Within 12 years, only 5 percent of the driving done in this country will be done by “autonomous” drivers – according to a study that is getting huge play all over the mediascape.

That is to say, only 5 percent of the driving will be done by people like you and me – ordinary people going where we like, when we like and controlling the car ourselves.

That is autonomy.

Sans the air quotes.

Not this Orwellian doublespeak about cars programmed by others and so controlled by others and which drive themselves without our input and which are subject to outside intervention contrary to our own wishes being characterized by the media as – ahem – “autonomous.”

That’s an inversion right up there with the “patriot” act – and Social Security “contributions.”

Time to buy old US gold coins

Anyhow, we are assured by an outfit called RethinkX – which styles itself a “think tank” but which I’ve never heard of (and I’ve been a working journalist covering policy issues for more than 25 years now) that the stampede to turn over our keys and give up our driving autonomy is both organic and inevitable. That within a dozen years, only a tiny minority of desperadoes will still operate their cars themselves – assuming of course they are still allowed to do so.

I am not buying it. The organic and inevitable part.

I smell a rat.

The shove – much more than the loathsome “progressive” egghead authoritarian Cass Sunstein’s infamous nudge – toward cars driven by others-than-us is too obviously artificial. This study smacks of propaganda. It appears intended to create the aura of inevitability and the impression that to “cling” to our old truly self-driving (by ourselves) ways is sad and pathetic, like the Amish and their horse-drawn buggies.

It also mentions not a word about the real reasons why people are becoming disillusioned with both driving and owning cars – the expense and hassle. Both creations of government – its endless rules, fees and mandates. The first creeping and now galloping nannyism, always in the name of saaaaaaaaaaaaaafety.

Which of course, so-called “autonomous” cars will enshrine – much as the GOP has cemented the “role” of government in the micromanagement of our health by replacing rather than repealing Obamacare.

I’ve seen this Mexican donkey show before.

I am betting the RethinkX study is funded by interests interested in pushing us into cars that drive us most un-autonomously. This has been the goal – explicitly stated – of certain interests since at least the time of Ralph Nader’s ascendance and gaining traction inexorably. It is the dream of those who would trample what may be the last truly free thing left to us – even if only intermittently.

Our cars.

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