There’s finally some congressional movement towards raising CAFE standards. W00t! Not only does it establish a 35mpg average, but it would create mileage standards for trucks, the very loophole that caused the explosion of SUVs and pickups in the 90s. Those unfamiliar with these fuel economy standards should read NHTSA’s overview. Sadly, NHTSA does not chronicle the history of complaints from automakers that the universe will collapse into a black hole and darkness shall reign o’er the earth if they’re required to [install seatbelts | provide turn signals | have airbags | increase fuel economy].
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If this spam question is what I think it is- AWESOME.
Don’t you mean mpg instead of mph? Had me confused for a minute there.
This is very good news. It’s just too bad that we have to wait so long for it to kick in.
I’m sorry; yes, of course, I did mean that. I think I went on acronym autopilot. :) It’s corrected now.
Even this wannabee green would be very disappointed, indeed, with a 35mph average . . .
Three cheers for bringing the “light trucks” and SUVs into the CAFE fold, though.
And 2020? That’s 12 years plus. Come on. Give em a year. Tops. If they sell the exact same cars in other countries with at least that kind of efficiency, they can do it here.
If only government would set and enforce more targets for business and industry we could live in a paradise like the former Soviet Union.
You’re right. I hereby call for all restrictions on raping and pillaging to be dropped for all US corporations.
Lets do nothing! And let the petroleum market forces further enrich our producer friends in the Kremlin, Iran, Yemen, Venezuela, kazakhstan, and Libya! No wait, we must do something! We must invade Iraq and stabilize the oil producing region!
If we really worked hard at it we could get rid of ease of travel, cheap fuels to heat and cool homes and offices, life-saving drugs, and abundant, inexpensive food. These are a few of my favorite things, but it sure would feel good to smack around those rapacious corporations that make those things possible.
C’mon Smails, you can do better than sit there and tell us that increased fuel economy standards means we’re DIRTY KOMMIES!
I actually would prefer different regulation myself, based on carbon credit trading (and before we get into it, this does not constitute an endorsement of current carbon trading schemes), though that would actually do anything about or dependence on foreign oil. I won’t lie and tell you that I’m unhappy about this, though. After all, I can rarely get my dream legislation.
Speaking of foreign oil, do you think we should be paying more money to Saudis and to Venezuela? Or do you think that the government should increase subsidies to American oil companies so that they’ll find new oil fields at a rate that can keep up with American consumption? Obviously, reducing our consumption isn’t the answer, or at least it makes us as bad as Stalin to actually enforce such things. And the oil industry will tell you that without more government investment, they’re doing as much exploration as they can.
I doubt you’d take any of the above options, so I’m honestly interested in what you think should be done.
OK, OK, I’ve got it! Lets just keep doing what we’re doing. We’ll drill, mine, and extract every BTU of energy we can encircle with our all-volunteer Army! And if foreign oil producers don’t want our $70 Billion / month … they must be terrorists.
You make some excellent points, and I agree the US needs to do something to at least lessen our dependence on foreign oil. Yet I have kind of a visceral negative reaction to using the heavy hand of government to compel people/companies to act in a cetain manner unless national security is implicated.
Further, I don’t put much credence in the environmental argument, and so won’t be persuaded by any arguments along that line.
The most persuasive line of reasoning I’ve seen is that reducing the global price of oil would leave less profits on the table for the Saudis to fund their worldwide Wahabbification of Islam as well as dampen the ability of Thug Chavez to engage in mischief. As others have pointed out, one of the best ways to do this would be to increase fuel efficiency in all US cars/trucks.
But it’s the iron law of unintended consequences that gives me great pause. We’re already starting to see what happens to food prices when millions of acres of agriculture are converted to giant ethanol-producing fields. So let’s say we were successful at significantly reducing fuel consumption in the US through higher MPG standards, and as a result the price of crude fell. Might that not result in increasing rates of purchase by China, India and others who could now afford the cheaper fuel? This would then drive prices back up (not to mention contribute more in “greenhouse gases” which many are so concerned with.)
So what will we really have accomplished except saving a few nickels on a gallon of gas? As high as the price of gas is today, adjusted for inflation, it’s lower than it was during the oil shocks of the 70s. Coupled with the rising incomes of Americans, that’s why there’s not a lot bellyaching going on about it (relatively speaking.)
That assumes that China, India and others wouldn’t buy our cars or adopt the technology that we would develop to achieve that standard. The classic example of this is the catalytic converter. Back when Republicans were conservatives (conservation; conserve; conservative), in the early 1970s, they passed stringent environmental regulations on auto emissions. The industry uniformly freaked out, saying that it was impossible to meet these new standards, and that they’d all go out of business. That was bullshit, of course. They went and invented the catalytic converter, which de-toxified (or, at least, less-toxified) the exhaust as an end-of-pipe solution. Now catalytic converters are in use within nearly all major machinery run by internal combustion engines, whether in the United States, China, or India.
Stepping back, though, your logic just doesn’t make sense when looking at historical evidence. Your argument is that businesses shouldn’t be regulated unless national security is a factor. Consider major cities shortly after the industrial revolution. (Or major cities in China right now.) The smog was so thick that the sun couldn’t be seen in the day. Respiratory illness was the rule, shortening life spans and crippling the workforce. Life, in short, sucked. Then came pollution and efficiency regulations, saving millions of westerners from a truly miserable existence.
There is virtually no free market incentive not to pollute. Lacking regulations to the contrary, the path to greatest profit in the market is to dump your spent uranium on some empty land, bury it, and sell it (sans disclosure) to a church looking to build a private school.
Reducing our reliance on oil is good for national security, yes, but it’s also good for our economy, good for consumers, and good for our environment. Vehicles today get no better mileage than the Model T Ford. That’s just pathetic. It’s been almost a century, and there can be no question that the free market has failed to increase mileage. It’s time for some regulation.
Smails,
Your mastery of hyperbole just keeps me coming back here to see which talking point/marching order you are propping up today. Reading your stuff is like driving past an accident…ya just have to peek. Thanks and keep ’em coming!
@ Tim:
Thanks for that! To be frank, I’m glad party HQ has (finally!)seen fit to promote me to infiltrating blogs such as this. Even though the talking points are still written and e-mailed out by Karl every morning, this allows me a little bit of creativity. And it certainly beats intro-level stuff like holding down minority turnout in key precincts on election day!
Thats bloody smashing Smails! Glad to hear Karl got his email squared away. (Who knew when you deleted an email, it also degaussed the tape and removed it from the computer room…those damn clever programmers)
I think the disconnect for you is that you dont see the environment as a national security matter. When the earth decides to react to our use of it, the grandest terrorist attack will look like a shad planking in comparison.
Tim, you make a very important point. The earth does not need us. The ice caps can melt away, the oceans rise and boil, and our civilization will be crushed by a changing climate. So in a Republican-like self interested way, if we want the end of the death tax to have any lasting value, or cherish our inherited beachfront property, we really should get to modifying our consumption and discharge habits. Let’s do it for #1 (me)! We must preserve our birthright against the undeserving and lazy warm-water pond scum!
I think a lot of anti-environmentalists fail to understand that most environmentalists (myself included) aren’t concerned about Earth. The planet will be perfectly fine. There is literally nothing that we can do that would bring life to a halt on the planet. It’s our own asses that we’re worried about. Humans exist thanks to a very tenuous set of circumstances. If those change, the overwhelming majority of us are screwed, with humans reduced to a small band of its hardiest specimens.
“Anti-environmentalist,” eh? Well, I guess that beats “global warming denier” and all that conjurs up. Just out of curoiousity, what term would you have applied to those skeptical of Malthus or Ehrlich? How about those of us who didn’t get our shorts in a knot over bird flu?
Global warming just happens to be the left’s cause du jour, aided and abetted by their willing allies in the media who realize the headline “Earth’s Temperature Increase Seen as Cyclical” won’t sell a lot of papers.
Malthus? There’s a WayBack machine moment. 10 points for Smails. You fired a brain cell that lay dormant since college. If memory serves, Malthus has basically always been as roundly trounced as an L. Ron Hubbard text book. A couple of his concepts were somewhat accurate, but his conclusions and methods were wrong. Dont know anything about Ehrlich so will leave that for someone else.
Its not fair for anyone to imply you are an anti-environmentalist, in my opinion. ;) Your party leadership is anti-environment, or more accurately anti-‘anythingthatdoesnotgenerateamonetaryprofit’.
You, however, from what I have read….are pretty much a lockstep guy and are just doing what your told.
Now back to the MPG. Please elaborate on how government regulation will turn us into the former Soviet Union.
So this is a massive conspiracy, involving 100% of research scientists in the field, every major media outlet in the world, the whole of the Democratic Party, and the government of every industrialized nation (save the U.S.)?
I never said it was a conspiracy – just a bunch of exciteable people being duped. Ya know, the kind of folks that are worried about a drought every time the reservoir drops below 95% capacity.
@Smails: Boy, where were you when that damn liberal Ignaz Semmelweis was touting that “doctors should wash their hands” nonsense. He managed to dupe everyone, and now hospitals are run like the Soviet Union! Oh, woe, that you weren’t around to save us from this horrible fate of drastically lowered mortality rates.