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jtr1962 said:
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Sub_Umbra said:
Anyway, while all of those SUVs on the road just look like the "SUV loophole" to you, it looks very much like political will to me. Those are huge numbers of real people buying those vehicles. They actually want those vehicles. They vote. Whether they are right or not is irrelavent. They can only be ignored or summaraly dismissed by politicians at great political peril.
For whatever the reasons, right or wrong, all of those people have already voted on the CAFE standards where it really counts, with their wallets.
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Don't forget that part of the reason so many own SUVs is because of misleading advertising and misinformation on the part of the auto industry. For starters, they used the bigger and heavier is safer myth. And then they suddenly made it appear as if the fuel crisis of the 1970s and the need to conserve suddenly vanished just because gas prices fell. Actually, the very reason they fell was in response to the conservation effort, and the reason they are high now is in part because of all these SUVs. It takes a while before prices adjust to reflect usage. After that, auto makers simply advertised SUVs a lot more than other vehicles simply because they made more of a profit on them thanks to exemptions from fuel economy, emissions standards, and safety standards. It wouldn't be much of an exaggeration to say that people were brainwashed into wanting SUVs rather than having good reasons for actually wanting one. Face it, most Americans don't drive off road, don't need to climb the side of a building, don't need to tow 10,000 pounds, and don't drive in weather severe enough that a regular automobile can't handle. As for the oft-used excuse, "I have a family now", well people had even larger families twenty years ago yet managed to get by with a regular automobile.
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You've missed the whole point. As I stated a couple of times, it doesn't matter whether the SUV owners are right or wrong. It doesn't matter whether they're stupid or that they don't have their facts straight, or that they have been conned into their actions. Unless you're God or you've become the Absolute Dictator in charge in the United States, none of that means Jack. We don't do things here because YOU think that something is right or wrong. All of your rationalizations mean nothing without an enlightened dictatorship that would happen to agree with you.
Any serious energy policy changes in the US will be the result of a political process. Since this is still somewhat of a Democracy, the fact that you feel that everyone who dissagrees with you must have been duped is unimportant. When a Democrat or a Republican votes their choice it does not matter that a good percentage of them from both partys will be ignorant, stupid, misguided or totally uninformed. They all get their vote, no matter how stupid YOU think they are.
Democracy is far, far from some kind of blanket guarantee that the right thing will always be done and everyone will live in a world of peace and light. Democracy's only guarantee is that the individual is closer to making the decisions that have the potential to mess up his own life.
What I have said in my previous posts on this thread is that there is no political will for change in our energy policy at this time. What that means in our country is that nothing will change for the time being -- unless we have a radical change in the form of our government. Handwringing about how stupid SUV owners are won't change national policy. Ignoring the political realities won't change national policy.
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jtr1962 said:
Nevertheless, since people won't give up their SUVs unless it's in their self-interest I think two things should be done. First, allow the ultra-efficient vehicles I mentioned to cruise at higher legal speeds, and in a dedicated lane, whenever possible. A person might willingly give up their SUV if it means they can drive to work at 100 mph in a dedicated lane that usually moves at that speed rather than at the 65 mph (or frequently slower) that they drive at now. Time is money. This idea would work.
Second, put governers in SUVs to limit their top speed to a more efficient 45 mph. These are off-road vehicles, aren't they? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif You don't ever need to go much over 45 mph when these vehicles are used as intended (either off-road or towing a trailer). Once SUVs can't be used as cars any more, the only people owning them will be those who actually use them for what they're made for.
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Where is the political will that would be needed to bring either of those suggestions to fruition? I'd love to watch the politician who decided that it would be good for his career if he flagged down one out of every two or three passenger vehicles on the road today and tried to impose his draconian solution. [joke]I will admit that the image of many light weight, ultra-efficient vehicles at 100 mpg rear-ending Hummers lumbering at 45 mph would be entertaining.[/joke] I wonder why no politician has suggested those two solutions. It probably has something to do with politicians wanting to retain the option of picking their own retirement date -- instead of the voters.