Bad enough that we’re ordered about by the government in Washington. But what about this business of being ordered about by the government of California?
Its befehlshaber (that’s German for order-giver) Jerry Brown just ordered the tripling – the almost quadrupling – of the of the number of electric cars which must be on the state’s roads by 2025.
Instead of a ludicrous 1.5 million of them, it must be a preposterous 4.5 million.
He did not suggest. Offer it up as a worthy idea. Befehlshaber Brown simply issued an executive order – a Fuhrerbefehl (that’s leader order, in German) that it will be so. In order to “curb carbon pollution from cars and trucks and boost the number of zero-emissions vehicles driven in California.”
He means force-feed them. “Boost” them sounds gentle and voluntary, even – like a Girl Scout fundraiser or some such.
But what has this to do with the rest of the country?
Unfortunately, a lot.
By decreeing that nearly 5 million electric cars must be on California’s roads by 2025 – less than seven years from now – Brown has personally imposed billions in costs on the car industry, which will have to design and build these electric cars – for which there is currently no market.
If there were a market, such production decrees would not be needed.
The car companies will build and design electric cars to meet their quota – just like affirmative action, only on wheels.
But the broader point is that if the car companies are compelled to make such a massive investment in EVs, they will want to make money on the proposition.
One way to do this is to jump on the electric car bandwagon nationally. To not only acquiesce in the CA EV idiocy but to seek its imposition countrywide, so that everyone will be compelled to buy in. In order to spread the costs around.
People may not particularly want these electric wunderwagens, much less be able to afford them – but perhaps they can be nudged into renting them . . . perpetually.
Especially if there is no alternative – no way to opt out.
The model for this nudging – it’s more like a bayonet in the back – is decades-old.
California – a huge state and the largest market for new cars in the country – decrees “California” emissions standards. It has been doing so since the ’70s. These are more severe than the “49 state” emissions car companies have to comply with outside of California.
It is expensive to have to build two versions of the same car – a “California emissions” car and a “49 state” car for the rest of the country.
The solution is obvious: Build one car – to California’s standards. Make everyone pay more for what California has decreed. This is already the case with regard to exhaust emissions. It will probably be the case with regard to EV production quotas.
It will be egged on by the tendency of regulatory bureaucrats in the other 49 states to be of like mind with those in California. There is no such animal as a government bureaucrat uninterested in the expansion of his fief for the sake of the liberty of the citizenry. California bureaucrats are worse than average by this measure – but none are better.
Thus, the bureaucrats in other states can be counted on to issue similar befehls. They have done so already with regard to California’s emissions befehls – writing their own duplicates, which then makes it a fait accompli as far as what the car companies will build.
One size fits all.
This is what Brown hopes – and intends – to accomplish by issuing “executive orders” – Fuhrerbefehls – that millions of electric cars will be incarnated by decree. The prices will go down more and they will do even more. No permitting market demand to decide the matter.
As Captain Picard used to say, make it so.
Brown has also decreed – at a cost of $2.5 billion – the erection of 250,000 electric vehicle charging stations across the state. As with the EVs themselves, if there were market demand for this, it would not be necessary to decree it. It was never necessary to decree the erection of gas stations – because there’s money to be made selling gas to people who freely wish to purchase it at market price.
EVs – and EV charging stations – are about stealing (or transferring) money.
The government of California is getting into the “business” of using funds extracted from the people of California, in order to erect state-owned recharging stations to further subsidize state-mandated electric cars.
The Soviet Union didn’t disappear back in 1989. It moved West.
And now, it’s going national.
“We want to stay aligned with California,” said EPA official Bill Wehrum.
Indeed.
Fuhrer befehl – wir folgen! That’s German for: Leader command, we follow!
Like it or not.
And no matter where you happen to be living.
. . .
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California bureaucrats are worse than average by this measure – but none are better.
Well, by definition of the word average, some will be better and some will be worse than the average. But we get the gist of what’s being said.
The Great Earthquake can’t happen soon enough!
Actually, there are some things I like about California. But overbearing fuhrers are not one of them. And while I may be speaking sarcastically in the intro statement, I can only hope that the mindless folly that passes for rational thought on the Left Coast will permanently separate itself from the more sane part of the United States.
Before it dooms us all.
Just thinking out loud here – How about a Federal $50K Excise Tax on EV’s for the stated purpose of defeating Cali’s assistance to its native industrial rent seekers and to compensate for the loss of gasoline taxes necessary to maintain roads plus dealing with Cali imposed stresses on the national electric grid.
It would be wise to check with the SCOTUS about whether they’d give cert to the inevitable lawsuit challenging the excise tax’s constitutionality.
I like the idea, Mike. But there will be an unseen consequence.
This would assume that gasoline-powered vehicles will last long enough to stay on the road without having to be replaced by the New Era of Travel.
And then there’s having to get around the other fatwas issues by the political class in every state. It’s a race to the bottom, as all these politicians have brains circling the drain. They keep their status by expanding the areas of our lives that they inflict their moronic ideas upon.
A politician that has no influence that can be peddled is useless.
How about just taking away the punchbowl of tax breaks funded by all of us who like, want, and would buy large powerful cars that run on gasoline and diesel?
Electrics can’t sell on true cost alone, not at the Gov Moonbeam levels…they will have to ban IC motors in every area over 500K people in California to hit their target. If I’m forced to walk, or drive an EV…to work anyway, then you know the answer.
I would still refuse to drive a Tesla further than 100 miles round trip, or a “GolfCart” EV more than 50 round.
Otherwise it will be constant musical chairs…stuck at work…200K working charging stations, no power to get home, 10 people in front of you waiting for the charging station…
It would be impossible for Moonbeam to force anyone to make anything.
He might cause the closure of a great many dealerships that simply will be unable to sell anything that isn’t electric, but it would be a race to the bankruptcy court with the winner to be determined.
Don’t forget the Yugo. Instead of making a good cheap car everyone wanted, they decided it would be better to just force everyone to buy Yugo’s by law, that is to say, at gunpoint. Kind of like paying $18,000.00 a year for three doctor visits. Who in their right mind would willingly do that?
The way things are going, the Yugo could wind up like the DeLorean DMC-12.
I wonder how many electric vehicles it will take to offset the stunt of putting a Tesla into space?
Are you unaware of Space X?
I’m well aware of SpaceX. That is the basis of the question. The emission “savings” of how many electric vehicles will it take to offset the small amount of carbon dioxide and other fun chemicals released by that stunt?
Liquid fueled rockets don’t produce enough carbon dioxide to measure. They burn liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen to produce steam.
Hahahahahaha, you are one funny Joe! Rockets enghoned produce emissions that destroy the ozone, increase carbon and release aluminum oxide. They are hardly what anyone would call “green” technology.
My uncle (real uncle – not sam) used to tell me the car as we know it would disappear in my lifetime. If we are going electric, I do believe an electric plane (which gets you there in 30 minutes opposed to 1.5 hours in traffic) may be the most economical way to go. That is why U.S. car companies are jumping all over the electric quad copter as the replacement for the car. Oh wait…. It isn’t the U.S. doing this – but China! https://www.forbes.com/sites/aarontilley/2016/01/06/drone-ehang-184/#1822e3582dc6
On short trips, driving is always quicker than flying because of air traffic congestion.
“The government of California is getting into the “business” of using funds extracted from the people of California,” Actually, because Californians deduct their “state” taxes from the federal return, the money actually comes from – you guessed it – you and me. Nice how socialists always find ways to get other people to pay for their stupidity. Used to be they eventually ran out of other peoples money – but now they have figured out how to print money from thin air. Update bankaccount set balance = balance + 3 trillion. Why got to work when you can just run an update statement on the computer!
Except california like other states where people have SALT deductions are states where more goes to the federal government than comes back.
I doubt there is a state where more comes back than is paid in, given the debt crisis the vomitstream media is ignoring.
That math is bad. CA is 10% of the population so you have to include 10 percent of the spending that can’t be localized (I.E. Defense) and that pushes you over its 39million residents per capita share to the tune of some 40 billion dollars.
Defense spending is more localized in California than any other state its size.
The frightening thing is that Jerry Brown is a relatively sane “moderate” compared to who will succeed him when he leaves office next year. Xavier Becerra, the state’s Attorney General, actually threatened to prosecute employers who cooperate with Federal immigration authorities. People like him are California’s future.
Politically, California is about to jump off a cliff. Republicans are an endangered species there. In last year’s Senate election, there was no republican on the ballot. Considering the fact that once upon a time California was the land of Nixon and Reagan, this is a pretty big deal.
California is becoming like a Third World country… half the population is Mexican peasants who came north illegally, the other half is obscenely rich Hollywood and Silicon Valley types. The state doesn’t care about affordable and practical cars for average people. The peasants can have donkey-carts, and the rich, who have money to burn, will have their Teslas no matter how much they cost or how impractical they are.
California is NOT part of the “United States.” Neither is New York or Massachusetts. I would really like to see this country dissolve and let these freaks go their own way.
the only way to clean up the air in cali is to let in another 30 million non white peasants. we have been told for 20 years we will collapse without having tens of millions of disease ridden nonwhites speaking 50 different dialects pouring in every year. there are to many people in Cali that is why you cant breathe there. there are to many people in the whole country since the 70’s. when we were at around 200 mil we had low land prices and high wages. add 135 million now we have high land prices and low wages. I want some white hating communist to show me where in the world that is overpopulated has a booming economy. is it afreaka? india ? Pakistan? bangledesh? messico?
south America?
if it wasn’t for st Reagan cali would have not turned into messico
California, by national referendum, should be expelled from the USA. The “Land of Fruits and Nuts” is now a national embarrassment and has been for perhaps sixty years. Everything perverse, immoral, stupid, and harebrained seems to originate in CA, from the hippie movement in the Sixties, the drug culture, the divorce culture, the “if it feels good it” culture, the undermining of traditional education, etc. Oddly, most of these perversions are concentrated in the western coastal areas of the state. Go inland a bit and the place is quite normal and largely still bedrock conservative. These areas even have (Gasp!) churches! Hilariously, both LA and San Fran have experienced nascent secession movements. I say to hell with that – the rest of the state should forcibly expel LA and SF.
Frankly they need to partake a little more of the drug culture. Maybe if they were more laid back and focused on the munchies they would leave people alone.
Moonbeam never needed drugs.
The inland agricultural regions other than being a drier climate are much like such regions anywhere else in the USA. Of course it is these regions the rest of the state holds over the nation because of the vast amount food produced there. So CA would first have to be split along its already present divisions into one or more states then the ones compatible with the USA kept.
Occupation of those areas would take little more than closing the canals.
I must have missed expulsion by national referendum in the Constitution. Where is it?
It is called an amendment
There are 27 of them. Which one do you imagine says such a thing?
A while back USA Today had a story on port truck drivers. It bemoaned how the corporations had put them into debt bondage and as a result made them like slaves. It glossed over how the state had in a single declaration created the situation in the first place. These port driver owned and used old trucks that weren’t good for much else. CA made them illegal for the environment. To keep their livelihood the truckers had to buy -new- approved trucks. The only way they could do this was with the corporation’s lease-to-own program. This is the leverage and the debt that turned them into slaves. The terms for the program are insane. Basically if they get fired they lose the truck and all their payments. If they miss a payment same thing. It goes on and on about the company town like horrors of it but spends no time discussing how the state gave these corporations the leverage.
I moved one of these COE tractors from a lot near the port to an auction, and I doubt it brought what I was paid to move it because of its age, but it was very well maintained and climbed all the hills in tenth gear without straining.
Other west coast ports are planning on banning older trucks. They won’t be allowed anything older then a 2007 model.
richb, concerning the west coast, I don’t really know anyone who’ll take a load to Ka. Not only is the inspection insane but the 55mph limit is doubly insane. It’s not worth it and insurance is cheaper if you don’t go to Ka. or places like Houston. Rare does anyone have a rider on their policy to avoid Harris county but if you did back in the day it would almost halve your insurance costs.
Some companies advertise for drivers…..who have to agree take one of their 3 or 4 year old tractors on a lease to buy. They say stuff like nothing older than a 2014…..but that 2014 will be all used up.
I’ve know a few who bought or tried to buy one and got screwed deluxe when they turned out to be on their last legs. I had a new rebuild Cummins that was a specialty build and it was a bad boy. Somebody had brazed a bolt into the air cleaner box to hold the air cleaner in place but it broke off going down the road and sucked through the engine. It had to have a new rebuild and I looked to see the warranty and how many miles it had. I was driving that truck and only me and in those 90 days it had 50,000 miles. Before ELD in the last 3 years I was driving 6-700 miles 5 or 6 days a week. Take a tractor that’s been running doubles and 4 years is an ancient machine for most line-haul tractors.
Ultimately the transition from gas cars to electrics will simply be a way station in the transition to no cars.
That’s what the activists want anyway. Once the individual freedom and fun aspect of having a car is gone why would you own one? I’m having to listen to blather from other people about the future transition to self driving cars. Once again people are entranced by the techno grandiosity of the whole idea and neglect to consider the human factor. Why pay money to own and maintain such a vehicle if all you’re ever going to be is a passenger?
Cheaper and less hassle to just take a train.
Oh yeah…I wonder whether all those charging stations are going to be “free”.
Of course they’re going to be “free.” For the people using them anyway. The people putting them up, on the other hand, will have to bear the cost of installation plus electricity charges, just to make sure their customers can charge their cars while they shop.
the best thing about self driving cars is IT WOULD ELIMINATE THIEVING PARASITE COPS on the roads
And THAT, Charlie Brown, is why they won’t ever take over. Same reason drug prohibition is fought tooth and nail to retain by the Fat Blue Line even though all they bleat about is how “dangerous” it makes their lives.
Hell Marc, it IS dangerous. Taking all those steroids….and avoiding internal affairs is double risky.
Seems to me two clauses in the US Constitution are being violated with California’s antics regarding smog specs, and this EV fatwa. One is the Commerce Clause, I think its Art on Sec 8. wherein Congress shall make regular trade between the states. In other words, not enact all manner of regulations (rule,s laws, requirements, etc) but to make it happen… if California are imposing requirements that an article of personal property that I can lawfully own, buy, use, in Nevada is NOT lawful for me to own/buy/use in California then interstate commerce is being restrained… which is illegal.
the other is similar but functions differently: the full faith and credit” clause, I think the 14th Article of Ammendment. includes this bit. That says that any right or priviedge enjoyed by an individual in ONE state MUST also be able to be enjoyed in any other state. Thus if I can drive my Marshmallow Thunder Chicken with its 893 CI V 12 with three four barrel carbs in State A, I can ALSO drive it in state C…. even if that state is California. ALL lawful residents present within the US shall enjoy EQUAL PROTECTION under the law, no matter WHICH state one happens to be in.
Launch a lawsuit bsed upon these two violations of civil rights.
Brown is full of brown. You can’t force people to buy a car they don’t want. His decree will be ignored. Also as it gets worse and worse there is an opportunity for a car company to start making 49 state vehicles. If they make a profit and I think they would, more and more manufacturers will get in on that action.
But if that is all they will offer and make available? Or manipulate the market by jacking up the gas price so high, or have a contrived gas ‘shortage’ that it would make people change their behavior (against their will) and turn to those awful electrics? Anyone remember what happened during the Arab oil embargo?
It was also said that the gov cannot force anyone to purchase a product. Like Obamacare…. Ring a bell?
all of the above but the main way would be to force all the states agencies to use electric cars
Hi Lorin,
I hope so but fear otherwise. Consider all the parts of cars we are already effectively forced to buy, such as six air bags. The principle is already established. Why not apply it to the car itself?
The majority of guns that manufacturers sell today are illegal in Kali. So they simply don’t sell those models there. In most cases, they manage to stay in business. And in many years, they do well indeed.
You will say that this principal does not apply with cars. I disagree. When any ONE state mandates that products that can be sold there must be vastly less effective and desirable than is rational, it will be more profitable to leave….and offer products that buyers in the other 49 states will gladly buy.
The People’s Republic may have more economic impact than any one other state. But compared to the other 49 states combined, it is a relative dwarf.
You can still get a 45/70 lever action in Cali. The only gun you’ll ever need.
the second amendment aint about hunting or reloading or shooting an imaginary bear attacking you.it was to take down an oppressive govt which Jefferson said should be done every 20 years. 45/70 wont get it done. Nice rifle I have one but I have many other rifles
Point is, you can still get awesome weapons in California. And don’t forget, the gun banners only want to ban poor people from having guns. It is just fine for their personal private security guard to have one.
Geologists and seismologists have evidence that a serious earthquake is due “any day now” in California. If it’s as serious as these experts say, it could be America’s first trillion-dollar disaster. Even a less serious earthquake could precipitate a financial crisis in California. When that happens, it’s game over.
To really pour gasoline on the fire, California has let disaster preparation and infrastructure slide in the past several years.
It’d be interesting to see what Elon Musk and the other tech oligarchs out there do when this happens.
That actually explains a lot when you think about it. I figure California sucks up to the Earth in the hopes of it not swallowing them whole.
Every a-hole in the state thinks it’s their duty to transform mother nature anyhow. Now we’ve found out that the Aborigine in Australia have documented certain hawks taking burning things from wild fires and starting their own as a means of flushing game. What will Kaliforniacation do when their beloved birds are seen doing same? Of course the reason they have so many fires is because they want to stamp out every natural blaze so what they get is unnatural blazes. Then it rains and the bare ground begins to slide. Whoo boy, a big ass old earth quake should create enough “human tragedy” stories to keep Katie C. busy to her unnatural dying day.
Hello Eric!
Thanks for continuing to report on the insanity. Coming back from surfing in San Clemente in January my regular fuel stop on the I-8, Golden Acorn, had a power outage (surrounded by windmills, and their generator didn’t kick in, hehehe!). So I had to fill up at Jacumba at 4.00 a gallon. We’re paying about 2.17 a gallon here in Tucson. I could just make it to the Frys (Kroger) in Yuma, but that place is so busy that I have a hard time getting in. Any further than that and I’m running on fumes, even with the 36 gallon extended range fuel tank in my F-150. It’s still worth surfing in CA, but that’s about it.
Aloha, Vic
I left Cali over 20 years ago, before the communist rot had really kicked in, I wrapped the AK and the G3 in blankets and kicked the dust of that wicked place from my feet. It is sad that a place of such natural beauty and wealth has been taken over and despoiled by barbarians.
Having said that,mi have a diabolical and statist suggestion. Since transmission line loss is a truly major waster of fuel and source of pollution in this country, and since the electrical grid is insecure and not hardened, perhaps we all need a federal law requiring states to produce, say, 75% of the power used within their borders. And they should have the reserve capacity to generate the remaining 25% and a reserve for sharing with surrounding states of 15%.
This would be within the privileges granted by the US Constitution to the feral government, would promote the common defense, and legitimately regulate interstate commerce. What’s not to love?
California is a beautiful place and needs to be reclaimed as a republic member of the American Union of free and independent states. The usurpers and crooks need to be put in their place.
Hmmm last I remember – California had a slight shortage of electricity… how will that work with millions more electric cars…. oh foolish me…. nothing another tax wont solve…..
The saddest thing is California is actually a really beautiful place…. Where Id absolutely love to live at some point in life. All this nonsense however – dont think ill ever be able to deal with it. Especially if they ban good cars… The irony is that the place was originally made by a bunch of people who moved out there to be as far as possible from government intervention to do whatever they wanted (thats always the view I had as a kid). Now its exactly the opposite….
Heres a request for you Eric – an article about where it all went so wrong…..
It is not supposed to work in any sort of way people would consider it to be working. The policies are designed to create a situation where government rations energy. Where government says who can go where when and how.
How is this going to be enforced?
Simple: you will have no choice.
California lawmaker wants to ban gas car sales after 2040
http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article176030626.html
September 29, 2017 12:01 AM
France and the United Kingdom are doing it. So is India. And now one lawmaker would like California to follow their lead in phasing out gasoline- and diesel-fueled vehicles.
And this will pass handily after the next election cycle sweeps in a wave of Super Soviet rulers into the Kalifornia Single Party government:
Think California politics is on the far-left fringe? Just wait for the next elections.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/think-california-politics-is-on-the-far-left-fringe-just-wait-for-the-next-elections/2018/02/04/80e679c2-05e5-11e8-8777-2a059f168dd2_story.html?utm_term=.aab692f5c27e
SACRAMENTO — For those who think California politics is on the far-left fringe of the national spectrum, stand by. The next election season, already well underway here, will showcase a younger generation of Democrats that is more liberal and personally invested in standing up to President Trump’s Washington than those leaving office.
Stop selling cars in kommieforina.
Hi Anonymous,
The car companies ought to do that – but (with a few exceptions, such as Mazda) they have come to love Big Brother and have decided it is better to “work with” him than to oppose him. This has been the case since the ’90s, at least.
So, rather than take a stand against California, they will simply adopt California’s edicts nationally – or push for their adoption. America isn’t going socialist. It is socialist. The only question now is whether it will be left or right socialism.
I think that you are right on the timing of when the automakers came to love Big Brother. I worked for Thomas Built Buses in the late 1990s. I was asked to go to a meeting with Caterpillar, one of our engine suppliers to discuss the upcoming changes in the engines for 2002-4, which was going to be the Tier 1 (or 2) engine for emissions control. The emissions, which included selective catalytic reduction (a catalytic converter) and some air injection hardware added 50 percent to the cost of the engines. I asked them why they didn’t send a team of lobbyists to Washington DC and take part in the process of “public education” instead. I stated that it would be more cost effective and better for them and their customers. They just sat and stared. One of the people blurted out that they had to meet these “regualtions.” I said, it might be too late then. About two years later, Caterpillar left the on highway engine market for good. I stand vindicated and these people are complete idiots. I remember muttering that under my breath as I left the meeting. About 3 months later, I left the company as well.
Hi Swamprat – I think this is the case for every industry now. Financial services, so many pointless regulations are happily accepted by the big players… same with medical / big pharma. We are now seeing with tech and telecoms it seems.
Why – simply because these regulations, though they may add a cost which will be passed to the consumer, they are also a critical barrier to entry….. Sometimes I suspect all the big auto companies are happily embracing electrics and self driving cars, much of everything else can easily be made much cheaper and more efficiently, particularly by Chinese (or even by a lean new startup like Elio) at a fraction of the cost….
I have to continue scratching my head in knowing that Electricity on average is only 15 to 20% efficient. One must burn 5 to 6 gallons of gas or its equivalent in coal to produce the Electrical energy equivalent of one gallons worth of useable electrical energy.
The above numbers are old and may be somewhat off. But not by much. It takes a lot of energy to dig coal and transport it. It would make more sense to be the end user in having coal fired Autos. LOL
Your numbers are off. End to end, electric cars are about 50% efficient in a state with natural gas derived electricity like CA. This means that the electric car will put about 50% of the energy from the natural gas into motion. That’s a bit better than a good diesel engine (about 40%), but less than Mazda’s new upcoming Skyactiv-3 (56%). If you’re in a state with coal powered or oil powered electric generation, it’s a waste to drive an electric car.
CA is profoundly dumb, actually. Our electric grid is already failing under the current load of electric cars. The enviro-fascists refuse to allow more power plants or high voltage power lines, so they’re all running beyond peak, the rolling blackouts are coming again soon. Since we don’t have enough electric generation to meet demand, we actually import power – some of it coal, but the enviro-idiots proclaim how clean we are since we’re shutting down fossil fuel plants in favor of renewable (and have to buy out of state power when the wind is low or sun is down). Even better, we’re shutting down nuclear, which is clean, to appease the enviro-morons.
Sigh. Too bad my industry is based here. It’s hard to sever professional networks built over a lifetime and move elsewhere.
“our” electric grid is rolling in excess. ERCOT, Texas’ grid has so much excess that non-peak hour wind generation is selling mega-watts for up to -$8. They pay to have someone take it.
Specialty trailers are becoming a norm for hauling wind gen parts. I work in fields every day that are being replaced by new, better parts that increase the efficiency of wind generation.
Texas’ grid is independent. There are a couple of connections to Oklahoma and New Mexico, IIRC.
Hi KB,
There are also peripherals that ought to be taken into account with regard to electrics, such as the fuel used to extract the materials necessary for the batteries. But the more important point, I think, is that IC cars are exceptionally clean – many within a hair of being “zero emissions” by the EPA’s own standards.
It is only when carbon dioxide is factored in that EVs have a meaningful edge. But CO2 is a dubious pollutant. It has been deliberately conflated with compounds/byproducts that create smog, acid rain and which can be factually claimed to be a health threat to humans. But C02 is none of those things. It is an inert gas. The assertion is that it causes or enhances “climate change” – and now we are across the line, into the real of political science. Or rather, politicized science.
It is asserted that the climate is changing unnaturally. That it is changing unnaturally because of man-made carbon dioxide production. These are not facts.
The climate changes – hotter, colder – naturally. Whatever changes are occurring now could be the result of increased solar activity or any of several other factors.
C02 is merely one of several “greenhouse” gasses and concentrations of it have been much higher in the past, naturally. It is an assertion only that the fractional increase in current atmospheric C02 attributable to human activity is warming (or cooling) the earth.
It is interesting – telling – to note, by the way, that the political scientists have had to alter their terminology to avoid obvious embarrassment, i.e., what used to be “global cooling” and then “global warming” is now the catch-all, “climate change” – a non-specific term that is extremely unscientific for exactly that reason.
Some Americans may have felt uneasy 35 years ago when DUI laws, DWI checkpoints, seatbelt laws, and car liability insurance laws were started, but most people felt that the experts must be right.
Pro-police state shows like “COPS” and “America’s Most Wanted” were then aired, neighborhood watch groups were formed, “get tough on crime” candidates were elected, and laws allowing mandatory minimums, IMBRA, 3 strikes laws, curfews, police militarization, teen boot camps, school metal detectors, private prisons, and chain gangs were enacted.
Nanny state smoking laws then started appearing.
When 9/11 happened, the Patriot Act was passed, NSA wiretapping, no knock raids, take down notices, no fly lists, terror watch lists, Constitution free zones, stop and frisk, kill switches, National Security Letters, DNA databases, kill lists, FBAR, FATCA, Operation Chokepoint, TSA groping, civil forfeiture, CIA torture, NDAA indefinite detention, secret FISA courts, FEMA camps, laws requiring passports for domestic travel, IRS laws denying passports for tax debts, gun and ammo stockpiles, laws outlawing protesting, Jade Helm, sneak and peek warrants, policing for profit, no refusal blood checkpoints, license plate readers, redlight cameras, speed cameras, FBI facial and voice recognition, tattoo databases, gun bans, the end to the right to silence, free speech bans, searches without warrants, CISPA, SOPA, private prison quotas, supermax prisons, sex offender registration laws, and sex offender restriction laws were allowed.
Now that the USA is a total police state, Americans are finding out that changing anything is impossible and that freedom is lost forever.
http://f2bbs.com/bbs
True. A gent in LA made the news this eve for being a prohibited Gun owner. He had two guns registered to him at the time his restraining order was issued for him and was ordered to turn them in. He refused, so they got a search warrant. They seized 25 weapons and several thousand rounds of ammo.
His neighbors had no idea such a criminal lived next door and praised the SWEAT (SWAT) Team that arrived to steal his stash. Wish he had been my neighbor, I’m going target practicing tomorrow morning. I would have stored his stash for him . . . .Live Free or Die are empty words here in Kalifornia.
Turns out he had been charged with domestic violence but was out free and not yet convicted . . .
No FREE MAN should be barred the ownership of Guns . . . . .
KB, there is no “free” man any longer. As Free Speech stated, we live in prison planet, esp. the US. Amazing what decades of bullshit propaganda will do for a once semi-free country/planet. Of course no one mentions poor farmers in China taking on the military and sending them packing. It ain’t good PR……for the statists.
Hi KB,
Indeed. It is alarming to note that mere assertions are now effectively the same as tried-and-convicted. This business with accusations of sexual abuse is an obvious example. Certainly, Spacey and Weinstein appear to be creeps. But the worrisome thing is we are lectured that any woman who accuses a man of such things must be believed automatically and her accuser just as automatically damned. Before proof is adduced, let alone a trial conducted.
But it is of a piece with other forms of pre-crime (and sentence first, verdict after!) that are now commonplace in the land of the “free” – including being treated as a presumptive drunk driver merely for being a driver and a presumptive terrorist merely for attempting to travel via airplane.
there DOES seem to be a growing backlash to the Me Too meme… any accusation, real, imagined, plausible, impossible, can lead to any man’s political/social/economic destruction. SO…. men in vulnerable positions of responsibility are taking to adopting the Mike Pence Standard, for which he was soundly reviled, ridiculed, pilloried: these men are admantly refusing to ever be alone with any female not their wife or daughter. Or mother. Need to interview me for your news article, and you’re female? Fine/// my secretary/aide/intern/friend, also female, will be with it. OH, NO< I don't WANT anyone else to hear what we're talking about, that might lead to compromise, some leak or something like… OK, fine. no meeting.
So, once again the laws of thermodynamics are proven effectual: for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. False accusations, no way of disproving them… fine. Now we will never meet along, just we two. ALWAYS that Third Party to, uh, monitor, chaperone, remember, witness……. far cheaper for the man involved than for his company or personal wealth to get robbed to defend against what should be a Nothingburger….. Wisdom.
Hi T,
Pence’s policy is sound. I will do the same myself, henceforth. There is too much on the line for any man to take the chance – when all it takes is a women’s claim that he did something “inappropriate.”
An irony here is that the same feminists who insist upon equal treatment once again demand special treatment – and on account of their being weaker and more fragile than men. They do not say this, of course – but it is implicit in the argument that a woman (delicate thing!) must be believed, period – while men (strong, evil) are always suspect.
GEEZ. I’ve stated it more than once that I’d embrace the issue vs fight it. When asked if I touched her breasts my answer is “Hell Yeah” I look like a fool or what? Not only that I trumped her Y as well.
If I’m going down, I’m going down on my terms.
KALIFORNIA PROP 69 Warning: The above answer is know to men in Kalifornia to result in incarceration and or wage garnishments and further loss of your 2nd amendment right and will also be followed with a Public Humiliation.
Free Speech, That was a hell of a beautiful rant. Well said, and I agree. Although I am not an optimist, because the dumbing down of the nation has been thorough and complete, I do still hold out hope that freedom is not lost and that it’s not impossible for things to change. All the signs point to these people who run things will fail and fail big, bringing the whole system down around our ankles. When this happens I think they just might lose their grasp. And if Darwin’s theory holds any water, the snowflakes will not be the ones putting things back together again. They will no longer be flakes, having morphed into real capable and accountable folks, they will be irrelevant or they will be dead. The law enforcement gangs will still be running around looting and pillaging. How well they do will determine if the rest of us come out the other side with any kind of freedom. I honestly don’t see them succeeding. There’s a hell of a lot more fed up well armed citizens than there are pigs. I know we’ve allowed this to go way farther that it ever should have, but when chaos arrives people just might stand up to the tyrants. We’ll see.
I’m not seeing any wording in the Executive Order that could compel the production of these unwanted vehicles:
“WHEREAS California increased the number of zero-emission vehicles in the state by 1300 percent in six years—growing from 25,000 in 2012 to more than 350,000 today—and zero-emission vehicles now account for approximately 5 percent of all new car sales in California …
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that all State entities work with the private sector and all appropriate levels of government to put at least 5 million zero-emission vehicles on California roads by 2030 …
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that all State entities, in carrying out programs under their authorities, shall collaborate with stakeholders to implement this order, including but not limited to taking the following actions:
Update the 2016 Zero-Emission Vehicle Action plan to help expand private investment in zero-emission vehicle infrastructure, particularly in low income and disadvantaged communities.”
Reading thru the above Soviet style plan, it appears they are throwing lots of money at incentives for people to purchase these things … oh, and you can drive in a HOV lane if you have one of these babies.
That seems to be it … announce a grand goal that’s politically popular, steal lots of money from taxpayers and throw it at the handful of people already inclined to buy this stuff, but not yet take the draconian measures necessary to make people involuntarily buy these things.
No border wall — yet.
it’s especially hilarious that he thinks POOR people are gonna buy Teslas if he throws some subsidies at the “problem”
Hi Jim,
Brown and people like him suffer from delusional thinking as well as an insufferable arrogance. They not only have no clue about the every day realities most people (who are not millionaires) must cope with but utterly do not care. Their “vision” takes precedence over everything. The world will be remade to suit them – and those like them. He and those of his type are America’s version of Europe’s nobility circa 300 years ago, as far as their mindset and their agenda.
We are the peons, proles. Our role is to defer and genuflect.
Genuflection is what he had in mind when he first decided to become a priest. Then he realized he probably wouldn’t be the pope when he was 30 so politics was his natural other choice.
Key word in the legislation? “Stakeholder”. Any time you see that word know this, people with no skin in the game are calling the shots and are dictating to others that they must change their evil ways and bend to the will of the Stakeholders…or else.
Remember, every regulation, statute, enactment, act, bill, decree, edict, bylaw, rule, ruling, ordinance, dictum, command, order, directive, pronouncement, proclamation, dictate or fiat has implicitly in its wording, “this will be enforced at gunpoint if necessary”.
Stakeholder. It’s a word Orwell should have coined.
Stakeholders is newspeak for “high contracting powers.” Take a look at the Geneva Conventions, the Hague conventions, pretty much any proclamation back in the day having to do with the Catholic church, European governments and Kings and you will find that term.
The “high Contracting Powers” is just a group of criminals who believe they have some sort of divine right to rule the human herd. They are the ranchers of human livestock. The modern version of this originated with Unam Sanctum, the decree by Boniface 111 that all the world is property of the Church by reason of his royal Poopness’s vicar of Christ-ness. It is a usurpation of divine ownership. It is a false claim and we should see it for what it is, a heaping pile of Dino dung. “Now that’s one big pile of shit.”
I think Mazda may have wasted its time and money on its new IC tech. It’s clear California will want nothing to do with it, since its not pure electric.
And since California is still too large of a new car market to just ignore all car buyers are screwed.
California is becoming increasingly poor.
It may not be the boss for long.
The solution is obvious.
Build ONE car – for America, and tell Soviet Kalifornistan to sod off.
That solution would make sense, but California is too large a new car market to ignore. Brown knows this and knows he can get away with it. No other state could get away with it.
Rich,
California is losing the kind of population that would be the target market for EVs. There will be a financial crisis in California which will blow much of this Soviet style rhetoric out of the water. The same is true to a degree of urban Washington and Oregon. What used to be middle class can no longer afford to live in California. The people who populate Silicon Valley are up there a couple of standard deviations above the mean but the population of people who can actually afford something like a Tesla is still exceedingly small. Without the graft that Elon Musk receives from governments, Tesla, and his other schemes would have already failed. Jerry Brown and the people of California have extreme structural problems and flailing away at this kind of rule by fiat will only exacerbate the problems….California is a disaster on the verge of a catastrophe. I used to go out to Santa Clara one week a month to teach a computer systems architecture class in the early 90s. It used to be such a fine place….San Francisco was one of the truly beautiful cities I ever visited. Now one needs a “poop map” to avoid stepping in shit from the homeless population. I must say, I have no desire to visit the left coast anytime soon. Mazda could make a great profit marketing its new car to the rest of America. Then the residents of California could piss and moan to their government loud enough to dislodge them from control. However, I don’t see that happening. The brainwashing in California has been rooted too deep for too long…same for Portland and Seattle.
How does he propose enforcing this? What rational car company is gonna build this huge volume of electric cars, knowing that they would have to take a huge loss on each one to get people to buy them, and maybe still wind up with a massive inventory of unsold cars?
Seems like the cheaper approach would be to hire some lawyers and sue CA govt in federal court as imposing an unconstitutional decree — or just say, meh, we won’t SELL any cars in CA if it comes to that — knowing they haven’t yet built border walls keeping people from buying cars in neighboring states.
I once bought a car while on vacation in Washington state, and then shipped it to Hawaii, and it was still cheaper than buying from a Hawaii dealer. Even easier to do this if you just have to fly or drive to Phoenix, Las Vegas, or some city in southern Oregon, then drive ‘er home to somewhere in CA.
I am guessing they will likely limit the yearly amount of IC new car licensing when the electrics continue to not sell.
And make it harder to “import” a car from another state.
Then they’ll just be registered in neighboring states instead.
I am guessing that is common already. It’s been a pain to bring a car to California a long time already. Friends of my folks moved out there in 1989 (from Illinois), and brought their mint mid 70’s Buick with them. They were ultimately unsuccessful in ever registering it there.
They thought it weird when California seized the title and the Illinois license plates when they brought it to the DMV to get plates. They really thought they would leave the DMV with California plates on their trusty Buick on the first visit. Nope, they left with a temporary tag in the back window, they would have to pass a pollution test.
Which the car couldn’t pass. Even though it was owned by an mechanical and chemical engineer who babied the car since it was brand new. Even in 1989 it ran, looked like, and felt like a new car. Even though Illinois had started pollution tests, it didn’t test cars as old as that Buick. I guess they figured California wouldn’t either. They were wrong of course.
Granted the car didn’t have its original exhaust anymore, it had been replaced with a dual setup that was far better then what GM had installed. So he puts the original setup back in. Nope, still wouldn’t pass. Tried all kinds of things. Nothing worked.
So he finally gives in and brings it to an exhaust shop (recommended by the DMV). They replace the whole system, which they install incompetently. As his wife drives it home from that shop (he follows in their other car), it catches fire on the freeway as they are stuck in the legendary traffic. Since the fire department can’t get to them, the car burns down to the frame.
The wife gets a ticket from the CHPS for not having a license (the hero also angry the temp tag on the car had burned up too). Fleeing her burning car with her children, she neglects to take her purse. Hero total jerk about the whole thing, angry at them for tying up traffic (never mind it was tied up before their fire).
They ended up having to buy a new car after having to deal with the much higher COL, having to spend way more on a house then they had wanted etc. In spite of that they did like living in California. Loved the weather, gained some new friends etc. Though they moved away about five minutes after they retired in 2006.
In 1989 Illinois was testing mid 1970s cars. At least around where most people lived, same as they do now. They tested clear back to late 1960s. It was a low/high idle test. Not too difficult to pass generally speaking.
The late 1980s to early 1990s is the period where CA and the crush the old cars (then defined as anything built before either 80 or 82) people were in full swing. They wouldn’t be beaten down until about ’95/96. By then of course most 1970s cars were no longer in use through natural attrition in much of the country.
Morning, Rich!
Hideous story. Similarly, I am certain the CA bureaucrats would crucify my ’76 Trans-Am. Its actual tailpipe emissions are lower than the standard for 1976 cars (I know this because I used to live in Northern Va and had the car smog tested there) but it is nonetheless heretical, illegal and many other despicable things because it has a modified exhaust system (among other things).
Given this fact, their goal is clearly not to make sure cars are “clean.” It is to make it onerous to own a car, especially an older one. These cars run better – and cleaner – when modified, assuming it is done competently. But that doesn’t matter.
It’s ironic that the state which was once the home base of the car culture is now the epicenter of car hatred.
The irony of it all, that one fire probably put more pollution in the air then that car would have probably put in the air by just running…….
Last I looked, any car/truck registered in Washington (State) may be renewed from anywhere in the world by mail
Why would that be limited to Washington state?
Back in the 80’s, I sold a Ford Fairmont wagon to a German couple touring the world on a shoestring. They called me from California where they planned to sell the car and buy tickets to Hawaii and then to Australia. Not to complain but to inform me that without the “California emissions” equipment, they could not sell the car in Cali. They could, of course “leave” it with a licensed dealer who would transport it out of state for nothing in return. I told them they should drive to Nevada, sell it and hitch back to LAX. They did so.
there is only ONE court that is lawfully able to takeup a lawsuit like that, so it must be filed with THAT court only… the Supreme COurt. READ The Constitution.. Art 3 Sec 2 Par 2.. California is still a STATE, last I read. No matter with any state as a named party can be taken up by any lesser court than SCOTUS.
Hey Eric,
You might like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GoA_zY6tqQw
This story details the obscenity trial waged against Jello Biafra; https://www.thisamericanlife.org/285/know-your-enemy/act-two-0
Cheers,
Jeremy
The Farmers Insurance ads are entertaining?
If he actually wants them on the roads, he’s going to have to decree that people buy them too. That should be entertaining to say the least.