Car Glass Rules Could Impair Cell, GPS and Radio Signals In CA

An anonymous reader writes "The California Air Resources Board (CARB) just passed a new regulation that requires glazed glass in automobiles that is supposed to reduce the need to use air conditioning. The catch is that the same properties that block electromagnetic sunlight radiation also block lower frequency electromagnetic radio waves. That means radios, satellite radios, GPS, garage door openers, and cell phones will be severely degraded. Even more surprising is that it requires this glass even for jeeps that have soft covers, plastic windows, and no air conditioning.'"

Comments

Re:! surprising

[Rei]

The thing is, Jeep (and others, like GEM) are appealing to CARB for a waiver, and will probably get one. It was an oversight, not something deliberate.

Re:the thing is....

[FatdogHaiku]

..marijuana really isn't illegal at the federal level

NO, that's wrong. It's a SCHEDULE I drug along with opium, Heroin, LSD and a long list viewable here:
http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/pubs/csa/812.htm#c

The complex litany of penalties is viewable here:http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/pubs/csa/841.htm#a

There was a Marihuana Tax Act... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marihuana_Tax_Act_of_1937:
Excerpt From Wikipedia
In 1969 in Leary v. United States, part of the Act was ruled to be unconstitutional as a violation of the Fifth Amendment, since a person seeking the tax stamp would have to incriminate him/herself. In response the Congress passed the Controlled Substances Act as Title II of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970. The 1937 Act was repealed by the 1970 Act.

Re:CARB, necessary evil

[QuoteMstr]

If you want something that gets 10 mpg, go ahead and buy it. Just don't come looking to me for a handout when you can no longer afford the gas. Yep, history spoke against me last year, yep, were 70,000 dollar Hummer drivers got their handouts.

Economically speaking, a high tax on gasoline is the best way of increasing fuel efficiency. But like we've seen time and time again, the technically best solution is confounded by social issues. Fuel economy standards are the next best thing. Consider:

• High gasoline prices hurt poor people. It's not their fault they can only afford a 1985 Fiesta. Yes, you can use rebates to somewhat soften the blow, but the proposed schemes are very complicated, and you can only draw the line so finely.
• People are more price-conscious at the pump than at the dealership. People in general are terrible at estimating things like depreciation and amortization, which means they don't account for the cost of gasoline when choosing a vehicle. It's cognitively easier to accept a slightly higher across-the-board increase on the price of new cars than it is to accept high prices at the pump, even if they're financially equivalent
• As a lemma from the previous point, politically, people rage at high gasoline prices, but calmly accept higher vehicle prices. Why? Vehicle prices are higher to start with, so the cost of better fuel economy gets lost in the noise. Second, people only go vehicle-hunting once every few years, and they expect the price to be higher anyway due to inflation. It's difficult to cognitively separate out the price increase from inflation and from better fuel economy standards. Because people compare the prices of new cards against each other and not against previous intervals, it's easier to stuff costs in new cars.
• Because the cost of better fuel economy standards only affects new cars at first, the burden is shifted toward the people most able to afford it: those rich enough to be buying new cars in the first place.

Better CAFE-style standards than nothing at all.

CARB is synonymous to SCO

[MoFoQ]

CARB "scientists" aren't really considered as scientists by real scientists.
Shoot, even one of the "scientists" from CARB faked his credentials.

CARB's also behind MTBE which nationally was mandated by the Federal Clean Air Act of 1990 but was predated by California's own state law, California Clean Air Act of 1988.
And as early as 1986, there was a scientific report that stated that MTBE was a "bad cookie" (finding the exact copy is a tad difficult but it is referred by the USGS in a 1993 report)

A major local (to the Bay Area) opponent to CARB is Dr. Bill Wattenburg (an older version of his site is here)

And apparently, CARB wants to require particular" paints (PDF) and barring any scientific/engineering breakthrough, that probably means dark colored cars (black, dark blues, etc.)

And dang, CARB's budget for 2009-2010 is over 600 million, just the imagine how many teachers would have been spared lay-offs...or how many professors, TAs, faculty at UC/CSU schools would have been spared from furloughs.

Not to forget the CARB vs Diesel fiasco

Re:! surprising

[Khyber]

When seconds count, the police are always minutes away.

Last time I got burglarized, there were PRINTS ALL OVER THE PLACE that were too large to have come from anybody that lived in my house. The cops didn't bother to even lift them to see if they belonged to a known fucking criminal.

As far as I can see, police have no benefit unless it's a drastic situation. They rarely follow traffic laws that they're supposed to be enforcing, and they selectively enforce those, as well. There are the few good officers out there, and they actually try to do a damned fine job, but the majority are just useless.

And don't even try to report a CRIME IN PROGRESS (Ponzi Scheme) and have the evidence to go with it, even despite the fact that at least one court ruled that said company was an illegal pyramid scheme (nevermind the fact that unsolicited sales in parking lots is prohibited in CA, some of the same people sucked in got fines in court for it.) They simply do not want to hear about it.