The discounts have pretty much disappeared anyway. EZ Pass users in Va pay full tolls most everywhere except the Coleman Bridge in Yorktown. The toll is $2 Northbound only and $.85 if you are a commuter, which means you have to take at least 3 trips across North Bound per month. When I got the EZ Pass, the discounts were for using EZ Pass, commuter or not. You got a break on pretty much all of the tolls. Not anymore. And since I do not commute regularly through a toll road, my device is simply a convenience. I use it once or twice a week max. Downtown Expressway and Powhite mostly. If they tack on a fee, I will order 3 of them from Massachusetts. One for each vehicle. Now I only have the one.

It's only a buck a month, but I just changed my refuse collection company for about the same difference. And a couple of other small changes - moving from Vonage to Magic Jack, etc. and the savings add up to a few hundred dollars a year. Not a lot of money, but if I can get the same or acceptable service elsewhere for less money, that's what I am going to do.

For me, the $1 per month EZ Pass fee will cost me more than paying in cash. When they first got us all "hooked" on them, there was a pretty good savings. Not any more.

It's all about fiscal conservatism. How could I justify not saving where I can and still call myself a fiscal conservative?

Fatus, your kind of thinking will be the end of us all. Almost was on 9/11. "Couldn't happen here" people like you thought then. And you have crawled back under your rock throwing sticks and stones. It does not take someone with Dave's impressive background to see the writing on the wall. Most of us know the danger we are in. One man's "fear mongering" is another man's word to the wise. I choose the latter, wiser course. Thanks, Dave, for an eye-opening post! Keep it up. Fatus proves there are still many among us who don't get it and depend on us to look out for them.

I usually place quotes around the phrase "gay" marriage to denote the absurdity as I did in the text of the post. Headlines sometimes don't do well with punctuation and quotes as Virginia Right! is syndicated on a number of other sites. So I try to avoid quotes in headlines. Marriage is defined (by law) as between one man and one woman. It is like the phrase "reverse" discrimination. It's either discrimination or it's not. Same with marriage. "Gay" marriage is NOT a marriage.

Lol. I sure did. Trying to get the camera rolling, the internet working and write at the same time apparently was too many tasks at one time for me! I have corrected the obvious error! Thanks for letting me know.

Speculators respond to Obama's anti-oil policies by speculating that if we stop drilling, stop pipelines like Keystone XL and tax all forms of carbon based energy, the price of oil will go up. And they are correct. The president of the United States has enormous power of influence and has failed to lead on oil, and almost any other front except the special interests of his fringe elements. All of the factors you mentioned have one thing in common - they have remained essentially unchanged in the last decade. All account for the base price of gasoline. But they have remained the same while prices have doubled. The only thing hthat has changed is the leadership and policies of America. And Obama is directly responsible for the increase.

Actually, since the (as you call them) Bush Tax Cuts were already the law of the land, Obama "allowed" nothing. What he did was not raise taxes in a recession.

However, the Obama Administration has created a new metric to measure the effect on employment of certain actions (or inaction's). He calls it "Jobs Saved".

In reality, NOT raising the going rate by extending the "Bush" Tax Cuts saved jobs that would have otherwise been destroyed by the Obama Tax Hikes that didn't happen (Thanks George W.!)
So, the money is not overseas, as you opine, rather, it is here, in America supporting "jobs saved".

Most of us have a metric that we use that Obama does not want to hear. It is called "Jobs Destroyed". As Obama regulates coal and oil out of use, millions of jobs have been damaged or destroyed.

And we could also count "Jobs that Never Materialized" which would count the jobs lost by the moronic "investment" in fake companies in the "Green" sector which were nothing more than a treasury funded payback to Obama donors.

Trillions more in debt and nothing to show for it. Obama has surpassed even Jimmy Carter on the "Worst Presidents Ever" list.

Forward - Because 3 1/2 years of reverse didn't work.

I wasn't talking about the average Conservative here. I was talking about Cantor's efforts on behalf of Lugar costing Virginia Republicans support being offered by the TEA Party. And the TEA Party is well aware of who Dick Lugar is. And for the purposes of this article, they are the only ones that matter.

I believe you missed Sandy's point completely.

Fred - My observation was based not only on my personal observations, but also on the opinion of the other members of the media there. And also people who were backing other candidates as well as crowd reaction. I am not supporting any candidate in this race and have not endorsed anyone. My comments were based only on what the candidates actually said at the debate as far as their platforms. I was attempting to give a fair and unbiased assessment. Obviously, if you support one candidate, you would like to believe that candidate won. However, I spoke to a number of people who were supporting other candidates that agreed that Jackson won. I have not found a single person who supports another candidate that thought someone other than Jackson won (besides those going for their candidate).

And I would have to disagree with you that Ms. Radtke "put forth a clear solution to our fiscal problems". She said that she had a plan that would balance the budget in 5 years. She did not give details, nor could she have in the 2 minutes allocated. And there was not a question that directly addressed the candidates economic plans. I made no assertions on the merits of her plan one way or the other. Nor did I base the winner on the merits of his plan, only on their performance at the debate. This was not a review of which candidate has the best plan for anything. It was based solely on what they said at the debate. Nothing more.

I included the links to all 4 candidates websites if anyone wanted more information and details on any of the plans or positions of the candidates.

I am not sure if you were at the debate or not. Sounds as if you were not. Your comments about education and comments Allen made were not part of the debate, nor was most of what you wrote.

I am sure most of the highly partisan supporters like yourself think their candidate won. I believe I am far more objective than you in this race. And my opinion as far as who won is just that - my opinion. And I was prepared going in to declare the candidate that I thought had the best debate the winner.

But in the end, readers are free to take my objective opinion into account for what it's worth, or your obviously partisan opinion. I am not trying to sway people to vote for or against anyone.

I'm not sure you can say the same.

Tom