Christ

 

MAGA

 Back to the good old days of gas-guzzling polluters.

God forbid we should make any progress anywhere.

Embarassingly transparent

AM radio is where most of the right-wing propaganda occurs.  I can understand why Republicans want it available, but what's with the Dems?  Also, GOP, whatever happened to your passionate belief in freedom of speech and zero governmental interference in private commerce?  

The bill’s introduction came after reports indicated manufacturers like BMW, Volkswagen, Mazda and Tesla are removing AM radio from their vehicles because electric engines can interfere with the AM stations’ sound.

[...]

[Texas Senator Ted] Cruz said in the release Congress should quickly pass the bill to ensure the country has access to news, music, talk shows and emergency alerts.

All of which are available on FM radio.

[Ed Markey (D-Mass.)] said free AM radio has been essential for use in emergencies and as a source of news, weather, sports and entertainment for tens of millions of people for decades.

Yes, but there are special stations dedicated for emergency information. Are they only available via AM?  No.  And all those things can be had via FM radio.  I'm pretty sure talk radio propaganda can move to the FM band as well.  

FM needs more expensive equipment and costs more to maintain, but propaganda is popular and pays well.  On the other hand, I can see that poor people susceptible to AM propaganda are probably not buying electric vehicles anyway, so no problem.  The future may be all electric vehicles, but that's probably a long way off.  And in the meantime, automobile manufacturers should only be regulated as to safety and environmental concerns, not propaganda efficiency.

source

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 05/24/2023:

Ford must be extremely sensitive.

The big deal spillover

Where will we get all the chips needed for new electric vehicles?

[E]ven as Biden signs into law more than $52 billion in “incentives” designed to lure chipmakers to the U.S., an unusual alliance of industry lobbyists, hard-core China hawks and science advocates says the president’s dream lacks a key ingredient — a small yet critical core of high-skilled workers. It’s a politically troubling irony: To achieve the long-sought goal of returning high-end manufacturing to the United States, the country must, paradoxically, attract more foreign workers.

“For high-tech industry in general — which of course, includes the chip industry — the workforce is a huge problem,” said Julia Phillips, a member of the National Science Board.

[...]

From electrical engineering to computer science, the U.S. currently does not produce enough doctorates and master’s degrees in the science, technology, engineering and math fields who can go on to work in U.S.-based microchip plants.

[...]

Powerful members of both parties have diagnosed the problem and floated potential fixes. But they have so far been stymied by the politics of immigration, where a handful of lawmakers stand in the way of reforms few are willing to risk their careers to achieve.

  Politico

How about incentives and facilities to educate and train US citizens?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

California always leads the way

Well, THAT won't be contested, will it?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

While you're distracted

The Trump administration on Tuesday rolled back an Obama-era law that pushes automakers to produce more fuel efficient vehicles, severely limiting a rule designed to decrease pollution from transportation in the face of climate change.

The new rule cuts the year-over-year improvements expected from the auto industry, slashing standards that require automakers to produce fleets that average nearly 55 mpg by 2025. Instead, the Trump rule would bring that number down to about 40 mpg by 2026, bringing mileage below what automakers have said is possible for them to achieve.

The Trump administration has argued that cutting Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards will allow automakers to produce cheaper cars, something they say will save 3,300 lives as lower prices spur consumers to upgrade to new vehicles with better safety features that guzzle less gas than older models.

  The Hill

That's absolute bullshit. The Department of Transportation has already put out a report that it's too late to do anything about climate change, so there's no reason to put restraints on auto makers. *

They're in grab it all while you can mode.

They tried to roll back the Obama law a year ago. We weren't coping with a pandemic then.

*

One startling example of this attitude can be seen in July’s US Department of Transportation’s draft environmental impact statement on future vehicle emission standards, which acknowledged the scientific consensus that without significant action,global temperatures by 2100 will be 4 degree C higher than preindustrial levels. Instead of framing the accepted science as a call to radical action, it used the stark numbers to justify no policy change, reasoning that the inevitable temperature rise was so great that increasing fuel efficiency standards would make little difference. Leaving aside the absurd circular logic of justifying doing nothing because not enough is being done, the Dept. of Transportation report demonstrates that the IPCC report won’t change any politician’s mind who simply does not care about the future: 1.5 degrees, 2 degrees, 4 degrees, it’s all inevitable to the Trump administration and doesn’t mean we have to do anything.

  MIT Press

Fake News

CNN's Jake Tapper had a special last night on Trump's lies and the dangers they present.  (I never watch TV any more and was reminded why. Christ, there were so many commercials, it seemed like commercial and show time had switched places.  Is that normal, or did advertisers think this was going to be an extra-high viewer event?)

One of the dangers was connected to Trump's climate lies.  If people quit believing what scientists are telling them, we are all in peril of our very lives.  With that in mind...

The concentration of climate-heating greenhouse gases has hit a record high, according to a report from the UN’s World Meteorological Organization.

The jumps in the key gases measured in 2018 were all above the average for the last decade, showing action on the climate emergency to date is having no effect in the atmosphere.

  The Guardian

And you know the Republican, corporate and Trump admin response: it's too late, so let's party.

The rise in concentration of greenhouses gases follows inevitably from the continued surge in global emissions, which was described as “brutal news” for 2018. The world’s scientists calculate that emissions must fall by half by 2030 to give a good chance of limiting global heating to 1.5C, beyond which hundreds of millions of people will suffer more heatwaves, droughts, floods and poverty.

[...]

Petteri Taalas, the WMO secretary-general, said: “There is no sign of a slowdown, let alone a decline, despite all the commitments under the Paris agreement on climate change. We need to increase the level of ambition for the sake of the future welfare of mankind.

[...]

Three-quarters of the emissions cuts pledged by countries under the Paris agreement of 2015 are “totally inadequate”, according to a comprehensive expert analysis published earlier in November, putting the world on a path to climate disaster.

Monday’s surprise move by General Motors, Toyota and other auto giants to back President Trump in his fight with California over pollution rules came after days of White House pressure to support one of the administration’s biggest efforts to weaken climate regulations.

  NYT

I wouldn't call that a surprise.

Previously, many automakers had indicated to California that they would not take a stand, according to Mary D. Nichols, chairwoman of California’s clean air regulator, the Air Resources Board.

Late last week, their stance quickly changed.

Andrew Olmem, a top policy aide to Mr. Trump, began calling car companies to push them to sign on to the administration’s effort in the courts to eliminate California’s right to set its own auto emissions rules on planet warming pollution, a power granted under the Clean Air Act of 1970. He was joined on the phone in some cases by Justice Department officials, according to a person familiar with the matter.

[...]

Carmakers have long feared that Mr. Trump might retaliate, either with tariffs or trade restrictions, if they didn’t support his effort to dismantle the rules, which were designed to fight climate change. After California struck its deal with [four automakers: Ford, Honda, Volkswagen and BMW], the administration and Justice Department pushed a series of unusual legal and policy moves against the state and those companies — including an antitrust investigation — that were widely perceived as retaliatory.

[...]

The split among the auto giants is far more consequential than simply the pursuit of divergent legal strategies among corporate competitors. “This is a huge rift. These vehicle manufacturers are splitting up in unique ways,” said Barry Rabe, a professor of public and environmental policy at the University of Michigan. “Imagine an administration unleashed in a second term to confront any industry that does not do the political bidding of the president,” he said.

[...]

The Trump administration and the Justice Department have also pursued a host of legal measures against California and the car companies that have sided with it.

Last month, for example, days after California filed its suit fighting the administration’s revocation of its emissions authority, the Justice Department opened its antitrust inquiry into the four automakers that had joined with California. The administration also sent a letter to the state threatening to withhold federal highway funds if it did not comply with certain Environmental Protection Agency demands. And last week, the Justice Department sued California over its effort to extend its climate change initiative into Canada.

We are being run by a crime syndicate.

In September, the administration revoked the legal authority of California and other states to set their own standards.

Because Republicans are so deeply committed to States rights.

Separately, the E.P.A. and Transportation Department are working on a new rule, which they expect to publish this winter, rolling back the national fuel economy standard to about 40 miles per gallon.

That crafting of that rule — which Trump administration officials had expected to unveil in May — has been plagued with confusion and delays, as many people familiar with the process say that Mr. Trump’s appointees are struggling to prepare a plan that can withstand legal challenges.

That's why you pack the courts, right Mitch?

Republicans, corporations and the Trump administration may well be right about one thing: It's too late.

But, we know that the corporations knew what was happening back when it wasn't too late. So maybe they should be sued and made to pay for all the efforts we can possibly make to at least attempt to avert the climate disaster every serious report says we're headed for.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Governing by grievance*

Yesterday AM:





He's really ramping up tweets that set up a blame-the-fed scenario for the recession speeding its way toward us, in part due to his own absurd (thank you PM Frederiksen) actions.

Last night.










So is MAGA now going all the way back to the 20s?   

This morning  (Did he even sleep last night?)





...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

* h/t Toluse Olorunnipa

Bitch, bitch, bitch

That's what I say every time I see he's posted another tweet.

"Other much better car companies are coming into the U.S. in droves." My ass.  Name one.

And why is a UAW president responsible for G.M. production?

Dickhead.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

LOL UPDATE:

Somebody told him what an ass he was on that last tweet.



Oh, SHE blamed the UAW, huh? 

You want it open!  Stamp your little foot.

Dickhead.

Make America choke again

California and 16 other U.S. states are suing the Trump administration over its plans to scrap standards for how much greenhouse gases vehicles can emit.

California Gov. Jerry Brown and Attorney General Xavier Becerra announced the lawsuit Tuesday.

It takes aim at a plan by the Environmental Protection Agency to scrap standards for vehicles manufactured between 2022 and 2025.

The standards would have required vehicles to get 36 miles per gallon (58 kilometers per gallon) by 2025, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) over the existing standard.

EPA administrator Scott Pruitt says the standards are not appropriate and need revision.

  TPM

I agree. They need to be revised upward. When I was in high school 110 years ago, they were telling us they had the technology to make engines that would get 100 miles per gallon. This is all bullshit.

What's with the number 36?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Make America Toxic Again

The Trump administration is expected to announce that it will roll back automobile gas mileage and pollution standards.

Automakers wanted the government to relax the current standards, which were imposed by the Obama administration to combat climate change. They say the rules will cost the industry billions of dollars and raise vehicle prices.

  TTPM

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

And it's only just begun

Trump in Japan:

"Try building your cars in the United States instead of shipping them over. Is that possible to ask? That's not rude. Is that rude? I don't think so," Trump told executives from automakers including Toyota (TM) and Mazda (MZDAF) during a trip to Japan on Monday.

  CNN Money

Not only is it rude, it's incredibly ignorant.

"Many Japanese cars are made in the U.S. already and this request is not reflective of today's reality," said Stephen Nagy, a professor at Tokyo's International Christian University.

Oh, excuse me.  "Not reflective of today's reality."

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Jobs! Jobs! Jobs!

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

For Your Own Good

Federal regulators are proposing that new automobiles sold in the United States after September 2014 come equipped with black boxes, so-called “event data recorders” that chronicle everything from how fast a vehicle was traveling, the number of passengers and even a car’s location.

While many automakers have voluntarily installed the devices already, the National Transportation Safety Agency wants to hear your comments by February 11 on its proposal mandating them in all vehicles. Congress has empowered the agency to set motor-vehicle-safety rules.

Clearly, regulators’ intentions are about safety, as the devices would trigger — for about 30 seconds — during so-called “events” such as during sudden breaking, acceleration, swerving or other types of driving that might lead to an accident. The data, which can either be downloaded remotely or by a physical connection, depending upon a vehicle’s model, is to be used by manufacturers and regulators “primarily for the purpose of post-crash assessment of vehicle safety system performance,” according to an announcement in the Federal Register. (.pdf)

  Wired

Oh, sure.

They'll be used in lawsuits by auto manufacturers, and that's what they're designed for. Why else volunteer to install them?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.