Right-wingers of all varieties certainly have much to complain about. Since Obama’s inauguration, government has grown so rapidly and irresponsibly that Bush now seems like a fastidious tightwad – and to think, I honestly thought Obama could not possibly be worse than his predecessor. Every conservative/libertarian/anything-other-than-a-mainstream leftist can name an Obama policy that that he finds particularly nauseating. The interminable bailouts are probably the most hated policies, followed (or perhaps led) by the new health care bills under consideration. I must admit that one of the more seemingly innocuous initiatives stirred my rancor. For me, the “cash for clunkers” program, which is peanuts in comparison to the more egregious examples of government aggrandizement, touched an emotional nerve.

As far as I’m concerned, driving a clunker is an indispensable element of adolescence in America. When I turned 16 (in 1999), I got behind the wheel of a gray 1979 Dodge Aspen that spent the previous decade rusting under a tree next to the barn. The car was hideous, but I have not subsequently owned anything with power comparable to its slant-six engine. Nor have I ever had as much fun with a car, despite its tendency to break down randomly and its unfortunate lack of a CD or cassette player.

Clunkers are valuable for teenage boys because they provide low-stakes opportunities to look under a hood and learn some basic car maintenance. No self-respecting country boy takes his clunker to a Jiffy Lube or calls AAA when a tire goes flat – this is true even for those who are, like me, not mechanically-inclined in the slightest. As clunkers inevitably decline in reliability, ingenious improvisations are required to keep them street-worthy; major repairs generally cost more than these cars are worth, so they just don’t happen. This does not always end well. A friend of mine, who coincidentally also drove a Dodge Aspen, spent a few hours tinkering with his engine, only to turn the car back on and discover that it now idled at about 60-miles-per hour. Some later experimenting on his part caused the car to simply start on fire. That was the glorious end of his clunker.

Driving a clunker makes early driving mishaps less problematic. My first noteworthy accident occurred when I drove my car into a ditch, flipping the thing completely on its side. A neighbor was kind enough to drag the car out and get me (and the five comrades riding with me) back on the road. Any new car would have been damaged terribly by such a misfortune, requiring thousands of dollars to undo the aesthetic damage and stuff the airbags back into place. The Aspen, however, had already experienced so much abuse that the event was inconsequential; I didn’t even bother to hose it off before going home. As far as I know, my parents never knew a thing about the event.

When my first clunker finally died, as all clunkers eventually do, I was fortunate to inherit a new clunker from a church friend. The old gentleman had recently crashed his 1985 Toyota Camry. The entire front end was smashed, but the engine ran just fine. Nonetheless, he didn’t think anyone would pay anything for it, so he just gave it to me. Although the crunched hood had to be held down with a bungee cord, and we had to improvise some new headlights, I proceeded to drive the car for an additional four years and 120,000 miles before it made its final journey to the junk yard.

I must acknowledge that my own experience with clunkers was rather anachronistic. I was fortunate to grow up in Washington State, which does not require car inspections.  For those unfortunate enough to live in states with strict inspection requirements (and I was shocked to discover that Texas is one such state), I guess cash for clunkers doesn’t change very much at all.

Still, even if few American teens still drive around in ancient clunkers, it is depressing to realize that the government is now using our tax dollars to shred old cars capable of many more years of good use. There are certain character-building adventures that require a Dodge Aspen or Datsun 720; a generation of Prius drivers is a sad thing to contemplate.