By Rob Meyne
- April 10, 2024
- 5-min read
If you want yet another example of how freedom dies, spend fifteen consecutive seconds considering the EPAs’ recent rule that will require the death of internal combustion engine vehicles.
The insidious nature of the creeping bureaucratic state has been detailed by people as varied as Ronald Reagan, Ayn Rand, and anyone sentient and intelligent enough to pay attention.
The EPA is the Devil’s Spawn. It was created under President Nixon, as a paean to the far left who thought all Republicans wanted to kill puppies, poison water, and finish it all over a heaping plate of Whooping Crane Helper. Nixon was, some would say, suckered into the con that you can get people who hate you to like you just by being more like them.
It seldom works, and old Tricky Dick lived long enough to realize his idea of empowering a bunch of unelected bureaucrats to regulate every small detail of our private lives, all in the name of saving the planet, has cost us much and not produced enough.
The EPA has gone to court to argue they have the power to regulate CO2. CO2 is, of course, a naturally occurring substance, without which life would not be possible. It amounts to a total of about 0.04 per cent of the atmosphere (that is four one-hundredths of one per cent). We exhale it, you and I, as do all animals. Plants can’t live without it. If Co2 disappeared, so would life. But we are to believe it is the enemy. Sure, yeah, let’s pretend it is evil and let some clown in DC make six figures bitching about it.
So now comes the most damaging, unintelligent, and eventually unpopular rule in the history of DC. It will result in the banning of cars and trucks, as we have come to know them. You read that correctly.
The rule will force American car companies to produce more electric vehicles, and fewer gas-powered ones, resulting in a de facto banning of traditional vehicle by 2032. You read that right. Eight years from now, everyone will be expected to go for EVs.
If you want a good summary, see the piece in Real Clear Policy, April 8, by analyst John Miltimore. It is clear and compelling. He says, “Forcing automobile companies to expand production of their least-profitable product lines at the expense of their best-performing ones is economic madness.”