CARB States, Groupthink, Useful Idiots and “Science”
Bob Tomaine NaturalGasNOW
Contributing Writer
[Editor’s Note: Pennsylvania is one of several CARB States. Who knew? Political groupthink, combined with useful idiots, is destroying science and not helping our lives.]
The origin of the quip that “the beatings will continue until morale improves” is murky at best and while variations exist, the basic sentiment nicely summarizes the current attitude at the federal level and among some states toward electric vehicles.
In short, thanks to a “proposed standard” from the Environmental Protection Agency, Americans would effectively be forced to buy EVs. In reporting on the EPA’s move, Roll Call explained that “(t)he Biden administration wants to jolt the electric vehicle market by putting the squeeze on automakers in the form of much tougher standards for greenhouse gas emissions.” The “squeeze” of course, is actually going to be put on drivers who’ll be compelled to buy costlier vehicles that few really want.
Those who seek nothing less than control will try nearly any approach to eliminating internal combustion engines. If a total ban might be too outrageous, their second choice will be to price them out of existence, a process already underway by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Never mind the genuinely inconvenient truth that internal combustion engines powered by gasoline, diesel, natural gas, propane, &c. are the ones that the majority of drivers prefer in their vehicles. The federal government is ready with an answer, having honed its techniques on the gas stove ban that President Biden said his administration “does not support” and it doesn’t take a great stretch of the imagination to see that the administration’s lack of a formal ban on internal-combustion-engine vehicles has nothing to do with its working to make them as expensive as possible. In other words, the line about the beatings and morale has now been updated to read “the coercion will continue until EV sales improve.”
Not everyone, though, is falling into line. SEMA, the Specialty Equipment Manufacturers Association, “advocates for the ability of consumers and the marketplace to choose what works best for them. There are many options on the road to zero emissions, as it is crucial for government policy to remain technology neutral.” Obviously, SEMA has a more-than-passing interest in everything automotive and it almost certainly has more collective experience and knowledge than the EPA in that field. It’s thus on solid ground when it states that “(u)ltimately, consumers, not the government, should be allowed to choose the type of vehicle technology that best serves them and their families” despite the fact that “it is clear from the Biden administration’s actions and words that electrification is their technology of choice.”
While SEMA isn’t alone in the fight, the EPA has plenty of allies as a significant number of states have effectively abdicated their sovereignty by becoming “CARB states” and blindly following California into the depths of its automotive fantasy world. Pennsylvania is one of those states placing destructive political correctness in its trendiest green form above consideration of their own citizens’ best interests. Oddly enough, the economically damaging Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative seems much more widely known in Pennsylvania than does the Commonwealth’s status as a “CARB state” with all of the economic damage and the limits on personal freedom the latter promises.
In a very real way, the COVID “crisis” was the perfect test run for the push to restrict individuals’ freedom of travel, which would be the most important and far-reaching result of the elimination of vehicles powered by internal combustion engines. After all, in a world rife with groupthink and no shortage of useful idiots, merely citing “Science” all but guarantees a reverent credibility even if a statement sounds as silly as, say trying to connect home runs in professional baseball to “climate change.” No one would make such a ludicrous argument any sooner than he’d attempt to prove that Rhode Island is bigger than Texas.
Oh. Wait a minute.
Never mind.
Text and Photo Copyright 2023 by Bob Tomaine
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