Hammers, a Canadian band now residing in Nashville, TN, blend elements of modern and

Time to engage the BS meter

Spin, distortion, misrepresentation and, in some cases, outright lies will fill the airwaves for the next two months. You can count on it.With the conventions of both political parties over and the race for the presidency in full swing, the challenge of sorting out truth from fiction falls squarely on the shoulders of voters.Calling this an emotionally charged election is pretty much an

Mary Peters paints a truck-free picture

It’s difficult to imagine a world without trucks. That is, unless you’re with the DOT.Solutions offered by U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters to some of the nation’s most challenging transportation problems do not bode well for truckers.Here’s the proof.Peters recently announced a plan for reform that would consolidate 108 DOT programs into eight programs with priority given to congestion

Recipe for disaster

For nearly two years now, I have covered the food safety beat here at Land Line, beginning when E. coli was found in bagged spinach, and some of our members were stuck with potentially affected product on their trailers and nowhere to go with it.Since that outbreak, I have been on a quest to find out what recall procedures the FDA and the USDA have in place to protect truckers who may be in

Open for business

An estimated 40 percent of American imports come through the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, and it’s apparent that about 40 percent of truck news is coming from those ports as well.Just the other day in Land Line’s newsroom, we spent 10 minutes going through the requirements truckers will have to meet to comply with the California Air Resources Board’s rules on drayage trucks, the ports

Trucking documentary to premiere Friday

“Drive and Deliver” is creating some pre-GATS buzz in the trucking industry. That’s the title of a new documentary-style film detailing the life of long-haul truckers.I haven’t seen it yet, but I did see a trailer and some promotional outtakes. Truthfully, it looks like it beats the heck out of some overrated studio films from the local Blockbuster that have wasted a number of my evenings this

Are you tired?

Do you think you should be tired?Are you tired of seeing news stories talking about lack of sleep, and how tired Americans are?I’m yawning just thinking about them.Every week we’re hit by “Good Morning America” or in USA Today with stories about why we’re too tired, can’t sleep at night, and probably suffer from a debilitating disease that quickly explains our being overweight and our early

Here’s a tip if you haul produce

How many times have you heard it? Information is power.Here on the Land Line blog, we’ve been discussing the state of the freight and how it affects owner-operators as opposed to major motor carriers.Plenty of owner-operators haul produce. This is a business where you MUST be on your toes. With the cost of fuel, there’s no room for a bad decision. So here’s a tip that we think will be helpful.The

Where's the soup-to-nuts freight?

The popular phrase “knowledge is power” rings true right now for many owner-operators struggling to make ends meet.We all know that giant shippers like automakers are cutting production because GM’s staggering losses dependably make the front page. That information is in your face. But what about that “other” freight – the computer stands, copy paper, tennis shoes, widgets made by companies whose

What's next? Chewing gum?

Those wacky lawmakers in Illinois are at it again. Truckers are all too familiar with the high jinks of the Illinois General Assembly. Logging repeated veto-proof margins to kill split speeds, only to fail to override gubernatorial vetoes, is just one example.Then there was the Illinois state lawmaker whom a Land Line staffer interviewed in recent years. She didn’t know the difference between a

Is freight really picking up?

The American Trucking Association’s chief economist, Bob Costello, made headlines early this month when he reported tonnage shipped by truck in the U.S. rose for the second consecutive month. Costello announced that ATA’s “seasonally adjusted tonnage index” rose 1.2 percent in June. And while Costello was clearly cautious, suggesting that the nation’s overall economy might not yet be on the road

Why is simple so hard?

Lucky is the person who has never had two or more people tell him or her how to do something. Jesus said you can’t serve two masters without loving one or hating the other. Supposedly, the Chinese pictogram for trouble literally means two women under one roof.In any event, the more people involved in making a decision, the more muddled the solution becomes. This may explain some, if not all, of

Easy rider

Truckers know the limits and high costs for driving around the Washington, DC, area, but until yesterday, few Americans understood just how big a bill they are footing for federal employees.The Associated Press published an interesting story on Thursday, July 31, detailing the federal government’s fleet of more than 640,000 vehicles. The AP reported that operating federal vehicles cost taxpayers

Hatchet job

Ronald Piper wasn’t done working Monday when he saw the headline that once again perpetuated myths about “medically unfit” truck drivers supposedly driving up numbers of highway crashes.By now you’ve seen the headlines and every television news station’s version of the story on the GAO’s study of an untold number CDL holders having medical disabilities. Untold is the correct figure, since the

A pox on flacks’ flak

When is a billboard like spam e-mail? When it exploits suffering, danger and valor to make a cheap political point.There probably isn’t a person in America who hasn’t received a slew of frantic e-mails claiming that the message is something that you won’t see in the mainstream media. Usually they come from someone you know, with the message buried under a ton of forwards as people blindly obeyed

Just one of the guys

“Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to build the world’s first bionic man. Steve Austin will be that man.”Those powerful words captivated me as a youngster as I perched in front of the TV to watch Lee Majors portray “The Six Million Dollar Man.” I still have a themed board game somewhere.Somewhere along the line, the fictional scientists in the show got

Preventive maintenance

I recently had some foot surgery that meant spending several weeks at home, with my foot in the air when I wasn’t hobbling around on crutches. Aside from getting a new handle – “Flat Tire” – from my editor, Jami Jones, and being asked if I had finally learned how to “double crutch,” the experience has given me time to ponder how many limping truckers I have seen. And sympathize with their

So DOT, you wanna play word games?

Word games and politics seem to go hand-in-hand anymore.It’s become one of the favorite pastimes it seems since Bill Clinton uttered the words: “It all depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.”It’s frustrating, to say the least, to watch politicians bat around the meaning of words, trying to twist and turn them to their advantage.The most recent word game haunting the trucking industry is

The BS with BMI measurements

There’s something about an automatic fitness judge that doesn’t sit right with me.How can humans put together in a variety of shapes, sizes with varying amounts of bone and muscle density be classified by a standard measuring only total height and weight?Most truckers probably have heard by now that FMCSA’s Medical Review Board recommended that all commercial truck drivers with a body mass index

Easy isn’t always cheap

Land Line keeps a close eye on tolling and so should you, especially if you have a transponder and an account to pay your tolls electronically.News stories continue to surface about customers being overcharged or penalized because of a glitch, an expired account or some other problem related to technology or an electronic account.Penalties and fines are in place to prevent people from cheating

The good, the bad and the obvious

Business practices in the broker industry are a hot topic of conversation in the industry right now – largely thanks to the recently introduced TRUCC Acts in Congress.While it’s not hard to get truckers to bristle at the mere mention of the word “broker,” it’s painfully obvious that it’s not just the truckers who get a little peeved when bad broker practices are highlighted.I have been inundated

Home sweet home

Don’t worry drivers; the medical industry has got you covered.The FMCSA Medical Review Board recently recommended that all commercial truck drivers with body mass indexes of 30 or greater undergo a one- or two-night study for sleep apnea.The proposal may go nowhere, or it may be adopted in full.Whatever the case, the sleep study industry is prepared for the latter. A press release recently

Don’t swim in it

So far, floods and severe weather along the Mississippi River have killed 24 people and injured 148; forced more than 38,000 from their homes; and ruined at least 3.4 million acres in three states. While the state economies are taking a hit and transportation and other businesses are facing operational challenges and the U.S. Mail is delayed, the real casualties are those people whose lives are

Dying on the job: it’s a mean surprise

I talk to truckers all the time about cases where drivers have heart attacks or strokes or some medical event that ends their lives while on the job. Recently, one driver told me he figured as much time as he spends alone in his truck, he thinks about it a lot and this is where he thinks he will draw his last breath. In his opinion – and I agree – getting killed on the job would be one very

On my honor …

Reporters and editors are famously calloused. Covering car wrecks, suicides and awful crimes can occasionally cause a person to be flippant or cynical, if for no other reason than to deal with the shock to one’s system.News this week that four Boy Scouts in Iowa were killed this past week when a tornado hit their campground was particularly striking for me and my family.Our hearts went out to the

Changing your heathen ways

Maybe it’s the fact that Boomers are getting older, but it seems like the marketing world believes incontinence is a more pressing problem than, say, $5 diesel. (There’s a joke about going/not going in there someplace, which I leave to your creative minds to find.)Not long ago, I wrote about a fairly expensive alternative to the trusty, if leaky, old-fashioned milk jug. Now comes word of a

It’s a bird. It’s a plane. It’s your tax dollars at work!

Free roads aren’t free because highway users foot the bill. The same could be said for “free” coloring books the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority is giving away.Don’t forget to pick one up for the kids next time through. It comes with crayons.In it, you’ll find Captain Tollway, the authority’s own superhero mascot promoting the authority’s new “Know Before You Go!” campaign. His job is to

Memorial Day is about remembering

As many of you were, I was fortunate to be at home for Memorial Day, but only after some finely tuned dispatching, hustling and customer skills. It paid off.Some goodtime BBQ’ing was in the works, a short ride to St. George Island for a dip in the Gulf waters, a stop at the Blue Parrot for conch fritters. And later, some cold adult beverages of choice (at home), allowed me to catch up on some

The Run for the Wall

They say they are doing it for those who can’t.Long columns of motorcycle riders are currently rolling toward Washington, DC, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall. They roared past OOIDA headquarters shortly before noon on Monday.The annual ride is to honor and remember our POWs and MIAs. When the 3,000-mile ride concludes in Washington, DC, more than 300,000 bikers are expected to have

99 bottles of beer in the car …

Faced with an uncomfortable choice this year, the Tennessee General Assembly once again demonstrated its inimitable ability to crawfish.A bill that would ban open containers of alcoholic beverages in vehicles has once again been introduced, and once again died. I guess the legislators were afraid to tamper with the God-given right of bored passengers to suck on roadies. (These are the same folks

Dangerous new sport: Bridge post holing

Land Line reported Monday that a 2-foot-by-3-foot hole opened up on an Interstate-30 bridge in downtown Dallas.Nothing too unusual there. Many of our nation’s roads are afflicted with sinkholes, potholes and cracks.For instance, in Kansas City, MO, the current mayor even campaigned on a platform of street repair. He issued a press release in January 2007 titled “Funkhouser Announces Plan to Rid

Greensburg still ‘Ridin’ the storm out’

To be sure, Greensburg has taken tremendous strides since a nearly 2-mile-wide tornado dismantled 95 percent of the small town’s buildings one year ago, May 3.More than 100 housing permits have been issues, and many environmentally friendly and energy efficient structures are going up every day, as highlighted this week by dozens of publications, documentary makers and the CBS morning show.But

An answer to trucker bombs?

Pee bottles have hit the mainstream, no pun intended. At least for children: If you want to relive the thrills of victory and agonies of defeat from toilet-training your own brood, just cruise over to this site, which will likely make anyone cringe.Capitalizing on the growing national phobia of the bacteria and viruses our kind have lived with for eons, the creators of My Pee Pee Bottle make a

Speed limiters put ‘cart before the pony’

I wish I could have attended Truck World 2008 during the festivities on April 19.I would have enjoyed witnessing Ontario Transportation Minister Jim Bradley and Ontario Trucking Association President David Bradley posing for the cameras while “activating a speed limiter” on a Kenworth. We can guess it was a real dog and pony show.Both Bradleys – one lobbying the other – continue to push for a

Dialing (down) for dollars

Rocker Sammy Hagar famously protested the speed limits of the ’70s and ’80s with his “I Can’t Drive 55.” Eventually, of course, those restrictions largely gave way, and we’ve enjoyed 70 and above on much of the Interstate system since.The double-nickel feels like a crawl to anyone who’s not Amish, but with $4-plus diesel and soon gasoline, how would you feel about 65 mph (and would we call that “

Jim Hebe is back

Last week I wrote in a daily news story that former Freightliner CEO James Hebe had a new job with Navistar International as senior vice president of North American sales. He’s accepted a high profile position with the company he started out with way back in 1971. Yep, he’s going back into the executive thick of it. And he seemed so happy pheasant hunting.
I am getting a load of e-mail from

Bad brokers and bottom feeders

It’s not hard to find a raw nerve in the trucking industry right now. But the Special Report I wrote on Tuesday, April 22, really set off a firestorm of sorts.A long-time trucking analyst Donald Broughton reported that 935 trucking companies with five or more trucks went out of business in the first quarter of this year. You can read the whole article here.What seemed to capture the attention of

Oregon continues smear campaign

There’s really nothing else you can call Operation Trucker Check conducted by the Oregon Department of Transportation. It’s a smear campaign.Results aren’t in from the 72-hour enforcement blitz that ran from April 15-17 are out, but guess what – they’re still touting drug tests from the last one where basically 10 percent of all truckers are doped up, driving bad equipment with no

High cost of fallout

During the past few years, I have written a couple of times about biofuels – making diesel or gasoline out of stuff other than oil. Most anything that contains hydrogen, oxygen and carbon can be turned into fuel – including old tires, and even diapers.Recently, we’ve seen an upsurge in ethanol production, fueled by a strong push from the Bush administration and strong lobbying by companies that

Witnesses called in case of Gas v. Diesel

Your honor, we would like to see the case of Gasoline v. Diesel resolved.It seems that a number of major media, when reporting about various trucker protests in recent days and weeks, said truckers were protesting over “gas prices.”Many truckers own personal vehicles fueled by gasoline, but I would argue that the protests were not about gas but concerned the price of diesel fuel.Although both

McCain breaks ranks on filling the SPR

Another U.S. senator has come out against buying up more and more oil for our emergency store while prices are so high.This time, it’s from the other side of the aisle and you might call him a guy with some standing these days. Sen. John McCain addressed the economy last week in a speech before a small-business roundtable in New York.The most important item in my opinion was his comment on adding

Why insurance companies love red light cameras

I confess that I have a lot of mixed feelings about red-light cameras. On the one hand, I can’t count the number of times I have almost been T-boned by a red-light runner, much less the number of times I have seen it almost happen. On the other hand, people still run the monitored lights in high enough numbers that cities – and companies – keep using the systems.A lot of folks think the cameras

Stashing more oil into SPR ludicrous

OK, sometimes the Congressional Record is not the most thrilling read, and sometimes it is. Monday’s comments from Sen. Bryon Dorgan land in the latter category. His topic was the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which is of course the DOE’s own emergency petroleum store and the largest emergency supply in the world.In his rant regarding an announcement made by the Energy Department last week that it

Got your mojos working

Mojo is an old word that’s been newly hijacked to describe “mobile journalists.” Beginning tomorrow, that’s us. Land Line Senior Editor Jami Jones, Staff Writer Charlie Morasch and I will be southbound for the Mid-America Trucking Show. In Kentucky, we’ll meet up with Senior Technical Editor Paul Abelson, Field Editor Suzanne Stempinski and Columnist Bill Hudgins.Also headed to Louisville are

‘Badge of dishonor’ could invite more than bargained for

Some state lawmakers around the country believe that imposing differently colored license plates on the vehicles of convicted drunken drivers will be a deterrent as well as a law-enforcement mechanism.The intentions might be OK – drunken driving kills thousands each year and ruins a great many more lives – but the sanity ends as soon as the neighborhood vigilantes or vandals provide unintended

Oxygen needed in the system of transactions

Someone said diesel is the lifeblood of ground transportation.If that’s true, then truckers are the heart. And many are needing life support.But don’t stop pumping just yet.The good news is, more and more media are reporting the plight of independent truckers and the fuel cost crisis. The word is getting out in local and national media outlets all over the country. People are starting to

Ad valorem: Latin for ‘in proportion to value’

Can we get a little “Tax Man” Beatles music here?Three states use a tax to bilk bucks out of trucking companies large and small for running miles in their state. It’s called an ad valorem tax, and it’s a property tax used by Kansas, Arkansas and Kentucky.What a boneheaded “property” tax. It doesn’t matter if you don’t own property in any of these states. If you have registered a vehicle through

The blogging revolution

OK, revolution may be a bit strong.But Web logs, like the one you’re reading right now, have come a long way since the online journals of the early 1990s.According to Wikipedia.com, Land Line Magazine’s blog was one of at least 112 million blogs as of December 2007.Bloggers like Matt Drudge of the Drudge Report and Will Leitch, founder of the sports blog deadspin.com, have gained a lot of

Why doesn’t OOIDA call for a strike?

It’s a trucking nightmare – 16 states averaging above $4 fuel. Calls for a shutdown are common, and here at OOIDA we are slammed with phone calls and e-mails from truckers whose businesses are suffering. This week, 90 percent of the thousands of calls we’ve received are about the cost of fuel. Many are asking why OOIDA does not call for our members to strike.As a trade association, it is not

Blacklist days behind us?

The good news is, after six months, it seems we are off the FMCSA’s blacklist.Thank you all for e-mails, phone calls and “shame on the FMCSA” messages to your lawmakers in DC and to FMCSA’s Office of Public Affairs. We have been overwhelmed with the support of truckers, friends in Congress and comrades in the press who have expressed their outrage at the agency’s decision to “close the door” on

A tale of two realities

The first weekend of March arrived with lions and lambs for those of us who love trucking.The snarling lion was this grim article by a writer from The Associated Press about the plight of many an independent trucker, small fleet and owner-operator. Read about it here.It starts off with an interview with a trucker who lives in the next town over from me, which somehow makes his plight even more

And my thanks to the makers of Red Bull

Talk about life in the fast lane, our candidates who are making their way to the top for the impending presidential contest – are they even human? The campaign trail of today is not just a contest of issues, wit and rhetoric, but of physical strength and super-power endurance. That and who’s got the fastest jet.It’s like one of those crazy “Great Race” movies.John McCain and devoted people have

‘Gee our old Lasalle ran great’

Do we have a presidential candidate? Do we have a president? Is it November yet? Can I unbury my head from the sand?Don’t get me wrong. One of the utmost privileges of being an American is the ability to vote. Countless lives have been lost in past wars to ensure that our rights and freedoms are held high and I do not take that lightly. As a military vet, I know firsthand of the sacrifices. That

Everybody in the whole cell flock

I looked up into my rear-view mirror and saw a scene that’s becoming ever more common. Dude’s on his cell phone with his right hand, holding a big foam cup of coffee in his left while resting that hand on top of his wheel and steering. He sorta looks in the sideview mirrors and slides into the left-hand lane, without signaling. Who knows how – maybe used a knee? The vehicle shimmies more than it

You can help me by ... handing over your cash

After Christmas, I blogged about helping strangers, weird-acting strangers who seem to be in need, just too peculiar for you to step right up and say “sure, how can I help?”I got a lot of good feedback from readers. One clever person even sent me a sound file of a little voice saying “help me help me.” I wonder if the sender knew I would recognize the creepy insect voice of Jeff Goldblum from

They rally around the family … with a pocketful of regs

If you know that reference, you’ve probably listened to Rage Against The Machine play songs like “Bulls on Parade” or “Fight the Power.”The band railed against problems of the time and called for social justice and outrage and gained fame with its social activism.Guitarist Tom Morello, who attended Harvard, was scheduled to attend the recent Long Beach Harbor Commission meeting to protest the

N.J. toll increases will only shift debt

New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine recently released a draft of his plan to increase tolls on the state’s three major toll roads to refinance other forms of state debt. It will require legislative approval to proceed.Corzine intends to increase tolls by 50 percent every four years from 2010 to 2022 on the New Jersey Turnpike, Garden State Parkway, and Atlantic City Expressway.What people need to know is

Blacklist

In the fall, National Public Radio aired an official guide to the U.S. blacklists. It pointed out that nearly 100 years ago, President Woodrow Wilson described embargoes as a “peaceful, silent, deadly remedy.” He was talking about economic sanctions as a foreign policy tool.Blacklisting is still used by our government as a tool to suppress or make people stop what they are doing.The government

Heroes among us

Truckers daily perform a difficult and absolutely necessary job for low pay and even less public thanks. You know all too well that “truck driver” is a slur in some mouths.So I always look forward to the annual Goodyear Highway Hero announcements, which recognize often incredibly courageous drivers who, just minding their business, suddenly find themselves racing into peril to aid complete

From farm to fork – not forklift

Covering the food safety beat here at Land Line, I pretty much “see it all” when it comes to all the gory details surrounding food recalls and what can and does happen when someone contracts a foodborne illness after eating bad food.In the last week or so, I am sure many of you have watched graphic footage on the news and the Internet of workers abusing sick and injured cattle at a California

They look like Giants

I have a confession to make. I’m not a real big fan of football. I don’t know team statistics, who is the best defensive lineman, or how many yards it took to complete the last quarterback sneak. I do, however, know the loyalty many fans have for their favorite teams, so I have learned to tread lightly when it comes to voicing opinions.Being leased to a New Jersey-based carrier, I was in for the

Let the games begin

Election season is upon us, and a few flicks through the cable news channels later, it seems like it’s forced on us much like wall-to-wall Britney Spears coverage.But beyond the shallow 24-hour coverage of one candidate snubbing another, the multitude of debates is allowing for real issues to make their way into this year’s presidential campaign – the kind of issues that don’t always make it into

Bull balls, fangs, what’s next?

In “The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress,” the late sci-fi writer Robert Heinlein has a scene in which his human hero is trying to teach a computer about jokes, especially practical jokes. Most practical jokes, he says, are at best a “once funny.” Repeat performances not only lose whatever humor they held, but also tend to make the target a tad irked.“Once funny” is what I think about fangs on truck

New Jersey, the Jackboot State?

Maybe there’s some job requirement in New Jersey that requires cops or other government people with authority to be uninformed, uneducated, unacquainted and totally in the dark on the Freedom of Speech in our country.“So you want to work for the government. Have you ever heard of the First Amendment?“No.”“OK, you’re hired.”How else do you rationalize seven cops arresting a couple citizens from a

Don’t let the dream die

As an elementary school student in the 1960s I lived through turbulent times, watching local, state, national and world events from the wide-eyed perspective of childhood but also with the curiosity of a born reporter.My natural curiosity and never-ending thirst for information, coupled with the fact that I hung out more with adults than my age group, often resulted in my being over-prepared for

I agree with Pearl P. Baker!

From time to time, a topic or news story will send some of us in the office here looking through old editions of Land Line Magazine.Besides enjoying old pictures of the Land Line editors and OOIDA leaders, you find stories about many of the same topics, albeit with a few slight changes.Recently a hospital in New York made headlines after a lawsuit revealed that the hospital allegedly forced a man

If the shoe doesn’t fit

The things you see in the road these days. It makes one think, as we travel the highways, what goes through a person’s mind to make them discard, at will, items they no longer wish to keep inside the vehicle.Granted, it’s pretty obvious when you see a baseball cap on the roadside, it is because the previous owner had the window down too far. Or, perhaps they were riding in a convertible with the

So long, road scrapers?

It was flurrying this week in Nashville and, if you have ever driven through Nashville when it’s snowing, you know that panic grips the motoring public. This light flurry was enough to bring three interstates to a crawl, spawning multiple wrecks as amateurs tried to get their 4WD Humvees and SUVs home before the going got … tweachawous, as Frau Blücher from “Young Frankenstein” might put it.As I

You’ve got mail – and an overloaded muffler

I got a pedometer one time with my $5 salad from McDonald’s.I know – it’s the ultimate contradiction – kind of like having a bachelor’s party at Showbiz Pizza.Anyway, this pedometer would tick off daily footsteps no matter where you went, adding up to thousands of steps each day.But there was a chink in the armor.I found the pedometer would tick off footsteps if I tapped my foot, or turned in my

Where’s the beef?

I am sure all of you who grew up in the 1980s remember the “Where’s the beef” commercial.For the past few weeks I have been covering a story regarding the theft of a refrigerated trailer in Fort Worth, TX, which was loaded with more than 14,000 pounds of ground beef product.What’s the most disturbing in this case is that some of that product had tested positive for E.coli bacteria earlier on the

Where you gonna put the teeth?

For those of you who have been on pins and needles waiting for the unveiling of the latest and greatest International truck – the cat is officially out of the bag.TruckNet member “Giddy_Up_Go” pulled off a coup that probably has corporate spies within the trucking industry OEM community green with envy.The long and short of the story is that while getting his Cornbinder serviced in Fort Wayne, IN

So much for the homebrew

A month ago I was in the market for a quality used automobile, and for a brief time my wife became increasingly sure I was about to go insane.I began my search online, and before long I was sizing up fuel economy and experiencing the usual hubbub surrounding a vehicle purchase.For a brief time, I was sure I wanted to buy a vehicle that runs on diesel fuel, but this is where I was forced to go on

Truckin’ Marines

Justifiably, much has been said about American truckers who streamed into Iraq as contractors to help support the early years of the long “War on Terrorism.” They went through hell, often without adequate armor or other protection, and none came home unscathed.Recently, the U.S. Marine Corps news site begins a three-part series on Marines who now carry out the vital supply functions and, when

The real cost of oil remains to be seen

The price of crude oil surpassing $100 per barrel has broken a major psychological barrier, and some oil traders believe the price will only go up from there.Hundred-dollar oil is a hurdle few of us were thinking about a few years ago, but the weary world jumped over it on the second day of January and somehow landed on its feet.Some traders in oil futures believe that crude could hit $200 per

Never having to sleep? I say, where’s the money?

I read, with great relish (hold the pickles and mayo), Brother Bill Hudgins’ blog about Orexin A, the mind-stimulating drug that could eliminate the need for sleep.Considering the possibilities of how it could be used – or misused and abused – in our industry, quite honestly I am scared. Scholars are trying to find ways to wring more work out my already overtaxed body.Comparing the results of

How would never having to sleep change your life?

Scientists at UCLA are experimenting with a naturally occurring brain chemical that could turn into a “sleep replacement” drug. Click here to read about it.The chemical, called Orexin A, appears to eliminate the effects of sleep deprivation without any other impact on the brain. This has been tried only on monkeys so far, so one has to wonder if our allegedly more complex brains would be