It Says Right Here . . .

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Why can’t they just give you the facts – rather than lie about them?

Well, for the obvious reasons. The first one being they’re paid to lie about them. The second being they may not even realize they’re lying.

Most of today’s “journalists” being the product of a government education. The process instills in them an instinctive urge to hew to the orthodoxies, which they immediately apprehend without having to give them thought. They must be true because they would not otherwise be orthodoxies. Imagine a herd of geese. One begins to honk and flap its wings. In short order, they are all honking and flapping their wings.

Such geese are ideally suited to honking and flapping on behalf of the government – and the corporations that own it.

For example, this “news” story published the other day by CNBC, which gives you the orthodox take on the facts, rather than the facts, themselves:

California regulators on Friday voted to ban the sale of new diesel big rigs by 2036 and require all trucks to be zero-emissions by 2042, a decision that puts the state at the forefront of mitigating national tailpipe pollution.”

Marvel at the unconscious effrontery of thing.

It is true enough that “California regulators” – more accurately and so honestly described as unelected bureaucrats with plenipotentiary powers to issue decrees that have the force of law – have banned the sale of diesel-powered heavy trucks by 2036. But did these “regulators,” as they are blandly styled, “require all trucks to be zero emissions by 2024”?

No, they did not.

They required them to be “zero emissions” at the tailpipe – which electrically powered appliances lack. There is no requirement that they not produce “emissions” – as non-reactive gasses are now styled, to convey the lie that they are responsible for pollution as opposed to being a tool, for politics.

Whatever your opinion about “climate change,” to use the word “pollution” to describe a non-reactive gas that does not “pollute” anything is either ignorant or despicable – being profoundly dishonest. Maybe – to momentarily allow, for the sake of civil discussion – the “climate” is “changing” as a result of fractional increases in the fractional portion (0.04 percent) of the Earth’s atmosphere that is C02.

Of course, to state it that way – honestly, accurately –  renders the suggestion improbable, even silly. So, instead, the matter is framed as being about “pollution” – a thing with some reality that most people (reasonably) do not want more of.

Supporters of the rule say it will improve public health in marginalized communities that have endured polluted air while mitigating the effects of climate change.

Flim meet flam.

Only it is something more than just that in that many of the purveyors of these lies seem to genuinely believe them to be true. In the same way a child genuinely believes in the Tooth Fairy. Both having been conditioned to believe (and to not question) by authority. With the difference being that “journalists” aren’t children – at least not chronologically.

And so they recite the lies they believe are true – having been conditioned by government schooling to not notice (or to reflexively suppress) logical fallacies, leave shifty definitions unexamined – and so on.

Thus, the “news” that there will be “zero emissions” . . . from the tailpipe.

In accurate – and so, honest – language, the unelected bureaucrats of California’s Air Resources Board (the body with plenipotentiary powers) have decreed that source of the “emissions” they imply are pollutants must emanate from elsewhere.

That is not the same thing as “zero emissions,” is it?

Instead of a number of individual trucks’ tailpipes, the “emissions” will emanate from a smaller number of smokestacks. Probably in greater quantity, too – as the amount of electricity that is necessary to move a heavy truck that weighs more than a dozen electric cars – plus the ones it is carrying, as to the dealership that sells them – will be orders of magnitude more than the amount of electricity necessary to propel a single electric car down the highway. Not to mention the “emissions” associated with the manufacturing of the storage device for all of that electricity – i.e., the battery.

A light-duty electric truck such as the Ford Lightning lugs around about a ton of battery, which is why this half-ton truck (in terms of how it is categorized) is in fact a three ton truck, with a curb weight well over 6,000 lbs. Which makes it a very heavy truck, indeed.

How much heavier would an electric flatbed truck that carries six three ton Lightnings from  the plant to the dealer need to be, in order to haul them without “emitting” anything at the tailpipe? How much would actual pollution – as for example highly reactive and non-renewable lithium, for instance – would be generated as a byproduct (and direct product) of manufacturing even a single 16,000 pound storage device (CNBC’s estimate) to contain the electricity necessary to power just one such rig?

There are about 2 million heavy trucks (not the electric kind) currently in use in California, with about 30,000 of them serving the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, where much of what is transported by truck to the rest of the country first arrives in the country. Do some rough math and times 16,000 times 30,000 – or two million – to get a sense of the pollution that will arise as a result of California’s bureaucrats requiring “zero emissions”  . . . at the tailpipe.

This is what comes of the “emissions” of  “journalists” who fail to articulate and convey the facts – being largely incapable of understanding what they are, courtesy of the “education” they received.

And the politics they believe.

. . .

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42 COMMENTS

  1. “to momentarily allow, for the sake of civil discussion – the “climate” is “changing” as a result of fractional increases in the fractional portion (0.04 percent) of the Earth’s atmosphere that is C02.”

    Adding CO2 to the troposphere always impedes earth’s ability to cool itself. The exact amount under controlled conditions has been measured in a laboratory using infrared spectroscopy. In the atmosphere, the effect is reduced by CO2 competition with the main greenhouse gas water vapor. But anything that causes a warmer atmosphere also causes it to hold more water vapor, which amplifies the effect of CO2. The effect of CO2 in the atmosphere is most likely greater than the effect in a laboratory.

    The bottom line is that CO2 is always a climate change variable, but CO2 above the current 420ppm (0.042%) is a weak greenhouse gas that can’t harm anyone. In fact, more CO2 in the atmosphere benefits C3 photosynthesis plants (85% of 300,000 plant species) so would be good news. I have advocated for MORE CO2 (at least 800ppm, or 0.08%) in the atmosphere since 1997, based on scientific studies of CO2 enrichment and C3 photosynthesis plant growth. I have read about 300 scientific studies on the subject in the past 25 years — about one a month. Greenhouse owners CO2 enrich to 1000ppm (0.1%) to 1500ppm (0.15%), so that is probably better than 800ppm. But the studies I’ve read rarely experimented with over 800ppm CO2.

    At the link below is an easy to read one page summary of a scientific study:

    http://www.co2science.org/articles/V6/N1/B1.php

    Anyone who wants to refute climate scaremongering weakens his or her argument by claiming, or implying, CO2 does nothing.
    More CO2 is harmless = yes.
    More CO2 does nothing = no

    Concerning batteries:
    A Volvo study found EVs had 70% more upfront CO2 emissions than an ICE for extra mining and manufacturing. Electric big rigs could be similar, or even worse. It takes a lot of miles of driving an EV to offset the 70% larger upfront “carbon footprint”. Big rigs would also be wasting trailer space for batteries, and the batteries are just as heavy when discharged as they were when fully charged.

    My next door neighbor is an alternative energy nut who drives a Toyota Prius with the license plate OilsGone. He went shopping for an EV in 2022 but surprised us by buying a used Mercedes ICE SUV. The EVs were very expensive, and he (finally) found out our DTE Energy used 58% coal for electricity. So any EV charged here is a 58% coal EV.

  2. Once the s(elections) were ushered in and our votes are worthless all the communist stuff went all in. Tucker’s fired, ICE cars are banned, some reason we’re supporting a jewish dictator with possible nuclear war. The communists are rubbing it in our faces they can put aven slobbering idiots in office like Fetterman in and others and too bad for you. The nation has fallen. It really fell in 1865 and this is what we get.

  3. Four Dead in Ohio

    The LugenPresse never mentions a few facts.

    It’ll be on Thursday of this week, 53 years later.

    A friendly reminder, somebody has to remember a moment in history.

    The reports from the digital universe have information that Russia is attacking Ukraine on various fronts.

    About time, the Neocons deserve one damn good ass-kicking.

    11-22-1963, Day One for War Everywhere.

    Drinking is the solution, it solves all of the problems.

  4. The “urinalists” who have so much solicitude for the “environment” also fail to tell you that the electric truck that delivers fresh kale picked by illegal Mexican immigrants working for slave wages to their Whole Foods will be powered by lithium batteries mined by Chinese working for slave wages.

    Minor details, though… can’t be troubled by such things when you’re busy saving the planet, now, can you?

  5. ” Imagine a herd of geese. One begins to honk and flap its wings. In short order, they are all honking and flapping their wings.”

    New York Post: “New York on cusp of being first state in nation to ban natural gas under new budget — and residents are furious ”

    Klaus Slob: “You vil NOT use ze gas!!! You vil burn ze garbage und you vil eat ze bugs und zis is FINAL!!!!!!!!!!”

    https://thesupernaturalbiblechanges.com/media/pages/blog/vaccine-chips-light-up-when-near-cell-phone-maria-zeee/09c6d76fd6-1677446142/cereal-wef-cu.png

  6. We went to see “Air” last night — really good performances/script BTW, and the trailer for the next entry in the “Fast and Furious” franchise showed Brie Larson as the latest addition to the “family”.

    Gotta wonder if Nissan paid for that bit of casting. Tidy.

  7. the “emissions” they imply are pollutants must emanate from elsewhere.

    “Elsewhere” being Arizona, Utah and Nevada. From Wikipedia: “The Palo Verde Generating Station is a nuclear power plant located near Tonopah, Arizona,[5] in western Arizona. It is located about 45 miles (72 km) west of downtown Phoenix. Palo Verde generates the largest amount of electricity in the United States per year, and has the second largest rated capacity. It is a critical asset to the Southwest, generating approximately 32 million megawatt-hours annually.” Over the last few years the focus of the big Colorado river dams (Hoover and Glen Canyon) has been the concerns over them reaching “dead pool” where the water level is below the intakes for the generating stations. The Bureau of Reclamation budgets revenue from the power stations so it is very important to keep the water flowing, even though the primary reason for damming up the Colorado was flood control and irrigation water storage. In fact, to get the funding bills passed, Hoover was adamant the flood control dams would be low, specifically so that they wouldn’t produce power and compete with private electric companies. Of course that went right out the window after FDR got his socialists in power.

    I spent the weekend in Salt Lake City. Driving through Wellington, UT I noticed a massive solar field just north of town. You can see it on Google’s aerial view but I think it is much larger since this photo was taken:

    https://goo.gl/maps/94oDQnSse56A5PNAA

    It is absolutely enormous, taking up at least as much space as the town itself. Compare this to a modern fracking wellhead, which typically is about the size of a surburban home plot. It will usually have 10-16 wells and burried pipelines to carry the produced gas to a compressor station, which usually requires a patch of land about the size of a small warehouse and will service dozens of wells. Many of the the wells aren’t easily seen until you’re right on top of them.

    The latest trick of the pro-solar crowd is to point out that once solar is installed in a desert it becomes an oasis of sorts for plants and animals. What they don’t point out is that many of them are actually invasive species that otherwise wouldn’t move into the area. But I guess that’s OK in this case…

  8. Pearls of Wisdom from today’s L.A. Slimes:
    https://12ft.io/proxy?ref=&q=https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2023-04-30/natural-gas-ban-decision-fossil-fuels-buildings

    >Buildings are one of the largest sources of climate pollution in California because most of the stoves, water heaters and furnaces in homes and businesses still run on natural gas that fouls the air and heats the planet.

    Umm, yeah. Furnaces are designed to heat the air, water heaters are designed to heat water, and stoves are designed to heat food. So, all “we” have to do to stop “climate pollution” (?) is ban furnaces, water heaters and stoves. I have a suggestion, L.A. Slimes: Howzabout ya’ll go first? And do enjoy your dinner of raw worms after a cold shower in your unheated flat.

    • My gas water heater barely runs. In the summer I often get a $0 gas bill because Xcel is too lazy to send out meter readers every month and overestimates my usage. Granted, I don’t have teenagers in the house, but I doubt even with a house full of girls the water heater would use much gas. Besides, those “on demand” water heaters everyone loves don’t work on electricity unless you have a 400A service drop.

      As for furnaces, in Socal I’d be surprised if the heater runs more than a few days in December. Isn’t the primary reason why people move there is because it’s always 75º and sunny? To tear all that out and install minisplits would be ridiculous, you’d never make back your investment. I looked into minisplits back in 2017 and figured it would have cost about 15% of the value of my property, while a new modern (but not high efficiency) boiler to replace the aging one was about 2%. And again, I get wildly fluxuating bills because Xcel estimates my usage based on area norms.

      The biggest problem with gas heat these days is the CME, not the actual product.

      • Hi, RK,
        My summer gas usage for hot water and cooking is typically 1-2 therms.
        >As for furnaces, in SoCal I’d be surprised if the heater runs more than a few days in December.
        Depends where you live.
        >Isn’t the primary reason why people move there is because it’s always 75º and sunny?
        Near the coast in parts of SoCal, yes. Costs $$$ to live there, which I haven’t got.
        Where I live, in western Riverside County (east of the Santa Ana Mountains), summer high temps average in the 90s to low 100s, winter highs ~40-50F, with lows below 32F possible. Back in the day, this area (Riverside & Corona) was prime citrus growing area, with smudge pots and wind machines a necessary part of the equipment, to prevent frost damage. I do not have central heat (or central A/C). Gas floor furnace (gravity/convection, not forced air) plus a brick fireplace do the trick most of the time, though I do have a small electric heater in my office for chilly days.

        Rare, but not unheard of, to see snow in the Santa Ana Mountains, though it never lasts long, but San Gabriel, San Jacinto, & San Bernardino Mountains get plenty of snow every year. An acquaintance who lives in Crestline (S. Bdo. Mtns.) told me they got between 4-5 feet of snow this past winter.

        There are three 10,000 ft. mountain peaks in SoCal (Mt. San Antonio, Mt. San Jacinto, and Mt. San Gorgonio, sometimes called the “Three Saints”). The hiking trail from Palm Springs to the summit of Mt. San Jacinto is famously difficult.
        https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/california/skyline-trail-cactus-to-clouds
        Length
        21.2 mi
        Elevation gain
        10,764 ft
        Which takes you from low desert heat to technical ice climbing in one day.
        People have died on this trail. It is not for the casual hiker.

  9. Eric, did I read right that they estimate a 16000 lb battery?
    If so, and subtracting say 4k for the diesel engine, that’s a net gain of 12000 lbs in the weight of a road tractor.
    I drove a flatbed rig for close to a decade: with a sleeper tractor and steel frame aluminum flatbed trailer I would weigh about 32000 ish empty. The max gross weight, of course, is capped at 80000 for interstate and most state roads, which left me with about 48000 lbs of cargo capacity.
    That 12000 net weight gain from the battery is a frigging quarter of that! That means on top of everything else, we’ll need 1/3 again as many trucks on the road to haul the same amount of freight.
    And that’s presuming we can find and access enough lithium etc to build thousands of these monstrous batteries, which I doubt we can anytime soon.
    This is literal fucking insanity.

  10. I wonder how much we would save in emissions if every last lying journalist, government official, and Congress member had to shut that pie hole called a mouth and keep it duct taped shut? Seeing is how nothing but garbage comes out of it and all…

  11. Isn’t it remarkable, that these bureaucrats think they can change reality by issuing a decree, regardless of the reality of it being possible, practically, or even beneficial. “So let is be written, so let it be done” and by the hand or their providence it will be, even if it can’t.
    There is no grid to support such electrical demand, and no effort to create one.
    Lithium is already in short supply and an environmental disaster to extract.
    Few can afford any kind of EV, how many fewer are going to afford an EV heavy truck?
    Just to name a few.
    Bottom line? These bureaucrats live in a fantasy world, governed by Unicorn farts and Fairy Pixie dust.
    Sorry ladies and gents (eff you if your someone in between), but it can’t be done, regardless of the expense, but try they will, which means YOU bear the expense, instead of living indoors and eating. Don’t worry though, the bureaucrats will get along just fine. Riding around in chauffeured ICV limousines to their favorite restaurant, well away from the real world.

    • I just read this quote from a local bike store owner:

      “And I’ll tell you why…You know, for people who ride bikes like me and my son, we’re always gonna ride bikes. The e-bike’s not replacing our bicycle…What the e-bike is really replacing for us is our car”.

      One of the comments jokingly lauded this new Chinese made freedumb.

      These things cost over a thousand or two and some can be much more.

  12. I haven’t read main stream news in years. Once Drudge sold his soul to the leftist devil, I pretty much quit reading news all together. That is of the exception of Lew Rockwell, and similar websites.

    • Right you are, Adi –

      It’s about a ton of battery; I got no sleep last night and so please forgive the slip. I fixed it – and thanks for the correction!

    • My Geo weighs less than the eFord truck battery. (1680 vs. 1800lbs). And being a bicyclist, my car seems very heavy – because a bicycle only weighs 20-30 lbs and gets me around fine. Really, I am serious, when I tool around the mountains here, up very steep grades, I wish my car was hundreds of pounds lighter. Everything is better about lighter as far as I am concerned. The engine labors going up, and since I coast down with engine off, the brakes labor going down.

      I am anxious for a 3 cylinder car which weighs in less than 1500 lbs, like 1200 lbs, and I would like know what kind of fuel economy you can get if a car’s weight was reduced by another 20-40%. Electric cars/trucks are going the wrong way, they should be getting lighter not heavier – which is how bicycles evolved.

      I can imagine a carbon fiber car with plastic windows – stronger and safer with a huge loss of mass. The Roswell craft was paper thin “memory” metal – and used in space.

  13. It’s not illegal when CARB does it, comrades:

    ‘The Clean Air Act allows California to seek a waiver of the preemption which prohibits states from enacting emission standards for new motor vehicles.

    ‘Likewise, the Clean Air Act allows California to seek authorization to enforce its own standards for new nonroad engines and vehicles, despite a preemption which prohibits states from enacting emission standards for such vehicles.

    ‘Moreover, the Clean Air Act allows other states to adopt California’s motor vehicle emission standards under Section 177. States are not required to seek EPA approval under the terms of Section 177.’

    https://www.epa.gov/state-and-local-transportation/vehicle-emissions-california-waivers-and-authorizations

    CARB is a beast, exerting ersatz federal powers. We can question whether the Constitution gives the US fedgov any authority over ‘pollution.’

    But after the fedgov seized that authority half a century ago, it’s a double wrong to cede it back to one privileged state (Commiefornia), which in turn gets to set air standards for a rump group of about fifteen ‘Section 177’ DemonRat states.

    If elected president, I will bulldoze CARB to the ground, and salt its plot in Sacramento with nuclear waste so that nothing will ever stand there again.

    • >CARB is a beast, exerting ersatz federal powers.

      CARB’s latest, and most egregious, attempt to usurp federal authority is the fatwa RE: railroad locomotives.
      GFL, CARB.
      You *WILL* see major pushback on that stunt.
      Here is The Thing which currently runs CARB:
      https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/about/leadership/liane-m-randolph
      >she worked on a wide variety of legal and policy issues, including work on the Klamath Dam Removal agreement

      Great. Let’s have less “renewable, clean energy.”

      • She looks like a photo-morph of Barack Obama and Kamala Harris.

        Like both of them, she’s a lawyer. Which makes her an expert on everything.

  14. 400 years of burning coal and oil and all that can be gained in carbon dioxide gas in the atmosphere is a measly 150 ppm, pathetic.

    All after millions of cars and trucks have been manufactured, power plants built, ships at sea, planes in the sky, locomotives pull freight by the ton thousands of miles for years on end, all you get is just a little bit more. Laughable.

    400/1 000 000

    40/100 000

    4/10 000

    0.4/1000

    0.04/100

    0.004/10

    .0004 parts of carbon dioxide in one part of atmosphere.

    Tells me we are all going to die!

    Run for your lives!

    Dot gov doesn’t care if you smoke tobacco and drink booze. You’ll probably die before you retire or die soon after retiring.

    Dot gov doesn’t care about 100,000 overdoses each year, one million lives in 10 more years.

    40 percent of Americans are considered obese. I have noticed that obese people live into their early 60’s and not much more. Anecdotal, but it happens from where I see it.

    Dot gov doesn’t care if you die before you reach retirement age.

    Facts don’t budge.

    Dot gov doesn’t give two hoots in Regina if you die before you retire, you pay in and never collect.

    That’s the deal. Who makes out like a bandit? Anyone?

    If you are in the armed forces, you can get sent off to a foreign land to fight for your freedom and theirs. If you happen to die, too bad, so sad.

    Carbon dioxide is more important than humans, so the problem to solve is overpopulation.

    If you happen to be one, you are more than likely in the way and that’s a problem.

    Garret Hardin’s Tragedy of the Commons comes to mind and you happen to be the target.

    Welcome to the real world.

  15. I read the Pravdaesque articles on CNBC because IMO they best represent the crude political emanations of the regime perfectly mixed with the hypercapitalism for them and communism for the rest attitude of the elites. They’ll put an article like the one mentioned by Eric right next to one, behind a paywall, of course, noting how 3 of the top 10 “most shorted” stocks are those of EV makers.

  16. Many of these pseudo-journalists come into their profession with the mind set of “making a difference” and going to “change the world” instead of reporting facts, historical data relating to said story and cause & effect of pending action. Journalists of old used to honor truth and had a healthy mistrust of power….not anymore!

    • “Journalists of old”?
      CBS, ABC, and NBC, along with most major newspapers, actively engaged in helping cover up any indications that Oswald was not the lone killer, or that the CIA was involved in the murder of JFK, 60 years ago. So exactly how old?

  17. I’ll give you another quote from Joey Wales. “It’s sad that governments are chiefed by the double-tongues” – Ten Bears
    And it’s only getting worse.

  18. Many journalists are repeaters, not questioners.

    “How much heavier would an electric flatbed truck that carries six three ton Lightnings from the plant to the dealer need to be” -EP

    This got me thinking about bridge weight limits. How many of these overly heavy trucks can fit on a structure before causing problems?
    How many routes that are open to trucks will be closed to the EV versions?

    • That parking garage that collapsed in NYC a couple weeks ago was due to being overloaded, according to a report I read. Next time I have to go into a parking structure I’ll do a quick scan for EV’s and go park somewhere else if there’s more then a few of them.

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