What If Cheney Was Right?

A few years ago Cheney earned a lot of criticism for saying "Conservation may be a sign of personal virtue, but it is not a sufficient basis for a sound, comprehensive energy policy."

What if Cheney was right?

What if, wanting above all to be personally virtuous, all Americans had taken Cheney comment as a sound basis for managing our lives?

We would have scrapped our gas guzzlers and replaced them with small cars with small engines.

We would have replaced our Mac Mansions with bungalows.

We would have, as a consequence greatly reduced our addiction to oil.

What is stopping us from following Cheney's advice?