Posted by
BLOGASSAULT on Monday, May 18, 2009 7:08:58 PM
Obama will offer new
CAFE standards later this week. You can hear the chanting already..."yes we can", "yes we can". Yes, he can force companies to build what he wants.
And then you read the language used to describe Obama's brilliance by other democrats, and you can only sigh.
“If media reports are true, after years of oil price inflation, policy stagnation and automotive industry litigation, President Obama has solved the energy and economic policy equivalent of a Rubik’s Cube,” said Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who was a principal author of the 35 mpg standard that passed Congress in 2007.
So, what exactly has he solved?
The national emissions policy for autos, which will ramp up to a new standard of about 35 miles per gallon in 2016, will harmonize the corporate average fuel economy, or CAFE, standard and the Environmental Protection Agency's greenhouse-gas standard.
That way, officials explain, industry will not have to worry that the administration will regulate those on separate tracks.
He is so smart! Man, he is a policy genius!
In secret conversations, the Obama administration has lined up support from many state governments and a huge array of domestic and foreign automakers, including GM, Ford, Chrysler, BMW and many more.
It should be no surpise that he managed to get agreements from most of the domestic auto industry being they are all either run by the Obama administration or owe the government a bunch of money. Foreign companies think Obama is the second coming so they signed on with ease. As far as state governments are concerned, most are in democratic hands right now, so he had little contest there either.
Here is what he has managed to do...get the car companies to agree to build a bunch of cars that nobody will want; small, ugly and dangerous, but easy on the fuel gauge. Might as well get used to it.