I'll be keeping my "clunker" - a 1998 Nissan Frontier with about 120,000 miles on it. But why? Don't I want to take the government up on its promise of a $3,500-$4,500 handout in return for bringing my old truck in for destruction? No thanks. 

My truck may be old; it may even be a "clunker" as far as the government's concerned. But as far as I am concerned, what matters far more than what the government thinks - or even its offer of a $3,500-$4,500 handout - is what I know to be true about my truck. 

For one, it is still running great. I think it has another 100,000 miles in it, easy. Why would I want to toss away a perfectly good truck? It's "old"? So what! Too many people are hypnotized and conditioned to believe that it is an essential part of being American to throw away things that are still perfectly good in order to get the "newest" and "latest" thing. This places people on a treadmill of endless consumerism - which profits no one except those who are doing the selling (and the lending). The truck is also paid-for. 

That means I have zero fixed expenses beyond the cost of gas and every now and then regular maintenance. Sure, it will likely need this or that as the years roll by. But I'll take the occasional expense for, say, a new alternator or maybe a replacement water pump over the absolute certainty of a monthly payment (with interest) for the next five years. 

You may snicker at me when you pull up next to me at the next red light in your new Obama-mobile. But guess what? I've probably got more money in the bank than you do. I definitely don't owe some shyster bank or car company a fistfull of cash every month. I have better things to do with my money - such as save it or spend it on things that are, you know, essential. 

A new car isn't. People may believe otherwise, thanks to the consumer conditioning they have absorbed since they were toddlers - but that's just because they've been suckered by Madison Avenue ad men. 

Bottom line: There is no way this scam - and that's what it is, a scam - will save you any money. Even if your old car got 15 mpg and you new one twice that, the total cost of the new car (don't neglect to include all taxes - including personal property taxes - as well as insurance and interest payments and all the rest of it) is going to wash away any "gas savings" you may have been hoping for. 

And if you really do drive a "clunker"? A car that is on its last legs and no longer reliable or constantly nickel and diming you into the poorhouse with repair costs? 

It's still not smart to partake of the Cash for Clunker Con. A much savvier move, money-wise, would be to sell your old car for whatever it will fetch, then use that plus whatever money you have saved up to buy a mechanically sound used car. 

For between $5,000 and $8,000 you have your choice of a veritable bounty of new-looking, new-driving and high efficiency slightly used cars. (I recently bought a 2002 Nissan Frontier - very much the same as my '98 only newer and with only 58k miles on it - for $7,200. It looks brand-new and it drives brand new and it cost me less than half the cost a stripped-down base model 2009 Frontier.) 

Most people who can afford to finance a new car in the $15k range can afford to buy a used car in this price range with cash. This is a far smarter move, financially, than tying the albatross of a large loan with interest around your neck. Debt is financial cancer. It eats you alive, eventually. 

And yet, the suckers think they are getting such a deal. It's no wonder. This is the same crowd that buys into advertising slogans such as "up to 50 percent more!" (which of course means 1 or 2 percent more in reality, if you are really lucky), that buys tax-yourself lottery tickets every week for years on end ("my number's gonna come up today, I can feel it!") and can't perform sixth grade arithmetic without the aid of a calculator - and maybe not even then. You cannot help such people. 

All you can do is manipulate them to your advantage. I want no part of that. Exploitation is not my bag, baby. I leave that to the government.

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www.ericpetersautos.com or EPeters952@aol.com for comments.