Davis is a Dim Wit!!!!
Help us remove the Manure in the Sacramento State House!!!
calgov2002:
 calgov2002: for old calgov2002 articles. calgov2002: for new calgov2002 articles. Other Bump Lists at: Free Republic Bump List Register |
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
This response is a little harsher than what i thought. The manufacturers should just send them all the Geo Metro's and their clones to California. Let them drive these crappy little cars that even High School kids don't want.
Bull. My wife hauls the kids in an SUV and it is safer than the tin foil deathtrap she was driving.
Then they'd just whine the liberals favorite phrase, "But...but...but...it's not fair!"
Only if they make the hollyweirdos do it too! 8 * )
Why stop there? There are legitimate uses for four-wheeled vehicles, and occasionally you see somebody using one in a rational manner. The guy who uses a sedan or compact car to commute or drive around in by himself, which, near as I can tell, is 90% of sedan owners, is a pig. A motorcycle would provide all his transportation needs and consume much less gasoline and road space.
What do you drive? I will drive my SUV with no apologies to anybody. It suits my lifestyle and needs. I paid sales tax on it when I bought it, pay for my own gas, pay license and registration fees, and thus pay road taxes. In an effort to be a tiny bit more politically correct, I did recently trade down from a huge one to a more mid-size model. Get over it.
Davis is a Dim Wit!!!!
Help us remove the Manure in the Sacramento State House!!!
calgov2002:
|
calgov2002: for old calgov2002 articles. calgov2002: for new calgov2002 articles. Other Bump Lists at: Free Republic Bump List Register |
They said they want to but their chauffeurs object.
I'll have them both report to your re-education camp immediately!
Environmental Sensitivity Training... 8 * )
You are a liberal busybody who should mind his own business. And unless you ride a bicycle to work, you are a hypocrite.
Well, large houses use more energy than smaller houses, so Californians should also be restricted to homes that have one room per person, and one bathroom per house. If you're going to be the Rational Use Monitor, then let's really get it on: no limos, no taxi-use unless it's shared, buses may not operate unless they are full to capacity, elevators must not operate (after all, the stairs are there and functional, aren't they?).
I'm sure that you can come up with some other life-style restrictions for the rest of us ... but are the politicians and "celebrities" ready to do so as well? Not likely ...
So keep your hands off what I drive, what I live in, and how I decide to spend my money ... unless you feel personally brave enough to try and come and take it away from me. Then I will have to introduce you to my two very close friends .. Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson.
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