You're comparing apples to oranges. HEET's main ingredient is methanol, a different type of alcohol than ethanol. Methanol is far less prone to phase separation, which is what you see in speeding_infraction's photo. Both alcohols absorb water, but at the molecular level (the alcohol molecules bond to the water molecules, but they stay in solution with the gasoline). However, ethanol will experience phase separation more easily. Phase separation is where the water/alcohol mix comes out of solution and separates from the gasoline. It's heavier, so it sits as a bottom layer with the gas on top, and since most gas tanks feed from the bottom, nothing good happens when diluted alcohol gets drawn into the carb/injectors.
I grew up in a part of the country that is very cold, and HEET is used (successfully) to prevent condensation in the fuel system from freezing and blocking fuel flow. It uses methanol's ability to absorb water to "lock it away" so that it can be burned up in the combustion process. And the methanol doesn't phase separate as easily as ethanol. So, using ethanol-free gas and adding methanol is not as goofy as it sounds...
