California Sues Automakers for Global Warming

Oh for the love of..... by BWJones · 2006-09-20 09:03 · Score: 5, Insightful

Oh, for the love of...... *checks calendar..... nope, not April 1st)*

"(California) just passed a new law to cut global warming emissions by 25 percent and that's a good start and this lawsuit is a good next step," said Dan Becker, director of the Sierra Club's Global Warming Program.

Now, I am pretty much middle of the road politically (Disclaimer: I lean a bit left though), but this is insane. Insane as in insanely bad. Hey, Sierra Club! This statement may have just cost you 2007s contribution from me. The global warming legislation had good components, but if you start allying yourself with lawsuits like this, count me out.

Lockyer told Reuters he would seek "tens or hundreds of millions of dollars" from the automakers in the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Northern California.

Uh huh.... and what is your take going to be Lockyer? Oh, just a small percentage you say, but a small percentage of an obscenely large number of dollars is still lots of dollars, right? Will you be buying a new Bentley with your share? Or will it be a party in your Escalade?

While we are talking lawsuit, what's the logical argument/premise going to be for filing the suit? If we hold the automobile manufacturers responsible then what of the users of their products? Are you going to say that the drivers of such automobiles are "addicted", so by their logic are immune to prosecution? Why focus on the automakers? Why not grab every last dollar you can by going after the drivers and the cities and states that build the roads and freeways, because without them, the automakers would not have a market, right? As long as we are suing people because of global warming, why not airlines? Airline manufacturers? Smokers? Dry cleaners? The leather tanners that made your loafers? Hey, how about the computer industry? Or....... I *know*, lets sue all of the electrical generating companies and take us back to the dark ages.

Seriously though, I understand that there are lots of sources of global warming, but Lockyer, this is not the way to solve the problem by making the automotive companies the boogeymen. The real solution from an automotive perspective is to federally mandate gas milage standards that are more stringent than where they are now, provide incentives for more fuel efficient and lower polluting automobiles rather than the current system where there is an incentive for large SUVs, and work from the consumer side *without* filing suits to line your pocketses.

*RANT*Oh and while we are at it, Hey! G.W.B, instead of sucking money out of research, development and education, why don't you do what you said and invest in education and research? We are not going to solve these problems through a narrow focus on religious fundamentalism while we are excluding science education.

Jeez, sometimes I feel like I am getting squeezed on the far left by goofy loonies like Lockyer and pushed out of the picture by power hungry neocon fundies on the extreme right. What happened to the middle ground where people of reason and careful thought worked through compromise to help advance progress?*/RANT*

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Re:Oh for the love of..... by eln · 2006-09-20 09:09 · Score: 5, Interesting

California has made many attempts to get automobile manufacturers to cut emissions, and have been repeatedly sued by those auto manufacturers to keep those laws from getting enforced. California is now simply returning the favor.

I doubt that anyone seriously expects the state to win this suit, but they are at the very least drawing attention to the auto manufacturers' continuous efforts to keep any law that might involve reduced emissions or higher fuel economy off the books.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by carpeweb · 2006-09-20 09:14 · Score: 5, Insightful

I lean left, too, but as a market capitalist, not as a socialist.

The real solution from an automotive perspective is to federally mandate gas milage standards

That's less effective than increasing the cost of gasoline, which is more market-based as a solution. Yes, I know that artificially increasing the cost of gasoline might have secondary economic and political effects, such as giving politicians more pork. But it definitely

provide[s] incentives for more fuel efficient and lower polluting automobiles

However, I, too, feel the pinch between the ascendant right wing and the lunatic left wing. There's not much room for "real" liberals, is there?
Re:Oh for the love of..... by cayenne8 · 2006-09-20 09:16 · Score: 2, Insightful

Hmm...I guess the cars manufacturers could just stop selling their 'horrible' product in CA, and see how that works, eh?
Geez, doesn't CA have enough problems in house that should take precidence over stupid shit like this?
By the way, I've always wondered..how the CA special emissions work. What if you have a car you've bought outside the state...and move to the state with it. Does it have to be modified to work within their 'rigid' conditions? What if you want to modify your car (chips, exhaust, other higher perfomance stuff)? Do they make you take it off when you move there, or stop you at the state border and make you walk in?
I've always heard the joke about CA being the granola state, but, now I'm starting to believe it....

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Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Re:Oh for the love of..... by LordKronos · 2006-09-20 09:18 · Score: 2, Interesting

California has made many attempts to get automobile manufacturers to cut emissions, and have been repeatedly sued by those auto manufacturers to keep those laws from getting enforced.

And if the lawsuits were successful in blocking the tougher regulations, then it would appear the law is already on the auto-makers side. So this suit could basically be summed up as "I'm suing you for winning the previous lawsuit".
Re:Oh for the love of..... by BunnyClaws · 2006-09-20 09:19 · Score: 3, Interesting

Jeez, sometimes I feel like I am getting squeezed on the far left by goofy loonies like Lockyer and pushed out of the picture by power hungry neocon fundies on the extreme right. What happened to the middle ground where people of reason and careful thought worked through compromise to help advance progress?*/RANT*
I feel your pain. As a conservative (Classical Liberal) I am squeezed out of the picture by the big government spending, constitutional rewriting current Republican administration. On the other hand I am scared off by the equally big government spending, federal government expanding fringe left. Both sides want a big government to force their agenda on the citizens.

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"Anything tastes good if you deep fry it."
Re:Oh for the love of..... by TheRaven64 · 2006-09-20 09:19 · Score: 3, Funny

If they win, will the car manufacturers have to buy them a new planet?

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I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Re:Oh for the love of..... by BWJones · 2006-09-20 09:19 · Score: 4, Insightful

I doubt that anyone seriously expects the state to win this suit, but they are at the very least drawing attention to the auto manufacturers' continuous efforts to keep any law that might involve reduced emissions or higher fuel economy off the books.

California is the home of marketing, right? Has it not occurred to anyone that legislation like this is bad press? Comeon now, you have some of the best minds in the world working and living in the state of California and this is what they come up with? How about some creative legislation, like providing state incentives rather than disencentives for more fuel efficient cars? Making metropolitan parking spaces smaller and providing drivers of micro cars discounted parking or opening up carpool lanes to micro cars like the Smart ForTwo? How about doing things like allowing drivers of micro cars to register their cars every other year? There are lots of other potential incentives that could be implemented rather than playing a legal one upsmanship that only serves to employ class action lawyers.

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Re:Oh for the love of..... by AuMatar · 2006-09-20 09:21 · Score: 4, Insightful

Gas is price-inelastic. This means increasing the price has very little effect on how much is consumed (note that SUV sales and gas sales have not been negatively impacted by the gasoline increases recently). So no, raising the price of gasoline is an utterly inefficient way of doing anything other than causing inflation. Like most market based solutions, they just don't work.

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Re:Oh for the love of..... by On+Lawn · 2006-09-20 09:26 · Score: 3, Informative

For a number of years, CA's strict emmissions have been met by all auto manufacturer's anyway. There is no special CA car like there was in the 80's.

When there was such an arrangement, bringing in an out of state car incurred a penalty fee on registration. For me it would have been $300 some odd dollars (ironically more than half the price of the car). But before I could register it, the car was deemed a gross polluter and I was forced to sell it out of state.

As far as I know, there was no way to retrofit a car to match the standards. Many a hobbyist have expressed how much they wish they could just pass some straight forward test for emissions, thats it end of story. But the car has to have some sort of pedigree, meaning either the engine you put in the car becomes the standard for the emissions test. You can only put in an engine from a newer car, and it has to be manufactured for CA (if that applies to that year).

But that is all from memory. Its been a while.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Maxo-Texas · 2006-09-20 09:27 · Score: 4, Insightful

I agree. The best way to make high mileage cars is to raise the price of gasoline by $1.00 and REMOVE THE TARIFF FROM ETHANOL SUGAR IMPORTS.

You do not need lots of new laws- lots of new officials to enforce those laws- lots of forms and procedures to fill out and follow- lots of lawsuits.

All you need is a simple $1 per gallon additional tax.

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She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Chris+Burke · 2006-09-20 09:31 · Score: 3, Insightful

While we are talking lawsuit, what's the logical argument/premise going to be for filing the suit? If we hold the automobile manufacturers responsible then what of the users of their products? Are you going to say that the drivers of such automobiles are "addicted", so by their logic are immune to prosecution?

Disclaimer: I'm a environmentalist and believe in anthropogenic global warming. I think this is retarded.

You're absolutely right, it's not like anyone is physically addicted to the Chevy Suburban. Maybe they can't mentally shake the cultural effect that says they have to have a big shiny phal^H^H^H^H car to prove their status in society, but that sounds like their problem. If Californians think SUVs are harmful, then stop buying them you superficial idiots!

I'm not getting the basis for the suit. Have the auto makers broken any laws?

It says in the article that they're alleging "damages" from greenhouse gasses. Well we've known pollution was harmful to varying extents since the beginning of the industrial age, and have accepted that we're going to have it to one degree or another. When we think that degree should be less, then we pass a law that requires reduced emissions. That's what has been going on for years, what California has spearheaded and their new law addresses... So what the hell else do you want the auto makers to do? ICEs produce greenhouse gasses. They always have.

If you could prove the auto makers hid research on the dangers of car exhaust, or produced fake research showing it to be harmless, you may have something, but even then if they abided by emissions standards I just can't see the problem.

But this is California, after all. Progressive, trendy, often superficial, and, oh yeah, packed to the gills with lawyers.

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The enemies of Democracy are
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Maxo-Texas · 2006-09-20 09:35 · Score: 2, Insightful

Gasoline is still not as expensive as it was in the late 70's when adjusted for inflation.

SUV sales collapsed when gas prices went up. Used SUV prices collapsed when prices went up.

Even mildly higher gasoline had a dramatic effect on the production of gas guzzlers.

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She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by PhotoJim · 2006-09-20 09:35 · Score: 5, Insightful

If California wants vehicles to emit fewer pollutants, it could change taxation policy to dissuade people from driving large vehicles, or from driving at all. It could improve public transportation so that people don't have to drive.

Oh wait. This is an American state. Market failures are ok, unless we can fix them without taxing anyone.

Seriously, instead of telling the manufacturers they have to meet a certain fuel economy rating, California should just apply taxes to vehicles that don't meet that rating. The further above the rating, the higher the tax. If someone wants to pay 35% tax on a Hummer H2 despite its fuel economy, let him. If the population of California still buys vehicles that drink too much gas, raise the taxes. Conversely, if they achieve a better-than-anticipated mileage, consider reducing the tax, or providing a small tax credit to very environmentally-friendly vehicles. Target demand, not supply. Give people freedom to buy what they want, but a strong economic incentive to buy what is best for society as a whole.

Taxing fuel makes sense too. The more fuel your vehicle consumes, and the further you drive it, the more tax you pay. However, this creates economic pressure on poor Californians, so it would have to be balanced with a tax credit system for the poor or improvements to public transit to mitigate the impact.

Sure, this will hurt the economy in the short run, but in the long run, doing nothing will do far more damage.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by UbuntuDupe · 2006-09-20 09:36 · Score: 5, Insightful

I hate people who take a teensy bit of information out of context and act like they know the whole topic. In an unrelated matter:

Gas is price-inelastic. This means increasing the price has very little effect on how much is consumed

Yes, gas is price inelastic -- in the short term. You are correct that

SUV sales and gas sales have not been negatively impacted by the gasoline increases recently

I also do not turn my li'l car in and buy an SUV on every day when gas prices drop.

However, if people expect these to be permanent, *then* they start making long term adaptations. Now, if we have a gas tax, and use the proceeds to clean up or compensate the damage from pollution, and people still drive the same ... er ... what's the problem?

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Apology to Ubuntu forum.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Darth_brooks · 2006-09-20 09:36 · Score: 3, Informative

The real solution from an automotive perspective is to federally mandate gas milage standards

That's already in effect, though in a rather cryptic and ineffective manner. Each automaker has to meet a certain cumulative MPG rating. 1 Ford Festiva @ 40 mpg + 1 Explorer @ 15 mpg = 27.5 mpg average for Ford. That's part of the reason Ford (and GM, and others) produce ungodly ugly, tiny, gas sipping crapmobiles that few people buy. It offsets the effect of the H2's, Escalades, and Expeditions that people are buying. Or at least were buying.

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There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell 'em.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by ePhil_One · 2006-09-20 09:37 · Score: 4, Insightful

By the way, I've always wondered..how the CA special emissions work.
Every X time period, you car has to pass an emissions test (required scores based on date of manufacture). If you car fails, you can't register it for use on public roads
What if you have a car you've bought outside the state...and move to the state with it.
Most cars these days a 50 state legal. If your's isn't, you are best off selling it outside the state and buying one that is, because the only way to register it in CA is to make it pass.
What if you want to modify your car (chips, exhaust, other higher perfomance stuff)?
What part of "For off-road use only" did you not understand when you did this to your car?
Do they make you take it off when you move there, or stop you at the state border and make you walk in?
So long as you are visiting, you don't need to change a thing. If you move to the state, you have X weeks to get a license and register your vehicles. (same in all states) Ok, some thing are plain illegal and will get you pulled over, but even those items will only earn you a ticket, it would have to be pretty serious for them to impound you vehicle.
I've always heard the joke about CA being the granola state
Its the land of fruits and nuts, get it straight. But compare the smag in LA or SF during the 70's to today; then realize there are 3x more cars on the road today. Pollution controls worked. Using them to call Californians crazy is akin to laughing at Linus T. for his idea to write his own OS.

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You are in a maze of twisted little posts, all alike.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Anonymous Coward · 2006-09-20 09:39 · Score: 2, Interesting

Gas is price-inelastic.

Only in the short term. Gas spiking up to $4/gallon for a few weeks after a hurricane doesn't get anyone to sell their Canyonero or find a job closer to home. Over the long term (meaning an average driver's car replacement cycle) it is elastic, since buyers can give more or less consideration to fuel economy when they buy a new car. If you think gas-guzzling SUV sales are still as high as they were 5 years ago, you need to acquaint yourself with Ford and GM's financial statements.

When gas was 96 cents a gallon, I drove an SUV that got 15 MPG; now gas is $3 and I drive a compact that gets close to 40. Et viola, long-term elasticity!
Re:Oh for the love of..... by SoCalChris · 2006-09-20 09:52 · Score: 2, Interesting

You think bringing a car into Ca from another state is bad, try a grey market car.

Several years ago, I bought a 1979 Mercedes 450SEL6.9. The car was originally purchased in France, and brought to the US when its owner moved here in the mid 80's. It was retrofitted to pass the US standards, but I always had a bitch of a time getting it to pass CA's SMOG tests. Several years ago, I let the registration expire, with the intenetion of reregistering it once it becomes smog exempt in a few years. Not that it matters now, I finally moved out of that wacky state.

Also, IIRC the $300 fee that you reffer to was deemed unconstitutional, and one of Arnold's first acts as governor was to issue refunds to everyone who had paid it.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by amRadioHed · 2006-09-20 09:54 · Score: 5, Informative

Hmm...I guess the cars manufacturers could just stop selling their 'horrible' product in CA, and see how that works, eh?

Yeah, stop selling in the 8th largest economy in the world. I'm sure that would work great for them.

--
We hope your rules and wisdom choke you / Now we are one in everlasting peace
Re:Oh for the love of..... by glsunder · 2006-09-20 09:56 · Score: 4, Insightful

Taxing fuel isn't the best way to go. It mainly hurts the poor and middle class who might not be able to buy a new car. A better way is to tax the poorest performing vehicles in a class and _use_ that money to subsidize the top ones. This way, if someone needs an SUV, they have incentive to buy a high mpg one. You're still allowing people to choose the vehicle type they need -- what if someone has 3 kids that need car seats? They basically can't legally buy and use a compact car. 30 years ago before car seat laws, sure. But not now.

The other advantage is you create a moving target. A 30 mpg SUV or 50mpg compact car might get a subsidy now, but not in 5 years when the average has been pushed up. No change in the law is needed. Likewise, you're not banning the 10mpg pickup, but the buyer might have to pay $10,000 in extra taxes to buy it. The big key is what comes in must come out (with a reasonable overhead cost). None of that crap where they divert the taxes in to lower housing property tax or give school superintendents a raise.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by dgatwood · 2006-09-20 10:01 · Score: 5, Insightful

Even better, it could fund the construction of about four or five more clean, safe nuclear power plants so we can remove our dependence on power plants that produce more global warming, e.g. fossil fuel and hydroelectric power plants. (Yeah, that's right. Hydro plants in some cases cause more global warming than fossil fuel plants thanks to decaying matter in the holding ponds producing methane.)

Then, California could mandate that all automobiles be powered off of electrical power using some of the newer, fast-charging batteries. At today's electrical rates, if my math was correct, assuming no conversion loss in the storage process, electric-powered cars would be equivalent to paying $0.125 (12 1/2 cents) per gallon at the pumps. With more nuke plants online, the price of energy would be even cheaper. This would have a significant economic benefit for the state, reducing the cost of consumer goods and driving the economy. This, in turn, would free financial resources that could be used to buy the next crop of automobiles, so in the end, auto manufacturers come out ahead, too.

Because they don't involve gasoline dispensers, mandatory electric cars (as in 100% of all new vehicles sold must be electric by 2012) would eliminate multiple causes of smog and pollution; not only would you drastically reduce automobile emissions, but you would also drastically reduce evaporation of gasoline vapors, fuel spills, etc. at the pumps. You would also eliminate a major cause of groundwater contamination---specifically, leaking fuel tanks.

Finally, this would dramatically reduce our state's dependence on oil, which would make us less vulnerable to the goings on in parts of the world where oil is produced. The long-term economic benefits are fairly significant.

The problem is that in order to remove our dependence on oil, we have to have a replacement. That means that the cost of battery technology needs to drop by a couple orders of magnitude. Volume will achieve this, but only if all car manufacturers are forced to switch by law. otherwise, they will look at the initial cost and say that it is too expensive in the short term, and would harm their ability to compete in the market.

And solving the battery problem is only one problem. The fact is, we also have aging power grids that haven't been maintained, coupled with a serious lack of generating capacity. Much of this shortage has been the result of environmentalism gone amuck, screaming "not in my backyard" about nuclear plants, all the while promoting things that are much worse for the environment.

That's what bothers me most about the environmental movement. It always seems to take a knee-jerk approach rather than a studied view of the whole system, and the result is that more often than not, the things that are pushed in the name of environmental reform usually do more harm than good. What we need most is a careful study of our energy policy in CA, a careful study of our generator capacity, and a detailed analysis of how much additional power we need to be able to handle EV cars. Then, we need laws that demand EV cars. It is far easier to control emissions from a few power plants owned by a few companies than to control emissions from a few million automobiles.

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Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by amRadioHed · 2006-09-20 10:04 · Score: 2, Informative

...Making metropolitan parking spaces smaller

I'm assuming you aren't from CA? I don't know about the rest of the state, but in San Diego ridiculously small parking sports are already common. Besides, it doesn't seem to help. Assholes with Hummers just take up two spots instead of squeezing into one.

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We hope your rules and wisdom choke you / Now we are one in everlasting peace
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Qzukk · 2006-09-20 10:05 · Score: 2, Informative

how the CA special emissions work. What if you have a car you've bought outside the state.

The CA "special" emissions work largely by becoming the de facto standard, since their emissions standards get adopted by several other states, not just California. Roughly 25% of the cars made meet whatever the Californians required at the time it was made, because to put it simply, it would cost more to design separate Civic, California Editions and Civic, Everyone Else Editions, except when the cost of manufacture is greater than the cost of designing a completely separate poorer-mileage version of the car.

Interesting fact I found looking this stuff up: Only California can make more-stringent emissions requirements (see paragraph 6 about "why should anyone care"). No state can require less pollution than California requires.

And yes, if you want to register a car in California it has to pass California's tests. Or you pay more. If your chips don't make the exhaust exceed their smog levels or whatever they're checking for these days, then I'm pretty sure that they won't make you change them. Of course, you could always just forget to mention them ;)

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If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Anonymous Coward · 2006-09-20 10:08 · Score: 3, Insightful

SUV sales haven't been affected by the price of gasoline? On what planet? Look here http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article ?AID=/20060404/BIZ/604040336/1005 Or here http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/ 20060602/AUTO01/606020398/-1/ARCHIVE SUV sales have completely tanked which is why GM and Ford are in serious trouble.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by dlcarrol · 2006-09-20 10:12 · Score: 2, Informative

Off-topic, but this is important.

Say it with me now: "Increases in prices are not inflation."

Increases in prices cannot cause inflation even if the side effects of commodity price increases cause many (or all) prices to rise.

Inflation is the devaluation of currency (a medium of exchange) which results in higher quantities of the currency (colloquially known as "price") required to represent the same amount of wealth.

So long as we keep believing that the general rise in cost (in dollars) is due to scarcity or some other market function (instead of the money/debt-forgiveness factory called the US Mint), we're doomed to a debt-laden crash far worse that would normally be tolerated in a self-regulated environment. Sure, taking another hit from the pipe pushes off the chills and the aches for a while, but how long can you keep it up, and will it kill you when you can't do that anymore?
Re:Oh for the love of..... by segfaultcoredump · 2006-09-20 10:13 · Score: 2, Informative

Actually, the price of gas is elastic... kinda... there are two conditions:

1) the price has to get well above $3 per gallon as an average over the entire US (so it should be $4/g in places with traditionally high prices like california).

2) the price has to stay up that way for a long time (not $3 this month and $2 next). By 'long' I mean 5+ years. Long enough to give consumers the ability to change cars and homes. (running out to purchase a new hybrid does not make short or even medium term financial sense when compared to a 15mpg land yacht that is already paid for. the car loan makes the cost of gas cheap)

In the short term, most folks can take the financial hit up to a point, and at that time they start to drive smarter. But there is a limit to how much you will save by 'driving smarter'.

In the long term, folks will buy new cars that get better mileage, purchase a house that is closer to work, get a job that is closer to their house, etc. But the prices have to stay high. Today, folks are looking at the mpg ratings. If the price goes down tomorrow, they will start to look at things like legroom and horse power ratings (bigger is better if gas is $1.50 a gallon)

Thus, in the long term, higher gas prices will result in lower consumption. http://www.slate.com/id/2126981/ has a nice summary of why it is inelastic in the short term and elastic in the long term, and why we still like our 10 mpg cars. And you know that the folks providing the gas to us know that it is not in their best interest to keep the prices high for long.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Kelson · 2006-09-20 10:17 · Score: 3, Insightful

If Californians think SUVs are harmful, then stop buying them you superficial idiots!

You seem to be laboring under the mistaken impression that all 30+ million Californians think and act alike.

The fact of the matter is that some Californians think SUVs are harmful, and some Californians buy them. Most people who think SUVs are harmful already don't buy them. (Not all -- there are people who think SUVs are harmful in aggregate, but decide that their own use is justified.) The challenge facing those who consider SUVs to be harmful is not to stop buying them -- most of them have already -- but to convince those who do buy SUVs to stop.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by spiritu · 2006-09-20 10:18 · Score: 3, Informative

Your data on SUV sales is utterly incorrect. The data (with links):

Ford SUV sales lead to loss: "7/21/2006 - Ford Motor Co. reported an unexpected quarterly loss Thursday as sales of sport-utility vehicles plunged amid rising gasoline prices. The loss threatened Chief Executive Officer William Clay Ford Jr.'s plan to revive the No. 2 U.S. automaker."

Chrysler has slower truck and SUV sales: "9/18/2006 - DaimlerChrysler AG's Chrysler Group said at the weekend it could lose about $US1.27 billion this year, a much deeper loss than it forecast in July because of mounting inventory and slower truck and SUV sales."

German premium car makers hit by slump in SUV sales: "9/13/2006 - Germany's premium car makers are feeling the pinch as consumers in the United States, the world's biggest car market, are turning their backs on fuel-guzzling SUVs."

Chrysler slashes production of trucks, SUVs: "9/19/2006 - In the meantime, the company plans to significantly scale back on truck and SUV output due to a decline in sales of such vehicles. Trucks and SUVs, which historically represent about three-quarters of Chrysler's volume and return generous profits, have been under pressure in the U.S. due to high gasoline prices, [DaimlerChrysler CEO Dieter] Zetsche said."
Re:Oh for the love of..... by dgatwood · 2006-09-20 10:20 · Score: 4, Insightful

And yet, we're still using about as much fuel as before the price hikes.

The use of fuel is not significantly affected by its price except over the long term. We might see fuel use drop over a ten or fifteen year period, but in that time, the amount of economic harm that high fuel prices has caused will drive our economy into the ground. The secondary effects are huge. My average price for shipping stuff to people has gone through the roof over the last few years. Where before I could afford to buy something for $10 over the Internet and get it shipped for $3.50, these days, I feel like I have to accumulate an order of at least $30 worth of stuff before it is worth the shipping price, as the minimum shipping cost varies from $6.50 to as much as $10, depending on shipper.

Now bear in mind that these costs don't just affect the cost of finished goods delivery. They affect the cost of shipping parts to the companies that produce the finished goods. They affect the cost of shipping raw materials to the companies that manufacture parts. And so on. This means that everything costs significantly more. For every extra dollar you pay at the pump, you're probably paying $20 in other areas as an indirect result.

And mildly higher gasoline has not had a dramatic effect on production of true gas guzzlers. They're still cranking out as many tractor trailers and diesel-electric locomotives as before. Cars don't make up the bulk of gasoline use. Fully 31% is used by non-transportation uses alone---natural gas, heating oil, industrial use, and electrical generation. Another 12% is used by freight trucks, 7% by aircraft. A mere 40% is used by passenger vehicles.

If SUVs make up only 15% of all automobiles sold, even if they use twice as much fuel as another vehicle (and given that they are usually driven shorter distances on average, that's a stretch), they'd be less than 30% of the automotive fuel use. That would mean that if you could get rid of them entirely, you would only cut our fuel use by 12%, but they'd be replaced by something, so you'd really only reduce it by 6%. And those are very generous estimates. A more realistic guess is more like 1-2% decrease.

Worse, recent studies show that the amount of energy used to manufacture hybrid vehicles is so high that they actually are worse for the environment than SUVs.

Ah, the ironing is delicious.

--
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by thrillseeker · 2006-09-20 10:34 · Score: 3, Insightful

Yeah, stop selling in the 8th largest economy in the world. I'm sure that would work great for them.

Without any transportation they won't be the 8th largest economy for long.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by thrillseeker · 2006-09-20 10:38 · Score: 2, Insightful

Taxing fuel isn't the best way to go. It mainly hurts the poor and middle class who might not be able to buy a new car.

If taxing the poor and middle class doesn't tckle your fancy then you're saying tax the rich. There's no way around it. But, if only the rich can afford to drive then there's damn little pollution to worry about, is there?
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Skreems · 2006-09-20 10:52 · Score: 2, Insightful

Thing is, there'd for sure be someone willing to step up and make cars that meet pollution standards.

Anyway, given the problems CA was having with air pollution a couple decades ago, I don't see how people can think emmissions laws are a bad idea.

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Slashdot needs a "-1, Wrong" moderation option.
The Urban Hippie
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Software · 2006-09-20 11:11 · Score: 3, Insightful

From your link: "As for Hummers, Spinella explains, the life of these cars averaged across various models is over 300,000 miles. By contrast, Prius' life - according to Toyota's own numbers - is 100,000 miles."
Toyota warrantees the batteries on a Prius for 8 years / 80,000 miles. Estimated life of the battery pack is 150,000. Plus, figuring on 300,000 miles on a Hummer is hilarious. I'd be willing to be you couldn't find one Hummer in the world with that mileage. I'd be 99% of them are in the scrap heap with half of that.
It's not difficult to show a lower cost per mile for the Hummer when you divide the cost by three times the mileage.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by daspriest · 2006-09-20 11:12 · Score: 2, Informative

Only one issue, most small business people purchase large F-350 type trucks only because it allows them a large tax break. They have no real need for the large truck to operate their business, but because they can write it off thanks to the tax break, they choose the truck.

I have seen H2s and F-350s with computer repair business and realtor business names plastered on them, what do they need those large vehicles for? Tax breaks is all I can come up with.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by York+the+Mysterious · 2006-09-20 11:41 · Score: 2, Interesting

That would work except nuclear power costs more per kilowatt than any other power source except small scale solar once you factor in state and federal subsidies on the industry including cleanup and research dollars. If you build more power plants you're just moving the bill from your electrical bill to your tax bill.

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Tim Smith - Ramblings from Nerd Land
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Nefarious+Wheel · 2006-09-20 11:52 · Score: 2, Funny

Just...don't buy an electric car from Dell.

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Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
Re:Oh for the love of..... by homer_ca · 2006-09-20 12:03 · Score: 2, Informative

Parent is correct. An out of state car with over 7500 miles is considered used and can be registered with no penalties. When it's time for the smog check, the testing station will measure emissions by the 45 state standards.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by ChrisMaple · 2006-09-20 12:34 · Score: 3, Interesting

You obviously have no idea of the disaster for California that mandatory 100% electric new cars would be. Anyone living more than 30 miles from work, or with a mountain between them and work, would have to move, change jobs, take public transport to work, or own 2 cars (one for each half of the trip.) California would become a mecca for importing used cars and keeping old cars on the road, increasing pollution. A huge disruption in manufacturing technology would be required to support the new technology. The electric grid, already severely strained, would need extensive, expensive upgrades and would break frequently while being changed. Remember, blackouts in California during heat waves means deaths.

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Re:Oh for the love of..... by w42w42 · 2006-09-20 12:38 · Score: 2, Insightful

Emissions laws are good, and that is the ironic part. Car manufactures are right now meeting Californias emissions standards. How can California now turn around and sue after their own set standards have been met?

Sounds to me like a politician trying to find a new golden trough to feed at.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by SparkyTWP · 2006-09-20 12:40 · Score: 3, Interesting

For a battery-powered car to carry the same energy as a typical 15 gallon tank, you would need 2000kg of the best performing Li-ion batteries available today (This figure includes the higher efficiency of electric). Your energy figure is also way off (I got about 1/2 the cost of gasoline), but it is definately cheaper.

I am almost positive car makers know this. The way I see it, the two reasons car makers haven't adopted electric is for two-reasons:
1. Batteries just aren't high enough capacity. You do not get the range that consumers want.
2. No one wants to wait 8 hours for their battery to change, especially if they're on the road. I realize that there are now fast-charging Li-ion batteries that can charge in a few minutes, but they are incredibly expensive and hard to make. The best compromise I can think of is if the packs were swappable. So you basically keep the "gas" stations. When you want to charge up, they take out your battery, put in a freshly charged one, you pay your money and off you go.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by arminw · 2006-09-20 12:45 · Score: 2, Insightful

.....And solving the battery problem is only one problem......

Batteries are THE problem. One pound of gasoline stores more energy than 1000 pounds of lead acid battery. Even a battery with 10 times lead acid energy density means it STILL takes 100 pounds of such a battery to contain the same energy. Even IF there were a good battery, what happens when you want to take a 500 mile trip and the battery runs only for 300 miles. How do you charge such a 300 mile battery in any where near a comparable amount of time that it now takes to fill a gas tank? Even a one hour charge to fully charge such a hypothetical battery would take one hell of a powerful battery charger! Some sort of fuel cell might eventually be the solution, but that means building a whole new fuel distributing infrastructure. In the near term, clean bio-diesel can reduce smog and recycle the carbon.

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All theory is gray
Re:Oh for the love of..... by 808140 · 2006-09-20 13:00 · Score: 2, Insightful

I like electric cars too, but at least with current battery technology, battery disposal is a very big problem. They may be cleaner while running, but when it comes time to take them to the dump, electric cars are a major hassle, since we're talking about groundwater contamination.

Nuclear power plants produce waste too, obviously, but nowhere near as much as disposing of electric cars would. Ironically (for your typical uneducated environmentalist) the batteries are a bigger problem than the waste in your equation!

Still, it's good thinking.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by radtea · 2006-09-20 13:28 · Score: 4, Insightful

A better way is to tax the poorest performing vehicles in a class and _use_ that money to subsidize the top ones

This is one of many solutions to this problem that are, as someone once said, "simple, obvious and wrong."

Good public policy, like good engineering, measures outcomes, not inputs. I don't care what class of car someone owns. Nor do I care that they are buying a gallon of gas today, which is what a tax on gas measures. Neither of those things has anything necessary connection with how much a person pollutes.

For example, a friend who lives in California owns an older car. But she drives about two miles every couple of weeks. Regardless, the emissions limits the vehicle has to fufill are based on some presumptive and quite false belief about how far she drives each year. Thus, the outcome we want to limit--high emissions--is estimated via an input--the fact of car ownership and its tailpipe emission levels--and some trivially false assumptions about how much the vehicle will be driven.

This is the kind of thinking that brought us Three Mile Island, where the engineer who designed the reactor control system thought for some unaccountable reason that the power going to the motor controlling a valve could be used to measure the the state of the valve, thus misleading operators as to the state of the reactor when a valve jammed. This is trivially bad engineering, and likewise trivially bad public policy.

If it matters, measure it. That is, measure the actual thing, not "something that I think ought to be somehow kinda sorta related to it in my incredibly limited imagination."

I know damed well I'm not smart enough to figure out an adequate surrogate measure of pollution that takes into account the incredible diversity of human behaviour. Trying to do so is like what the architects of modern security theatre do when they ban an entire state of matter from carry on luggage: they focus exclusively on one particular scenario that "just seems to me" to be the most important one, and ignore all the inconvenient realities.

The ideal anti-pollution charge is one that is based on actual emissions, not imaginary surrogates. This is both a technological and a political problem. Fixed power plants are easy to monitor. Automobiles could be retrofitted with tailpipe loggers that measured actual emissions, and a charge levied as part of the license fee based on the past year's actual emissions. But even this solution would a) cost more than some people can afford and b) create a cottage industry in tampering with the data.

The difficulty is that we would like any anti-pollution charge to only kick in above a certain level. We'd like everyone to have a certain amount of polution for free, or at least cheap. That way poor people wouldn't get hit by socially-regressive charges. The only way to do this is to somehow monitor fuel usage, which requires burdens of measurement and monitoring that are unacceptably invasive to many people, especially in the U.S. (although with your government, I can understand that a certain level of paranoia is justified.)

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Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by radtea · 2006-09-20 13:35 · Score: 2, Interesting

How do you charge such a 300 mile battery in any where near a comparable amount of time that it now takes to fill a gas tank?

By swapping out the batteries at the charging station and slotting in freshly charged ones.

Next question?

Oh, and there's only a factor of 500 between lead-acid batteries and petrol with regard to energy density, and less than a factor of 50 between lithium batteries and petrol. Still a big gap, but perhaps not entirely insurmountable.

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Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Fulcrum+of+Evil · 2006-09-20 13:46 · Score: 2, Insightful

Wake up, You've been asleep 30 years!

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"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
Re:Oh for the love of..... by dgatwood · 2006-09-20 15:09 · Score: 2, Informative
That's not true. That would only be true with the original lead acid designs. Here are some other possibilities:
- Li Ion. Designs with Lithium Ion batteries have more than four times the capacity per kg.
- Hydrogen fuel cell. Using a hydrogen generator with high pressure gas or liquid H2 tanks, ignoring the extra tank weight, you get three times as far as with gasoline for the same weight.
You're also assuming old vehicle designs. Those old estimates of 60 minutes per charge were based on standard car designs from many years ago. Modern vehicles are much, much lighter than cars built when the first attempt was made at EV cars. That alone makes a huge difference. And there have also been advances in electric drive train efficiency.

It's a whole different world than it was back when EV cars could only go an hour per charge.

As for the power grid, I mentioned that already. Obviously, that has to be fixed first, but IMHO, that MUST be fixed anyway whether we move to EV cars or not.
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Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by cayenne8 · 2006-09-20 15:27 · Score: 2, Informative

"What part of "For off-road use only" did you not understand when you did this to your car?
Uhh.....all of what I'm talking about is perfectly legal for road use in the states I know about.
It is perfectly legal to swap out exhausts...chips...reprogram your ICU and add on superchargers or turbos aftermarket....
About the only thing that is listed as 'off road use only' is a straight pipe, where you remove the catalytic converter...

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Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Khyber · 2006-09-20 16:32 · Score: 2, Informative

I assume he's never been to Redlands/Riverside. The air by the coast is clear, but guess where all that fucking smog settles from the sea breeze pushing it inalnd? Right into that valley, where my fiancee lives. The air's BROWN. California's doing the right thing in suing these people, and they also need to sue the people that flat-out refuse to properly maintain their 50's-60's oldsmobiles and cadillacs. It doesn't take much repair to an older car to get it to burn cleaner, for fuck's sakes.

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Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Re:Oh for the love of..... by Banner · 2006-09-21 04:01 · Score: 2, Interesting

Even better, it could fund the construction of about four or five more clean, safe nuclear power plants so we can remove our dependence on power plants that produce more global warming, e.g. fossil fuel and hydroelectric power plants.

Except that California BANNED Nuclear power plants some time ago. For that matter they've all but banned new power plant construction with I think only one plant being built in like the last twenty years.

See California expects everyone else to provide them with power (and eventually water I suspect, but that's another story). Yes building a bunch of nuke plants here and getting rid of all the fossil fuel plants (and allowing people to switch their gasoline cars to clean burning natural gas) would be great. But don't expect to see that happen here, makes too much sense.

What's even more absurd is that the polution here is noticeably less that it was twenty years ago! But can't go talking about that, can they?

Political statement only by Kelson · 2006-09-20 09:05 · Score: 4, Insightful

Speaking as a a Californian of the (at least by today's standards) liberal persuasion... this suit is insane.

If you can't convince the federal government that there's a significant causal connection between vehicle emissions and global warming, you're not likely to be able to convince a judge.

Besides, the state just passed a law to enforce stricter emissions standards. Given the size of the market and the state's car culture, that alone will have far more effect than this lawsuit.

As for reasons, I think we need look no further than the fact that we have an election coming up in less than two months.

Re:Political statement only by CheshireCatCO · 2006-09-20 09:42 · Score: 3, Insightful

To be fair, the Federal Government doesn't *want* to be convinced. At least, not with this Administration in power. (Note that it did seem pretty convinced back when Clinton and Gore ran the show. Funny, that.) This lot has a very clear adgenda regarding fossil fuels and anthropogenic global warming hurts their interests, both politcal and personal fiscal. So I don't think you can draw any reasonable conclusions about how strong the case for or against man-made global is by what the Government currently believes (or claims to).

On the other hand, judges are generally a lot more reasonable in the face of a sensible argument. But convincing the judge that humans are responsible for global warming isn't the trick. Convicing her that the automakers are responsible (and not, say, the people driving the cars) is the real hurdle. And that's also why this suit is so inane: it implicitly tries to shift the blame for global warming to Big Scary Corporations and away from us as individuals. Heavan knows we can't go taking reasponsibility for our own actions.
Re:Political statement only by Midnight+Thunder · 2006-09-20 10:35 · Score: 2, Funny

And that's also why this suit is so inane: it implicitly tries to shift the blame for global warming to Big Scary Corporations and away from us as individuals. Heavan knows we can't go taking reasponsibility for our own actions.

Yup, and didn't Arnie play a part in getting the Humvee available as a civilian vehicle?

This suit is like saying that McDonalds is responible for people not watching their diet.

--
Jumpstart the tartan drive.

*smug grin* by UbuntuDupe · 2006-09-20 09:06 · Score: 4, Funny

The targeted automakers are Ford Motor Co., General Motors Corp., Toyota Motor Corp., Chrysler Motors Corp., Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co.

Yeah, I always knew my Kia was safe for the environment.

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Apology to Ubuntu forum.

Re:*smug grin* by Hillgiant · 2006-09-20 09:21 · Score: 2, Informative

Run it on B20 biodiesel, and you have cut the (net) carbon dioxide emissions by 20%.

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Countersue by srmalloy · 2006-09-20 09:06 · Score: 4, Funny

The automakers should countersue the California Legislature on the grounds that the emission of carbon dioxide, a known greenhouse gas, by the California state government constitutes the same harm to the resources, infrastructure and environmental health, demanding that the members of the California government cease respiration immediately as mitigation of this harm.

Re:Countersue by Tackhead · 2006-09-20 09:26 · Score: 2, Funny

> The automakers should countersue the California Legislature on the grounds that the emission of carbon dioxide, a known greenhouse gas, by the California state government constitutes the same harm to the resources, infrastructure and environmental health, demanding that the members of the California government cease respiration immediately as mitigation of this harm.
I'm confused. Why are we worried about the CO2, when it's the methane that's the problem?
And isn't the bigger greenhouse problem the methane coming from bullshit spewing out of their mouths?
Which reminds me... Once upon a time, bullshit came out of a bull's ass, and horseshit came out of a horse's ass. Life was simple.
Two years ago, in an election-year fit of pique, California voters passed a $3B stem cell research bill, and now look at us. All we have to show for our $3B is a bunch of genetically-enhanced horses' asses that can switch between spewing bullshit and horseshit, out of either their asses or their asses' mouths. And we gave them all the keys to the Treasury.
Tip the United States on its left, and everything loose lands in California.

If I were an automaker... by geistbear · 2006-09-20 09:07 · Score: 2, Insightful

I'd refuse to see another vehicle to state agency.

Have the guts to sue the drivers by geoffrobinson · 2006-09-20 09:07 · Score: 2, Interesting

Cars don't pollute by themselves.

And great timing for the American auto industry btw. Maybe left-leaning interest groups (unions and environmental groups) could coordinate with each other.

--
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.

Re:Have the guts to sue the drivers by Ryan+Mallon · 2006-09-20 09:29 · Score: 2, Interesting

Not sure why the parent is modded as flamebait since he/she has a valid point. Cars do not cause pollution all by themselves. As far as I know car manufacturors do not fuel cars up when they are built so they are most probably not even capable of causing pollution when they leave the factory.

Like the parent said, if you want to target someone then target the drivers (obviously not the most popular opinion). They are willingly and deliberately driving a vehicle which they know causes pollution. Im not saying that this should be done, just that it makes about as much sense as what California is attempting to do.

Nuisance Suits for Dummies? by Keith+Russell · 2006-09-20 09:07 · Score: 4, Funny

Let me see if have this straight...

Set the highest standards for emission controls in the nation.
Sue the Big Six for not exceeding those standards.
???
Profit!

If the complaint names specific instances where the auto industry refused to comply with CA's standards, I don't blame the AG for filing the suit. Otherwise, I agree with the "nuisance suit" response.

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This sig intentionally left blank.

Re:Nuisance Suits for Dummies? by giminy · 2006-09-20 09:28 · Score: 2, Insightful

Parent is probably the best summary of the case here.

The Sovereign State of California set standards for what it determined to be healthy levels of pollution from automobiles. It then enforced those standards and required auto makers to meet the requirements, allowing them to do business in the state when they did. Now it is suing the auto makers because...?

In reality, it should be the People vs. the State for determining the incorrect levels of pollution that are deemed 'healthy.' There might actually be a case, there, too, now that the State of California, by way of this suit, is admitting that its own standards are/have been inadequate. All the citizen-folk have to do is search through public records for proof that the state knew this and refused to act on it.

Sometimes it's better to not put a fence around a pit because doing so only shows that you knew the danger and didn't do enough to fix it.

--
The Right Reverend K. Reid Wightman,
Re:Nuisance Suits for Dummies? by loraksus · 2006-09-20 09:29 · Score: 2, Insightful

This will probably end up in a settlement, and in it, the car makers will pledge to do x,y,z in terms of emissions, etc.
Just like pretty much every case where a telecomm company was sued by the state for screwing consumers "we'll bring out dsl to smalltown, oregon by 2007" etc.
Nuisance, but sometimes the states "negotiate" this way.

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Re:Ford and GM by russ1337 · 2006-09-20 09:09 · Score: 2, Funny

But think.. If California looses it will be proof that global warming is a myth!

Unintended consequences by Just+Some+Guy · 2006-09-20 09:09 · Score: 3, Insightful

Congratulations, jackass: you just gave the largest industrial manufacturers in the world every reason to spend billions to convince everyone that global warming doesn't exist. Think the anti-intellectual movement is bad now? Wait until GM's "Chicken Little" series of advertisements encourages SUV owners to run over anyone carrying a book.

Un-frickin'-believable. If you thought major corporations were bad before, see what happens when you give them an enormous financial incentive to be even worse.

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Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?

Good Idea, Take One Step Further by Shihar · 2006-09-20 09:11 · Score: 3, Insightful

This is a good initial first step, but I think that what they really need to do is go after the REAL culprits. Cut the middlemen of the car and energy companies and go right for the villains. I think that they should simply sue everyone with a car. Hell, just sue every single human that uses energy that might have come from a coal plant too. This way, not only are they going after the real villains, but the lawyers have that many more targets to go after... and in the end, isn't targets for lawyers, err the environment, what this is really all about?

This is stupid. We live in a free market democracy. If you don't like what the car makers are doing either A) don't buy from them or B) use the power of democracy to force them to change. There isn't even the semblance of an excuse for this sort of bullshit. We have two completely effective ways of dealing with the problem.

Nothing is more sad and pathetic then when lunatic fringe groups and lawyers team up. I am all for tougher regulation and applying a higher price to people dumping CO2 into the communal air, but this is NOT the way. This is just stupid.

Re:Good Idea, Take One Step Further by AK+Marc · 2006-09-20 11:20 · Score: 2, Insightful

This is stupid. We live in a free market democracy. If you don't like what the car makers are doing either A) don't buy from them or B) use the power of democracy to force them to change. There isn't even the semblance of an excuse for this sort of bullshit. We have two completely effective ways of dealing with the problem.

I'd be interested in what a Libertarian would say about this. For one, they believe in pretty much complete personal freedom, but the right to extending your fist stopping at my nose includes your waste. There isn't a CO2 scrubber on the tailpipe of my neighbors car. So if his CO2 affects me, why shouldn't I be allowed to sue? And if my neighbors on both sides are affecting me, why not get the state to sue the users or makers of the products? That would make sense too. After all, the freedom to sue is the American Way.

--
Learn to love Alaska

On the face it sounds insane... by drinkypoo · 2006-09-20 09:12 · Score: 4, Insightful

...but automakers have been doing all they can to avoid complying with legislation already passed in California that restricts emissions. If they don't want to comply with the law, why not go after them? Corporations don't have a god-given right to profit even if it means destroying our environment, which our dependence on fossil fuels is certainly contributing to. (I know there are a lot of you naysayers; that's nice, go bother someone else. Our industry and machinery puts out several times the CO2 output of volcanoes every year, and we believe that volcanoes have a measurable effect; that means that we must necessarily also have a measurable effect.)

Anyway, we the people power the government (through taxes) that enables these corporations to even exist. Why should the government (ostensibly though usually not literally the voice of the people) permit them to pollute, harming us all?

Germany is amusingly one of the few countries who have their act together on this, because their political process apparently actually works and allowed their Green party to gain power. Now, many industries there (and eventually, all of them) are being held responsible for their output, as should we all.

--
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"

Re:On the face it sounds insane... by Just+Some+Guy · 2006-09-20 09:39 · Score: 5, Insightful

...but automakers have been doing all they can to avoid complying with legislation already passed in California that restricts emissions.

Sounds like a governmental problem to me. If the manufacturers are avoiding the limits by legal means, then the legislature screwed up. If they're avoiding the limits by illegal means, then law enforcement has screwed up. Either way, it appears to be easier for California to sue someone than to admit that their lawmakers and/or cops are ineffectual.

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Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Re:On the face it sounds insane... by periol · 2006-09-20 10:07 · Score: 4, Interesting

In Switzerland (at least), manufacturers are required to pay for the disposal of the packaging for their products. You're right, this cost is then built right into the cost of the product. But you also notice how all of a sudden there is MUCH less product packaging everywhere. The manufacturer realized that if they have to include the actual cost of their product, they'd have to pare it down to move product.

That law isn't perfect, but it's better than what was there before. Better than what goes on in America.

Next candidates for lawsuit... by rdean400 · 2006-09-20 09:13 · Score: 2, Funny

The dairy industry: Happy cows come from California, but so do a significant portion of cow farts, which have been shown to contribute a significant amount of methane to the atmosphere.

The heating and cooling industry: all that waste heat from AC and furnace gets radiated into the environment, contributing to warmer temperatures.

The taxpayer industry: all those nasty humans breathe out CO2. They are responsible for a significant portion of Carbon Dioxide emissions.

fight warming by cool_arrow · 2006-09-20 09:14 · Score: 2, Funny

My mother-in-law does her part to combat global warming by running her air conditioning 24 hours a day with all the exterior doors in the house wide open. We need more concerned citizens like her ; )

they are no better... by MrFebtober · 2006-09-20 09:14 · Score: 2, Insightful

...than PETA, it would seem. I lost respect for PETA long ago because of their shenanigans and now I think I'm feeling the same way about the Sierra Club.

Hypocrites by greg1104 · 2006-09-20 09:15 · Score: 3, Interesting

The only way I would accept this suit as being appropriate is if everyone involved in this case rides a bike or walks to work.

Re:While I am all for reducing greenhouse gases... by Kelson · 2006-09-20 09:16 · Score: 2, Insightful

Buy a hybrid.

And yet for some reason, the suit includes Toyota, which pioneered the marketing of hybrid cars in the US, and Honda, which produces hybrid versions of some of their more popular models.

fscking attorney general... by Etherwalk · 2006-09-20 09:18 · Score: 3, Insightful

trying to get money for the state and look `good,' get his name in the papers. After the NY+ Suit against the RIAA, this is the next step. It should be listened to for five minutes in case they have evidence that the auto makers are being intentionally negligent or are working to alter perception of scientific truth (which should be a crime in this case, not that Cali should get money for it,) and then it should be tossed out with a hefty fine to California for trying to tax the rest of the country. Which is what this is. That's right, California's DA is trying to tax everyone who owns a car the cost of one massive settlement + one settlement's lawyers. Given the state of the American auto industry, that's downright criminal.

Car pollution that serious? by dtfinch · 2006-09-20 09:19 · Score: 2, Funny

If you've ever driven through California along the I-5, you might notice that an enormous amount of air pollution is caused by the cattle industry. Methane is third major greenhouse gas, after water vapor and CO2. The ground water in many areas is undrinkable. I think livestock tax would go a long way to solving their problems.

But livestock taxes, gas taxes, and emission fines (that hurt poor people, who drive older cars) would negatively affect the governor's approval rating.

And a major component of city smog is ozone, which they would have even more of if they switched from gas cars to hybrid or electric. It's hard to blame car makers for that.

Disclaimer: I don't live in California anymore.

Re:Car pollution that serious? by srmalloy · 2006-09-20 09:24 · Score: 2, Funny

You'd never get a tax on livestock because of their greenhouse gas emissions passed in Texas; I'd bet that the legislature would construe that as 'defamation of beef', which Texas has laws against...

This is the Colbert Repor.... by nextdrewsaid · 2006-09-20 09:19 · Score: 2, Funny

I really and truly can not wait until Steven Colbert pulls CA apart for this on "The Word" *ding*

You drive an SUV? *YOU* are the problem by Anonymous Coward · 2006-09-20 09:28 · Score: 3, Insightful

The problem is not the car companies. The problem is the stupid american people who don't think beofre buying a big gas guzzler. If you don't get at least 30MPG, you are the problem. Why should we people who buy efficient vehicles have to pay extra (from thw lawsuits) for the purchasing habits of idiots?

Also, when will people wake up an realize you can't ever make a "corporation" pay for anything? The costs simply gets passed on to the consumer, which is you and me.

Re:You drive an SUV? *YOU* are the problem by junk · 2006-09-20 09:43 · Score: 2, Funny

I drive a truck that gets, maybe, 14mpg.
I drive a 1972 station wagon that probably gets less.
I also have a bike that gets about 50mpg... if I'm not driving it. 35-40mpg when I am.

Why do I have these gas guzzlers? Because I love them. I don't drive them to get from point to point. I use them for that purpose, but I drive them because I love driving them. I love the way they sound. I love the way they feel. That doesn't make me an idiot. If I bought an ugly car with poor performance that saved gas and wasn't any fun for _me_ to drive, then I would be an idiot.

I don't complain about how many hours a day you probably spend on WoW... despite how much of a waste _I_ think it is. Perhaps you shouldn't complain about my hobbies.b

This is great... by tx_kanuck · 2006-09-20 09:29 · Score: 4, Insightful

I actually hope this lawsuit succeeds (wait, hear me out). If it does, then the California government has just opened the door for its citizens to sue them for not providing sufficient public transportation and thereby contributing to greenhouse gasses. They have the means to cut down on the required use of personal vehicles, but have chosen not too make use of that means, therefore they are at fault for requiring people to drive as much as they do.

And before anyone blasts into me that it's too hard to get public transportation working in a major city, look at cities like Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, London, New York, Chicago (ok, Chicago needs help), Tokoyo, and pretty much every European city.

This is great, go for it guys!!! Woohoo. (idiots)

(yes, there is some sarcasm there)

--
Now, if that makes sense to anyone, could you please explain it to me? I think I've confused myself.

First part is EASY. Second part is hard. by Valdrax · 2006-09-20 09:32 · Score: 3, Insightful

First, you have to prove that global warming actually exists. Which has not been done yet (Definitely not to the legal level of proof).

Actually, that part's pretty easy. The burden of legal proof is a little lower of a bar than the proof to ideologues and an uninformed public. That global temperatures over the past two centuries exhibit and upwards trend is pretty much proven. That atmospheric CO2 levels are tightly correlated to global temperature is pretty much proven. A mechanism to explain this is proven. That we have more C02 in the atmosphere than at any time in the past 800,000 years is pretty much proven.

Then you have to prove that the automakers are deliberatley causing Global Warming.

Ah, now THAT's where the lawsuit fails. You have to prove malice or negligence, and I think the burden of proof for THAT is where the bar is going to be set higher than they can reach, especially when the federal government does not consider CO2 to be a pollutant.

Ultimately, in the case of the auto industry, the problem is that the market does not want to pay higher prices for environmentally-friendly technologies, and there is no previous government mandate to only offer models that reduce emissions. Given that all they are doing is offering the option to be a bad citizen instead of forcing polluting vehicles on consumers, I don't see that liability can be proven.

--
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").

In Soviet Californiastan... by Shihar · 2006-09-20 09:37 · Score: 5, Funny

In Soviet Californiastan you don't sue the government for failure to implement pollution controls, the government sues you!

Is global warming proven to be caused by autos? by SuseLover · 2006-09-20 09:38 · Score: 2, Interesting

How does CA plan to prove that global warming is even happening and that it is caused by automobiles?

Disgraceful by mkiwi · 2006-09-20 09:38 · Score: 2, Funny

california, wtf, retarded (tagging beta)

Whoever did that- It is an insult to retarded people everywhere.

Well that's fine by Sycraft-fu · 2006-09-20 09:58 · Score: 2, Interesting

If they fail to comply with California law California can simply ban the sale of their products there. That's what happened with things like guns. There are types of guns that are legal to buy here in Arizona that aren't in California. That's fine. However it seems this would be a case of California wanting to go after the gun makers because the sell those guns in Arizona, where it's legal.

The problem is that they want to have their cake and eat it too. They want these cars, but want them to meet standards the auto industry is unwilling or unable to meet. Well too fucking bad. Maybe you need to just accept that if you want your restrictions you can't allow some or all of the cars a company sells to be sold in your state. Either they'll change because of the loss of business, or they'll accept it and you have to as well.

I've no problems with states deciding to restrict things, however they don't have the right to bitch if companies decide they'd rather not deal with those restrictions and just go elsewhere.

All you need to know is that an election's coming by John+Jorsett · 2006-09-20 10:04 · Score: 2, Insightful

Lockyer's termed-out this year and he's running for State Treasurer. This lawsuit is his way of getting his name in the media for free. Given the reaction I'm seeing here even from liberals, it might not have been the best idea he's ever had.

Time to invade by popsicle67 · 2006-09-20 10:11 · Score: 2, Funny

It is time to invade California and restore order. I know we have our problems abroad but they pale to the importance of the job we have ahead of us bringing Caliornia out of its current drug induced coma. I live in Oregon and hearing this sends a chill dowm my back. Imagine if the disease affecting them gets going here and we start doing stupid things like charging bartenders with a crime if one of their patrons causes an accident.Oh yeah, i forgot, that already happened.I guess we could just hang the lawyers and hope for

Whatever you can do to distract. by fygarburnscats · 2006-09-20 10:17 · Score: 2, Insightful

Being a resident of the State of California I'll say one thing as pertains to this lawsuit. If the politicians and their cronies in this state spent more time respecting the law and worrying about the constitutionality thereof, than they did trying to distract the masses with ludicrous political "shock & awe" such as the aforementioned lawsuit, we'd all be in much better shape. When I say we, I mean those who aren't already politicians.

Wrong! by RossumsChild · 2006-09-20 10:22 · Score: 2, Informative

Sacrificing my ability to Moderate the threat to correct your statement.

The Wall Street Journal actually ran an article TODAY about how light truck and SUV sales are dropping and it's about to cost GM the farm.

Try researching BEFORE you post.

In Other News... by lys1123 · 2006-09-20 10:24 · Score: 2, Interesting

In Other News, this story proved that Slashdot is not alone in posting Duplicate Stories

We live in a free market democracy. Or not? by Uukrul · 2006-09-20 10:29 · Score: 3, Insightful

This is stupid. We live in a free market democracy.
A free market democracy where you can contaminate my air and you don't pay me in return isn't a free market at all.
Air is not used as a product of a free market, so laws that apply to it must be different from laws that apply to other "products".

The day you put your car in a plastic bag (and the head, and the chemical plant, etc. ) and you pay for every cubic meter that you use I will agree with you, until then well come to a communist market: air.

--
My city: Barcelona.

They should sue themselves. by Trespass · 2006-09-20 10:30 · Score: 2, Funny

They should sue themselves for being an affluent consumer society with a decentralized infrastructure. While they're at it, they should make being a smug materialist illegal as well.

I wonder... by p00ked · 2006-09-20 10:36 · Score: 2, Insightful

What they're driving to get to court.

The Real Offender by jqstm · 2006-09-20 10:38 · Score: 4, Funny

California is missing the mark by going after auto makers. It should go after the real culprit here, carbon dioxide itself. We need to sue CO2 to stop its heat trapping ways! I see no other way to control this defiant and self-serving molecule.

Yes! I'm finally no longer responsible! by kuriharu · 2006-09-20 10:52 · Score: 4, Funny

Thanks to the gov't of California for absolving me of responsibility! It's my CAR that's polluting, not me for driving it! Thanks for suing Ford, et al instead of making me, the driver, the guilty party! Time to fill up and drive 500 miles tonight in celebration!

Impressive Spin by Xiroth · 2006-09-20 10:56 · Score: 5, Informative

Huh. Going from the comments here, this has been given such a cunning spin that even most people here are fooled by it.

Let's make it a little bit more clear. California are not launching the lawsuit on the basis that "They're producing too much greenhouse gases". They're launching it on the basis that the automakers are not complying with regulations laid down by the Californian government - regulations which have been tied up by multiple lawsuits from the involved automakers. This is a countersuit - an attempt to get the courts on the government's side so that the automakers have nowhere left to turn and have to comply if they are to continue selling in the state. By most people's estimations, a government forcing companies to comply with their laws for the good of its constituents is fine and entirely within their right, but even most people who would have no problems with it when laid out like that are arguing against it here because it's been presented just so.

A very impressive (and simple, too) piece of spin - technically true, and makes the other party look like a fool.

Re:Impressive Spin by jkrausyao · 2006-09-20 12:23 · Score: 3, Insightful

The automakers are not complying with the disputed California laws because they are not valid. They are not valid because California lacks jurisdiction to make these laws since they involve interstate commerce. The different levels of government have different areas of responsibility. For goods that are traded globally it is not efficient for local governments to be involved in setting standards. This is one of the main advantages of international trade agreements, removing from local governments the setting of local standards and instead promoting global standards which results in better products at lower cost.

If California wants to reduce global warming they can raise the state gasoline tax, encourge people to walk to work by increasing housing density and with mixed-use development of housing and work, and providing better mass transit.

Great idea... by Arceliar · 2006-09-20 11:02 · Score: 2, Interesting

Sarcasm

Pass a law mandating emmisions be lowered by 25%, then sue the makers of the auto's for the user's actions with their product being in violation of a law that was passed after they made their product. While we're at it, let's throw every gun and knife manufacturer in jail because their products have killed people in the past.

End Sarcasm

I'm not particularly familiar with the law that was passed, but if you ask me, laws limiting greenhouse gas emmisions are a good thing on the whole (assuming they mandate semi-gradual change). But outrageous actions (and IMHO to sue them right now looks outrageous) will probably hurt the cause far more than it helps it. But what would I know?

You can't reduce oil consumption by taxing it. by raehl · 2006-09-20 11:11 · Score: 2, Interesting

And yet, we're still using about as much fuel as before the price hikes.

The phrase you are looking for is 'fungible commodity'.

In the short term, a certain amount of oil is produced every day, that gets refined into various products.

There is more than enough demand for oil to use up the supply. That's what establishes the price - if the demand for oil products is too high at a price, the price will go up. If demand at a price is too low, the price will go down.

So, if you tax oil products, what happens? Demand goes down. Price falls. So you end up with the same price for gas as you would have had without taxes - just more of the prize going to taxes. (Well, in a global market, what really happens is the price across the planet drops slightly and the oil products get sold elsewhere.)

In the *LONG* term, if you lower demand enough by taxing enough, the price people can sell oil products for (before tax) goes down, so it becomes less profitable to seek out new sources of oil. So less oil becomes available. Which ... causes the price to go up! And now that the price is back up again, it becomes worthwhile to seek out harder-to-get oil.

In the real long term, you raise gas taxes because, as mentioned above, it takes most of the revenue from gas and puts it into the government's hands to waste appropriately. Since there is thus less economic motivation for people to sell gas, there is a comparatively bigger motivation for energy-producers to invest in energy-production technology that is not taxed, where they can keep more of the profits.

--
paintball

It *IS* kind of odd... by SvnLyrBrto · 2006-09-20 11:21 · Score: 2, Insightful

.... to see Honda and Toyota on that list. Those two, in particular, seem to be taking the initiative in flooding us with nice little fuel-efficent compacts. Good on them, I say.

Every third or fourth Toyota I see, it seems these days, is a Prius. I walk past two on the way to the bus stop every morning for work. Half of what's left are Scions of one flavor or an other; not exactly slouches mileage-wise themselves. And last I heard, they were putting the Prius' hybrid system into a Camrey and licensing it out to Nissan, and Subaru! Honda hasn't been quite so sucessful on the hybrid front as Toyota, but they're absolutely burying us in Civics... you can't walk half a block without tripping over a dozen of the things.

Sure, none of the above is quite as good as pure electrics or hydrogen, but they're a far cry from the ford executioner or the gm suburban-soccer-mom-from-the-depths-of-hades-mobil e.

cya,
john

--
Imagine all the people...

Actually I have a better way than taxing fuel by Colin+Smith · 2006-09-20 11:46 · Score: 2

Simply add fuel producers to the cap and trade system. Instead of the money going into the government coffers, it goes directly to their greener, non fossil fuel using competitors, (including the biomass based fuel producers).

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Deleted

External detrimentality, anyone? by violet16 · 2006-09-20 11:55 · Score: 2, Insightful

I'm surprised by how strongly the Slashdot crowd is against this, and how nobody seems to understand the basic economics of it.

So here is a quick primer on external detrimentalities.

A for-profit business naturally attempts to maximize its revenues while minimizing costs. One method is to pass (some of) the costs off to someone else. The classic example is a factory pumping its waste into a nearby river, thereby transferring the disposal costs to other people, whose enjoyment of or utility from the river is diminished by its pollution.

This is known as an external detrimentality. It's good for the business, and probably even good for the business's customers, because it gets to sell its products cheaper. But that's only because it hasn't had to account for the true costs of manufacture. It's effectively getting subsidized. And subsidies skew natural market forces, resulting in inefficiency. For example, if there's a rival industry that properly paying for waste disposal, its products will be less competitive than they should be, and the industry will attract less investment.

The government's job--generally speaking, if it's interested in an efficient economiy--is to eliminate external detrimentalities and force businesses to account for their true costs of manufacture. It might do this by making it illegal to dump waste in rivers, or placing limits on acceptable pollution, or charging money for the use of radio bandwidth.

Today, if I buy a car and drive it around, I'm probably paying less than that behavior really costs, because I don't have to pay for most of the pollution I'm responsible for. That is, non-car owners in society are subsizing me, if only via their reduced enjoyment of smog-free days. Whether or not that's a moral issue, it's certainly an economic one, because we have made driving a car cheaper than it really is.

Certainly you can disagree with the specific method California is using here, but unless you believe other people should have to pay for your car, you shouldn't fault the general intent.

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I should buy some cement.

Hey Guys!!! Missed a few...... by kc8jhs · 2006-09-20 12:13 · Score: 2, Insightful

What about Porsche AG, BMW AG, Daimler-Benz AG, Ferrari. Volkswagen Group, Maserati and others?

Anyone know what the California Attorney General drives?

Hitting first to look like your not to blame by Spiked_Three · 2006-09-20 12:46 · Score: 2, Insightful

This reminds me of another major government cover-up lately.

Remember the recent tobacco settlements? Billions of dollars the government is seizing from the evil tobacco manufacturers in order to protect us? Does anyone think the government didn't know about what was going on all along? So they ignore their own medical experts, pass laws to support and tax tobacco companies and all of sudden when the public finally figures it out, the government jumps in to protect us. They were the chief business partner of the tobacco companies. And yet most Americans think the settlement was fair. The Government, who profited enormously from the tobacco companies and knew all along it was hurting us, suddenly becomes our defender and takes more money from the tobacco companies. It's hypocritical political slimery.

This California thing sounds just like it. The auto manufacturers all meet the laws on the books. They in good faith work to reduce pollution and succeed. And now all of a sudden the government sues them because what they have been doing all along isn't enough. Does anyone alive think that California government should NOT be listed as a defendant in this case? Seems they are guilty of the exact same actions as those they are accusing.

Ah what the heck does it matter? Americas Government system is at a point of meltdown. Corruption, extremist, intentional public lying - we can't be far from a revolution.

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slashdot troll = you make a compelling argument I do not like the implications of.

Re:Not Quite... by ackthpt · 2006-09-20 13:49 · Score: 2, Interesting

You know, most of the tax increases in California are voted for directly by the voters. Notice how many bond measures get passed? Yes, those are taxes. California is simply financially suicidle. The state would not fall into a deficit situation if they would stop giving money to special interest groups for projects that have nothing to do with basic govrnment services.

Sadly the state was in the black, with a reserve, before Enron and friends, with complete support of the whitehouse ("Energy concerns are not the concern of the Department of Energy") or sommat like that was their response, which was one of many of the litany of stupid things said by the president while terrible things happened at home and abroad. Energy companies robbed the state while the governor turned to Washington for assistance and was ignored then turned to what resources were at his disposal. I certainly doubt things would have gone the way they had if a republican were governor, in short I and many others believe it was a set-up to get Gray Davis sacked and put a republican in Sacramento so the GOP could do in California what they did in Florida.

On another note, Prop 13 gave everyone in California tax relieve, including businesses, who hadn't actually asked for it(!) That's what has really broken the back of the state budget for years in California. Education is the largest (or nearly) expense of each state. California with 35 million (+) is in the bottom third nationally in education spending. Which explains the poor shape of many of California's once stellar school and university education systems. Now it's a wreck and the state is in a deep budget hole.

Perhaps a state gas tax... I'm sure those who don't drive the preposterous SUVs or lifted 4x4's wouldn't really mind so much. Make those who are a disproportionate demand on petrol pay for it. Besides, who but the rich and insecure really need a Hummer in the city?

--

A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar

Re:Not Quite... by HappyEngineer · 2006-09-20 14:14 · Score: 4, Insightful

Ahnold's first move was to encumber the state by a couple billion zorkmids by repealing an emergency bugetary measure which increased a vehicle registration fee.

The act had been in place, should the state fall into a deficit situation and, riding a populist wave of revolt against it, he yanked the revenue generator.

Your phrasing is very nice. I like how you called it a "revenue generator".

Personally, I'd have phrased it like this:

"Arnold's first move was to fulfil a campaign pledge and repeal an unpopular tax increase that the legislature put in place to help cover up its irresponsible runaway spending habits."

"Separately, the California legislature once again passed a budget that failed to even attempt to cut spending in order to bring the budget deficit under control. At the same time voters continue their support of these habits by passing referendums that spend money like a drunk teen with his father's credit card."

"In a fit of total irresponsibility, voters also turned down a referendum that would have required their government to operate within a balanced budget."

"Just for fun, voters voted against an anti-gerrymandering law because they like things just the way they are."

I wish more actors would get into politics. Only the worst sort of person devotes their life to being a politician. Actors are able to glide into office on the basis of their popularity. In the past I'd have been annoyed by that, but I now realize that voters rarely vote people into office for good reasons. Paul Graham wrote an essay on how the most attractive candidates usually win. Therefore, it's better to get a wide selection of random people in office than it is to have a consistently bad selection of incumbents who have spent their lives as parasites on society.

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Cow Cube

Re:Not Quite... by Doppler00 · 2006-09-20 14:23 · Score: 4, Insightful

That's B.S. How did energy companies "rob" California? Oh, was it because California was reluctant to build powerplants for the last 20 years and was thus forced to by power on the spot market? You know what private companies do? They buy long term contracts for power. I know an aluminum plant that did this many years ago and it came a point where their contract for electricity was so cheap, they stopped producing aluminum and resold their power. That's economics. Someone else needed the electricity more then them.

You don't get efficient power distribution when you start regulating it with the government. And BTW, true deregulation never occured in California, until it does they will continue to have problems.

Gray Davis got sacked because he was incompentent, even for a democrat, and people are pretty dumb about voting for hollywood celebrities too.

I don't want to hear anything about education spending. Most people around where I live pay almost as much in property tax then I do in rent. Why? Oh, it's for the CHILDREN. As if people aren't smart enough to choose their own schools to put their kids in.

Re:Not Quite... by Martin+Blank · 2006-09-20 14:44 · Score: 4, Informative

As I recall, the deregulation was passed while Pete Wilson (a Republican) was in the governor's chair. As much as I'm in favor of deregulation in concept, the law that was passed was badly broken, especially sinced it forced the major electric suppliers to sell off many of their power generation assets, which sort of goes against the spirit of deregulation when you're regulating what the power companies can do.

Anyway, California is an odd state, with more Democrats than anything else, but also a larger independent/decline-to-state fraction than most states. It's why, despite a generally left-leaning population, four of the last six governors have been Republican, going back to Reagan. California Republicans tend to be a little different from what one might consider mainstream Republicans, though, tending to run more towards the middle of the road (Bob Dornan notwithstanding).

Half of the state budget is mandated to go to education. The problem, however, is that the state's schools often struggle with enormous bureaucracies and a population that includes high numbers of children of both legal and illegal migrants, which have their own unique set of difficulties as they can move at odd points in the school year, making it difficult to keep them up to par. At $8000 or so per student average funding, there's no reason that there should be declared a funding shortfall. However, much gets eaten up in helping these below-average students.

There's no problem with revenues. The problem lies with the Legislature's insistence on spending every dime of new income without paying off old debts. The last couple of years have seen unexpected jumps in revenue in the order of billions of dollars. Half of it has to go to education, but the other half is immediately seized for pet projects. Existing pet projects are already hurting things (look at the number of panels that meet only a few times a month -- if that often -- and pay the members tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars for very little actual work), and they just add more.

Part of me just wants to quit the state. For the moment, I will be voting to re-elect the governor, because as much as I want to see Terminator 4 and True Lies 2, I fear the consequences of Angelides in office more than I want to see new movies. Having a Republican in office at least offers a semblance of a bulwark against the Democrat-controlled Legislature's drive to ruin the state.

--
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.

Missing the point of the lawsuit by JohnsonWax · 2006-09-20 18:53 · Score: 2, Insightful

The lawsuit is about the fuel efficiency and emissions standards. California sued the federal government as well over these issues.

Essentially what California is trying to do is to get the auto makers to support these standards, to get them to oppose the federal government's efforts to prohibit the states from setting their own standards (basically making LA look like some non-class-M planet from Star Trek again).

So far, Toyota and Honda have been generally supportive of California's efforts (basically, they're sufficiently on top of things that they figure any technology rush to meet these standards will mean marketshare for them - Ford and GM would be about as fucked as you can possibly be). But the others are lobbying Congress to pass legislation to block California's existing laws and any new ones. The suit is designed to attach a cost to auto makers for doing this.

Think of it this way, a judge won't find for the state for the mere fact that cars pollute. A judge may find for the state if the automakers collectively conspire to undermine regulation that would reduce pollution.

Re:Not Quite... by gomoX · 2006-09-20 19:09 · Score: 2, Funny

I am not an American, but I just can't digest the fact that ARNOLD FRIKKIN SCHWARZENEGGER is the governor of California. Just how unbelievably bizarro is that??? In 1998 "AS is the governor of CA" could be used as an analogy of "pigs are flying *and* hell froze over at the same exact time". I just have to sleep now. I can't process this.

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My english is sow-sow. Sowhat?

Re:Not Quite... by cbacba · 2006-09-21 00:19 · Score: 2, Insightful

Actors for politicians are generally a bad idea. Reagan was rather unique in that he actually did very little acting long before and he was quite well versed, having developed his views from scratch rather than having been feed with the predigested sort you see prevelent among the modern holy-wood left of today.

I shudder to think of 'Conan the Republican' and his kennedy clan wife. He seems to have great ambitions and shallow roots.

Just remember, when you trust gov. to solve problems, those in charge are there only because they are experts in getting elected and not for their ability to solve problems. And for most of them, the more problems solved, the less they are needed. In other words, a solved problem is a lost opportunity.

Re:Not Quite... by IAmTheDave · 2006-09-21 01:40 · Score: 2, Insightful

The state would not fall into a deficit situation if they would stop giving money to special interest groups for projects that have nothing to do with basic govrnment services.

Brilliant.

I have a love-hate relationship with CA. Some of their regulations regarding emmissions, etc, help push the envelope forward, but then they forget to grandfather in any older vehicles. On the other hand, their desire to be so gigantically left brings about things like teaching Ebonics in schools (and I capitalize Ebonics with a bit of reservation).

But it's true - Cali, in its desire to be so progressive - wastes huge amounts of money on things not central to running a state, and then runs into huge state deficits just trying to run basic services.

So suing car manufacturers is a double-edged sword. If it's a combatant of the industry suing the state, then fine. If it's trying to extort money, it's stupid. You can't have standard A, which manufacturers meet, then later decide to enact standard B where B > A, and sue the manufacturers for meeting standard A for the years it was the standard.

I'm all for better fuel efficiency. Enacting stricter regulations? Good. Suing for meeting older regulations during the reign of those regulations? Ridiculous.

--
Excuse my speling.
Making The Bar Project

Re:Not Quite... by ajs · 2006-09-21 03:26 · Score: 2, Insightful

Wow, congratulations, you just posted an article full of explicits, lacking any facts what-so-ever.

And from the article in question:

"If you took down the steamer, how long would it take to get it back up?" an Enron worker is heard saying.

"Oh, it's not something you want to just be turning on and off every hour. Let's put it that way," another says.

"Well, why don't you just go ahead and shut her down."

Officials with the Snohomish Public Utility District near Seattle received the tapes from the Justice Department.

"This is the evidence we've all been waiting for. This proves they manipulated the market," said Eric Christensen, a spokesman for the utility.

I don't have a "side" in this, as I think Enron is unfairly blamed for much that was a result of both state and federal corruption. However, I certainly don't agree with the notion that they weren't in significant control of the situation. The state's lack of action put them in a spot to be manipulated and Enron saw to it that they were manipulated to the fullest extent possible.

mass transit by qwp · 2006-09-21 03:49 · Score: 2, Insightful

The only way the people of california should back this..
is if 100% of the award.. goes to creating a mass transit system.
No lawyers fee's, No campaign contributions, Just fund a construction project
to move people fast, efficient and CLEAN.

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California Sues Automakers for Global Warming

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