G. David Felt

CRS, June 13: Members of Congress are eligible for a pension at the age of 62 if they have completed at least five years of service. Members are eligible for a pension at age 50 if they have completed 20 years of service, or at any age after completing 25 years of service. The amount of the pension depends on years of service and the average of the highest three years of salary. By law, the starting amount of a Member’s retirement annuity may not exceed 80% of his or her final salary. That means that members of the House of Representatives — who are up for reelection every two years — would not be able to collect pensions of any amount if they only served one term. U.S. senators, on the other hand, serve six-year terms and would be able to collect pensions after one full term. Federal Employees' Retirement System Act of 1986 - This is the new pension fund that congress created for all federal workers including themselves. Rank-and-File Members: The current salary (2016) for rank-and-file members of the House and Senate is $174,000 per year. Congress: Leadership Members' Salary (2016) Leaders of the House and Senate are paid a higher salary than rank-and-file members. Senate Leadership Majority Party Leader - $193,400 Minority Party Leader - $193,400 House Leadership Speaker of the House - $223,500 Majority Leader - $193,400 Minority Leader - $193,400 Pay Increases Members of Congress are eligible to receive the same annual cost-of-living increase given to other federal employees, if any. The raise takes effect automatically on January 1 of each year unless Congress, through passage of a joint resolution, votes to decline it, as Congress has done since 2009.

+1 So true, how come we have gotten to the point of just having the lesser of two evils always as our voters choice. Makes me solid in my belief that it is now time for the population to demand Term limits. House and Senate should be just like President. Two Terms Max, each term 4 years. No retirement funds, you pay into the same Social Security and Medicare we all do and not a golden parachute pension fund.

Pot Brownie

Awesome for TDI owners.

Patty Cake

Ya sure they are rats and not moles? Home Depot does have a smoke bomb that actually safely kills the rats / moles. You like the smoke stick, put it into the hole and cover up the opening. I got rid of my mole doing that. Good luck, they are a pain in the ass to get rid of.

Do we really need a 2nd presidential debate? Are we all not already damaged from the first one and the ignorance of one in particular? Work calls I think or maybe a good movie, no need to watch TV, what a waste or time.

Ham!

What families lost plenty? GM repaid ahead of schedule the full loans from the Gov, The GOV got shares in the new GM. The Political idiots in DC are the ones who sold off sooner rather than later waiting to redeem equal or gain on the stock. The workers got paid and their pension is solid and better now than it was under the old system. The % of ownership in GM has returned big gains into the pension fund. Yes some of the 3rd party companies had to write off losses, but not a single a single company had to close and they are all stronger now than they were then. All companies under the bankruptcy ended up with a % of the amount owed rather than nothing. This was a far better solution than what some especially on the ultra conservative side was wanting in just letting the US auto industry die. The death of GM and Chrysler would have devastated not just the worker families but the 3rd party companies and you would have seen massive financial destruction at the gain of a very small few. The 1% crowd.

Ford is surviving, but not winning. By Ford NOT taking the chance to clean the sheet and instead mortgaging everything, they are now in the position that under a world depression it could truly hurt them badly. Yes they reinstated dividends, Yes they did not take any loans from the GOV. They failed to dump the burden of their heavily underfunded Union retirement pension funds. They also failed to dump old assets that are dragging them down. Ford is surviving, but while they have profits now, they also have far bigger debt payments that are due and additional loan costs that have to be addressed in the coming future. Ford can survive, but what that cost will be is unknown and can they truly get everything brought up to a full competitive nature is unknown. Ford is also heavily behind in the EV arena which could also hurt them. Personally Ford should have taken the option to dump the Union Pension and restructure even if it meant partial loans from the GOV. There is much I like about Ford, but there is equally much to be concerned about and one of them is the slow roll out of new products that they have been slowly working on due to the debt load that Ford carries. I truly hope at this point that FORD and GM come out on top in what I believe will be a consolidation of the auto industry over the next 5 years. Can Ford bring up the CUV / Mid size truck market while keeping their Trucks / SUV's current? That is the question to be pondered.

Time for some Meat, I want to experiance this unlimited eating called Brazillian Steakhouse! Anyone ever been to one? This looks awesome! Meat-Eater's Mecca Story!

Dear NADA Chairman Jeff Carlso, Pull your head out please, right now Dealerships are a terrible experience, pressure from the moment you arrive up till you leave. Where is the Service? Was there service in the 12 rounds it took to get a final buying price on the auto? Was there service to me in the rounds and rounds of negotiating for my used car price? Where was the service during the final paperwork when I was hounded on about the benefit of buying protection package, 3M scotchgard protection for the inside, life time oil changes bought up front, etc. etc. etc. Were was the service when I came back to ask a question about how to do something in the car and my sales person was nowhere to be found and I was told to make an appointment with service. I go into service and am treated like a fastfood restaurant. In out and ignored. Where is the service now? Mr Carlso, how would you describe the Saturn set price shopping experience that people loved compared to negotiating prices? Again, you seem to ignore the service issue of dealerships and also the competition issue. You have cherry picked reasons to keep the dealerships, mostly it falls down to you protecting your worthless job by keeping dealerships going and paying into your NADA Union.

Drew, I thought you had to be near or have access to underground steam. Can anyone put in geothermal in their house? Very interested in learning more about the geothermal option.

Is this a house or a warehouse your wanting to turn into a living place? One thought, which I did, was I brought in a 30 Yard dumper, gutted my house myself, then on the exterior walls after I replaced all plumbing and electrical, had it spray foamed, then came back in and used 1" sheet rock, which gives you a very warm place, dense sound deadening so it stays very quiet inside at night. If you do go the remodel way, gutting it yourself saves you a ton of money as it is the manual labor that costs. If you want to go 1" sheetrock like I did, then you have to remember to adjust or when installing new electrical box's to adjust for the added wall thickness. Consider a Barbeque gutting party. Invite friends that would enjoy ripping out the inside, have them come and help gut the place, then feed em. I did this and friends and family loved it. was a blast and took all of about 2-3hrs to gut the whole place. Here, you just contact your local energy supplier such as PUD and they come and do the audit. I would think the same for you, just contact the local energy supplier in your area and they can come and do the audit. See if they have a plan, here in Washington state, you can have the local power company come and do the audit, they then have a wide variety of companies they work with to do the installation work and then it is added to your monthly power bill so you pay your bill plus the payment on the work done with interest, but if you do not have allot of money, it is a great way to upgrade and get it done.

So this would explain MB low selling of wagons, if they call it a Low Roof Sports Crossover, they would sell more of them? Just asking....

Battery Replacement, Prius cost $800 only for a reconditioned battery pack that has warranty and is stated to last 75,000 miles. Great read: Replacing Dead Hybrid Battery Pack for $800 Green Car Report Updated June 17th 2016 on Battery Replacement cost. To quote this researched story that includes plenty of FACTS from Toyota, the Battery in all Toyota Hybrids / EV's are now expected to be for the life of the auto. This is backed up with proof of Ford Escape Hybrids that have gone 300-400 thousand miles and Consumer reports research on Priuses with over 250,000 miles on battery packs that have insignificant battery storage loss. With that said, Toyota did supply this fact about a Prius Battery replacement installed price: Toyota hybrid battery replacement costs Below is a list of MSRP battery cost details for the various hybrid Toyota models offered since 2001. 2001-2003 Toyota Prius (1st generation) - $3,649 2004-2009 Toyota Prius (2nd generation) - $3,939 2010-2011 Toyota Prius (3rd generation) - $4.080 2012-2015 Toyota Prius Liftback - $3,939 2012-2016 Toyota Prius V - $3,939 2012-2016 Toyota Prius C - $3,807 2007-2011 Toyota Camry Hybrid - $4,892 2012-2015 Toyota Camry Hybrid - $4,892 2013-2015 Toyota Avalon Hybrid - $4,892 2006-2010 Toyota Highlander Hybrid - $6,198 2011-2015 Toyota Highlander Hybrid - $6,353 Each of these prices will be reduced by a $1,350 "core credit" for the old battery pack being replaced, which the dealer then recycles through a long-established Toyota program. So price is not the scary 5 figures that some believe it to be. Plus if you look at Tesla Forums, it is interesting to see that the original Tesla Roadster had a 245 Mile range in 2008, in 2015, for $29,000 Tesla would replace that battery pack with a new one that would give you 400 miles plus a $5,000 dollar credit so ending up costing you $24,000 and they had according to the web site plenty of people sign up for it. Now with the newest 100KWh battery pack, it seems the Tesla Roadster can get 600+ miles and the price is still the same yet the miles has jumped in how far you can drive it. Have to be a Tesla owner to get access to the full story, but plenty of archived web pages showing this off and Autoblog also did a story on this. http://www.autoblog.com/2015/09/01/tesla-roadster-battery-pack-replacement/ Is Tesla Battery Packs expensive? YES, are they worth it? To many they are. Have they helped push the R&D for battery research and EV's? YES Proof comes with the BOLT, Ioniq, Leaf 2.0, etc. Seems we will be seeing plenty of 200+ mile range auto's soon that are pure EV's.

@ccap41 That is a good rate, one of the lower rates in the nation. So that is very Good. Washington is .06 per KWh, yet with that you have some places that are crazy high. Also, remember that the rate you have you will need to check what the tax's and fees are as that does push it up. This is a great starting place for rates by state in the US. http://www.neo.ne.gov/statshtml/204.htm Washington with all the tax's, etc. comes out as the lowest in the nation at 7.41 cents or .0741 per KWh. This is an interesting site that is good if you state has options for who supplies your electricity. https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/ Another good source of electric rate info. http://www.eia.gov/electricity/state/ This is my favorite web site as it shows month by month the rates paid by residential, commercial, Industrial, and Transportation. http://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.cfm?t=epmt_5_6_a I think this last one will help you best in finding the info you are asking for.

Last count the following auto's had regenerative braking that benefits the auto. Toyota Prius Family Honda Insight Ford Escape Tesla Chevy Volt / Bolt Nissan Leaf To name just a few and regenerative braking is not new, but has been around since the early 1900's. This PPT from Oregon State University is packed full of info about this tech and the history and pro's and con's. Very well done. Oregon State University Regen Braking Also this well done story on Regen Braking Hidden benefits of Regen Braking by Clean Technica Regen Braking is awesome, but better yet is that all EVs have regeneration from the motor, which creates power when not needing it. Unlike a petro car that you can coast down a hill but it will still use gas so a net negative, but regeneration in EVs as you coast down a hill creates energy which is a positive.

I am excited by the new battery tech that gives 400 miles of range. This would be a real deal changer in how people see the EV auto.

Very Exciting!

Interesting thought, being that I love projects and not a fan of spending crazy money on the real thing, I would go for what you suggested above. Even bet that a Supercharged V8 from GM could kick the real things butt.

I was told to blame it on the Bat Man movies with Joker and all the rest of the crazy clowns. JK

We know that you can build an EV without all the computers, this is being done all the time by the hobbyist groups. I know based on monitoring the DOD, that they have EV projects, this project was called out for by the DOD to explore this technology. I just think it is a waste of Tax dollars as the facts show it takes more energy to produce Hydrogen than what you get out of it. So I just think they could have invested in research for other better options. Why not a CNG/LNG truck that could easily do everything this truck could do and we have a ton of supply already available. That is all.

GM needs to get their Hybrid on and stop just messing around with the Volt, that is a proven powertrain that should be in every CUV as well as they better have plans for EV's in other models. The planet is changing and with it, humans needs to change and adapt. Being set in one's way is a sure way to become extinct. GM gave the Military what was asked for as this was a Hydrogen Project. I also think they should have also looked at other options. Yes this hydrogen truck can make electricity for use by troops. Something EV is not ready for doing but moving in that direction. Someday we will have solar panels that can recharge quickly battery cells. I just personally think that the whole hydrogen thing is a waste of money. The military would have been far better off going with natural gas. As proven by the truck companies, you can have CNG or LNG on a generator with electric motors moving the actual rig. That is a fuel now that the Military can use for all the same reasons as they are stating about Hydrogen without the expensive cost of creating hydrogen. I am still very much a pro supporter of natural gas, but also clearly see a valid use for ev's. The technology is there now to start converting fleets of delivery trucks, vans, etc. to pure EV in the city reducing smog, emissions and noise as the cities become more quiet and a better place to live for those that like the city. We also have EV buses that can clearly go the miles on 1 charge for a day long service.

@ocnblu Ocnblu, giving me a negative is fine, please post your own thought about this concept, why or why not it will work or what you think is a better solution. Anyone that follows alternative energy knows that Hydrogen is very wasteful to produce yet very green for the planet. So why not look to other forms of propulsion. Coming from a multi-generation military family, being stealth and sneaking up on your enemy in todays terrorist world is now more crucial than ever. So why not have a PURE EV assault vehicle that can have fast swap of energy cells to keep the auto moving. If there is a better idea, name it and explain why please. I loved the TV Series Terra Nova http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1641349/ The auto's were all quiet electric ones with quick change energy cells that also quickly recharged off solar.This I would think would be perfect for a Military auto.