[aruanan]

But having worked for a GM factory dealer in the 1970's, I can tell you that they are necessary, if you want to effect any change. GM would have never done anything on their own.

Again, you're incorrect. The move to more fuel-efficient cars (well, tiny cars) was fueled by apparent (though not real) scarcity of gasoline. Because of this, certain automobile manufacturers were able to take advantage of a public perception and move product without any "help" from the federal government (as another example, the Japanese motorcycle market: these bikes were fuel-efficient, quiet, powerful, fast, and low-vibration; Harley Davidson complained that they were losing market share to unfair competition. Of course, this was simply untrue. They had merely a dwindling share of an overall growing market created by the Japanese motorcycle manufacturers (Honda, Yamaha, Kawasaki, and Suzuki) whose products appealed to those who didn't like riding on noisy, oil-leaking, kidney-pounding, technologically-backward relics)). Remember that the American car manufacturers were whining back in the 70's about Japanese "dumping". No, the Japanese (and earlier the Germans through Volkswagen) just capitalized on a social trend without any help from the U.S. federal government. And, once again, the federal regulations regarding fuel efficiency merely followed an existing market-driven trend. The bad thing was that they sclerosed the situation and made innovation more, not less, difficult by locking into law matters that should have been left to fluctuate according to custom, perception, and taste.

[Regulator]

That's interesting. Your hangup is the average mileage bit (CAFE, I assume). My comment was directed mainly toward the emissions regulations.

You say there wasn't really any gas shortage, and that cars would get as efficient as they need to be on their own based on the market. That's nice. Real or not, the corporate line when I was there was that you couldn't get there from here. Not "we don't need to, because there really isn't a shortage". But, "we can't do it". That's my comment on that point. They were wrong.

As far as emissions go, they want a level playing field. They sure as hell weren't going to go put convertors on the cars unless all manufacturers had to, because most people aren't going to pay for it, even if they think it's a good thing. But the fact is that people elected the people who wrote those laws, because they could see the pollution. You say I'm incorrect? Whatever. Keep readin' them libertarian theory books.

Fact is, the air in western cities looks better now than it did then, with more people. I have no idea how it is in Chicago, haven't been there in a few years. Does California need an emissions board? No. It needs 10 million fewer people. "Welcome to California, Now Go Home" - bumpersticker circa 1986. Didn't work out. The people who showed up were the dregs of the earth, just the kind of folks the Dims love. So they got to stay.

By the way, what's your experience in the auto/truck/oil biz? I've worked in all three. I saw all this crap first hand in the '70s. How 'bout you? Read it in Reason magazine one day?

Pull the troops out of the mid east and let the price go to whatever it will. Then we'll see how far "custom, perception and taste" go in fuel efficiency decisions. Personally I'm all for it. I was totally against the Gulf War. I couldn't care less what Saddam Hussein does to the House of Saud. I'm all for letting him do it. Then we can build vehicles that don't need their juice, which should be no real problem technically. And they can drink their goddamn oil. It isn't worth one American life. Unless of course you'd like to volunteer to die for access to "cheap" oil.

By the way, remember when Bush 41 told us it wasn't about oil? Nobody says that now. It's good to come clean. Cleanses the soul.