Rep. Eric Massa, the newest elected member from NY, decided to play Leo DiCaprio for a day and insist he drive a hydrogen fuel cell car from NY to DC before his congressional swearing in.  One problem:  The trip to DC is just under 300 miles and the fuel cell car he had hoped to drive could only guarantee him 175-200 miles.

Not to fret. Massa crunched the numbers before he left and decided he’d have a second hydrogen car towed to a halfway point, in which he would then swap cars and continue his journey.  At the end of each leg, the cars were then towed back to to their respective homes in New York.

Are you as baffled about this as we are?

Here’s how it went down.  Massa drove one fuel cell car while a hybrid SUV towing an additional SUV followed along.  Once he got half way, he switched to new fuel cell car.  The empty fuel cell was then towed back by the first SUV.  As he continued on his journey, the second SUV followed.  Once Massa arrived in DC, the second SUV then towed the second fuel cell car back to NY.

We’re too tired to do the math, but even Al Gore might agree that the emissions released into the air for this stunt were far more than they would’ve been had he strapped on a hard hat and drove a bulldozer to DC.