Posted on 08/12/2002 8:16:08 AM PDT by dubyagee
No gas hogs in LaLa Land
ROWLAND NETHAWAY Senior editor
Californians are strutting about congratulating themselves for their new state law requiring higher automobile fuel efficiency.
They believe that California's new state law will force car manufacturers to stop producing gas-guzzling vehicles responsible for global warming.
The logic behind the new law requiring greater fuel efficiency from car manufacturers is a faith-based belief that the automobile industry is involved in a giant conspiracy to deny the public fuel-efficient cars.
Ford, General Motors and the other car manufacturers, according to these anti-big business addicts, have the secret to 300-miles-per-gallon internal combustion engines locked away in a safe somewhere. The car industries make immoral profits by keeping this information from the public.
These urban-myth conspiracy theories have been around since the invention of automobiles.
Since I was a boy I've heard stories about the invention of new spark plugs, carburetors or fuel additives that could allow cars to run for hundreds of miles on a gallon of gas.
Generally, the stories included specific details about how the inventors of these miracles had been paid off and threatened to keep their mouths shut, if not simply murdered. Their supposed inventions were guarded more closely than the Coca-Cola recipe.
Same conspiracies, different era
Fifty years ago, these fanciful tales were voiced by run-of-the-mill drug store and pool hall conspiracy buffs.
In recent years, it has been the greenies, environmental groups, anti-globalists and Californians who think that government laws can force General Motors et al to finally release these secret fuel-efficient technologies.
It was cockamamie nonsense in 1952 and it remains just as harebrained today.
Car manufacturers wouldn't have to offer zero percent interest rates to sell cars if they could build cars with the size and power that buyers want and also get hundreds of miles per gallon.
Every car, SUV and truck owner in the nation would line up to buy such a vehicle.
The oil industry might not be pleased with 300-miles-per-gallon cars and trucks, but, hey, that's the breaks. There will always be uses for oil.
Since no knowledgeable person expects revolutionary efficiency breakthroughs on the venerable internal combustion engine, about the only way to increase fuel efficiency is to decrease safety by making cars and trucks smaller and lighter.
Anti-SUV acolytes may want to see everyone in scooter cars and public buses, but that's a hard sell to motorists who don't feel better about themselves driving around in lightweight, cramped, underpowered vehicles.
The last I heard, the car manufacturers said they would contest the new California fuel-efficiency law.
I suggest that the automobile industry simply ignore the California law.
Californians think their state law will force the car industry worldwide to build cars to California's standards.
Instead, car manufacturers should notify all the car dealers in California that they will be out of business on the day the state's new fuel efficiency standards go into effect.
If Californians want to own a new car, they will have to move to another state.
After a while, California would look like Havana, Cuba, where the cars are caught in a 1950s time warp.
Californians want the rest of the nation to pay to subsidize their lifestyles, which includes a gluttonous appetite for oil, electricity and water taken from other states.
There will be a lot less self-righteous strutting in LaLa Land if the auto industry simply ignores California's new fuel-efficiency law.
Rowland Nethaway's columns appear on Wednesdays and Fridays. E-mail: RNethaway@wacotrib.com
The feds have enacted legislation that expressly gives California the power to enact stricter standards than those that apply to the rest of hte country. This dates back to the early 70s and the first version of the Clean Air Act.
Isaac Newton's Guide to SUVs (I like the page title better than the article title, which is "How Dangerous are SUVs?", because it's a better indication of what the articles is actually about)
Why does any sane person remain in California? I don't mean to impugn the state itself, but, the policies that Californians must live with are insane!
I'd think that people would be leaving there in droves, but I guess not.
Say, that reminds me of a song, which in part goes something like:
You know what I'm gonna do?
I'm gonna get myself a 1967 Cadillac Eldorado Convertable,
Hot Pink!
With whale skin hub caps,
An all-leather cow interior,
And big brown baby seal eyes for headlights.
YEAH!
And I'm gonna drive around in that baby,
At 115 miles per hour,
Getting one mile per gallon,
Sucking down quarter pounder cheeseburgers from McDonalds in the old-fasioned non-biodegradable styrofoam containers.
- From "I'm an @sshole", by Dennis Leary
People are leaving California in droves (mostly to the Northwest). The trouble is, many more people are being born there in droves.
That is probably the case, and I can't help but wonder if these people didn't use the seatbelts in part because they already felt "so safe" in their SUV's. My point about SUV's is this, they aren't as "safe" as generally accepted by the public. They tend to have dangers inherent in their design (poor handling and stopping, rollovers) that cars don't tend to have. I have seen many SUV drivers attempt maneuvers that I would only consider doing in a sports car. Some pretty dumb behaviour.
Or more accurately, being born in Mexico and sneaking over the border to California.
Oh, yeah? Well, so's your momma.
Hey, sounds good to me. If they're so self-righteous about this stuff, then let the auto manufacturers use California as a "dumping ground" for all the sub-compacts that the rest of the continent has spurned. California wants its electrical power to be generated in someone else's back yard and then delivered all nice and pollution-free. Turnabaout is fair play, so let the national CAFE regs be satisfied by California sales of teensy vehicles with lawnmower wheels.
I've owned a few small cars - the smallest I'm willing to go is my 240Z. Bet they'd have a problem with *that*, too.
The people who think there are 300 mpg vehicles must be the same ones who think that the oceans are rising, because the island of Tuvalu is sinking. But wait! Q: If the oceans are rising, why is only Tuvalu, but none of its neighbors, sinking? A: Because reality has nothing to do with the opinions and beliefs that these people hold.
"It was cockamamie nonsense in 1952 and it remains just as harebrained today."
That's right! Big Oil is heavily invested in research and development for alternative fuel sources. Big Oil would have little to lose by switching to another fuel source, or a more efficent technology.
However, isn't this just for hydrocarbon emissions?
I don't know for certain. I'd guess no, that California's authority extends to carbon monoxide and NOx emissions, as they are primary constituents of smog. If you really pushed me, I'd suppose that the federal statute gives California authority to regulate either "pollutants" or "emissions."
If the word is "pollutants," it seems to me that the state might have an uphill fight demonstrating that carbon dioxide is a pollutant.
If the statute says "emissions," the state has an easier time, case CO2 is a tailpipe emission and thus within the literal language. However, it's pretty clear that Congress's intent at the time the legislation was adopted did not include giving California authority to regulate CO2. (Indeed, for the last 30 years, the goal has been to convert the carbon monoxide into CO2.) Thus, one could argue that California still lacks the required power. It would, however, be a much harder fight.
Of course, all of the above is speculation, as I haven't actually looked at the statute. It is, therefore, worth precisely what you've paid for it.
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