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Monday, September 25, 2006
GiveUp Awesomeness
Here's some stuff the WSJ will never agree with.
In terms of Give Up supporting blue state federalism and regulation by their superior economies, we have California suing car companies over global warming. Go California! The suit, filed in a US district court in northern California, alleges that vehicle emissions have contributed significantly to global warming, and argues that the car manufacturers should be held responsible for the past and future cost of combating this crisis. This is the Give Up hypothesis in action. Basically, federal agencies have been captured by corporate interests, so the only available tools for responsible regulation are the ability of progressive states (which have the most powerful economies) to sue for change. These states are so powerful by virtue of their population size and strength of economy, that they can substitute for failed regulatory agencies and force responsible climate policy with or without hte Bush adminstration. California is the largest car market in the US, with more than 2m new vehicles registered every year, compared with about 2.5m for the entire UK. Car sales in the state totalled $83bn (£44bn) in 2005 according to the Automobile Alliance, an industry group representing carmakers. The 29m registered vehicles in the state drive a total of 320bn miles in the year. Even if this fails to succeed as a court case, the threat to the bottom line will force car manufacturers to pay more attention to creating more efficient cars or face the wrath of California. I love it. |
4 Comments:
Libertarians and other such know-nothings may complain about the gov't interfering yet again in the Magical Free Market. But here's a bit of insight from a CA resident I read on another forum:
The automakers have been suing the state of California for years. The California Air Resources Board (ARB) has been blocked and sued in many of its attempts to decrease tailpipe emissions from cars. They've had to water down their requirements for ZEV (zero emission vehicles) to reduce the target numbers (X percent by the year 200X) multiple times and they've had to include extra credit points for PZEV and AT-PZEV (Partial Zero Emission Vehicles and Alternative Technology PZEV) to placate the automakers.
California is granted special permission to legislate more stringent air pollution regulations than the federal standard, however other states can chose to follow either the CA standard or the more lax federal standard, so effectively California regulations govern not only the 30 million people who live there, but also a significant portion of the pacific coast and the northeast. This is why the automakers are fighting tooth and nail to prevent any tightening of the regs.
Right now, there is also a big fight on as to the classification of CO2 as a pollutant. California is fighting to have it regulated because it has demonstrable negative effects on the environment, however the feds see that as impinging on their right to regulate the fleet mileage standards (the famous CAFE
standards).
What you should take away from this comment is that the Government of California is not willing to let the ARB regulations get frozen by the courts while they are continually sued by the automakers. These judgements take forever and everything gets put on hold.
Check out the Union of Concerned Scientists if you like. http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_vehicles/avp/
11:09 AM, September 25, 2006
That's a great point.
2:32 PM, September 25, 2006
Ah yes, that comment made me remember something--here in San Francisco, some jackass group is suing the city for its bike lane plan.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0912/p01s01-ussc.html?s=t5
One of the more interesting arguments in the case is that bike lanes have a negative environmental impact--they take away normal lanes and parking spaces, and the argument goes that more pollution will be caused as a result (from everyone driving in circles looking for parking spaces).
10:30 PM, September 25, 2006
Of course, the feds can always pass laws forbidding the states to make any regulation stricter than the federal regs (like with food labelling).
10:37 AM, September 28, 2006
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