[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Bill Magavern
Director
Sierra Club California

Yesterday, members of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers met with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, as part of their campaign to thwart our state’s pioneering greenhouse gas emissions standards.

Sierra Club California thanks Governor Schwarzenegger, Attorney General Brown and Air Resources Board Chair Nichols for bravely and staunchly upholding California’s clean car rules. Sierra Club California's "Climate Chicken" made a brief appearance at the Capitol, urging the automakers to cross the road to better.

Putting the brakes on California’s Clean Car Law AB 1493 (Pavley) rules won't lower the price that families pay at the pump, and it won't reduce global warming pollution. Only cleaner, more efficient cars will.

Here's why even Climate Chickens should support the Clean Car Law:

Climate Chickens Are Larger Than Life, and California’s plan creates even bigger reductions in greenhouse gases than the Bush Administration’s proposed fuel economy standards. If all 50 states were to take on the greenhouse gas goals, 1,323 million metric tons of greenhouse gas would be removed by 2020.

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Frank O'Donnell
President
Clean Air Watch

It’s a lovely Friday in our nation’s capital, but it’s being marred by the emissions of a new lobbying blitz by car companies and car dealers. They held a press briefing today. The target here is any attempt to reinstate the right of California and other states to set greenhouse gas standards for motor vehicles.

There they go again! The same companies that literally fought for decades against better fuel economy standards now claim new standards enacted by Congress are just peachy.

They are being extremely disingenuous. They are spending on lawyers and lobbying instead of better engineering. And, if they have their way, consumers will suffer. (Note, by the way, that in Canada, the car companies are calling on the government to raise gasoline prices! Keep that in mind when you hear them whine that all they care about is the consumer!)

The car lobby got to the Bush administration (you will recall the administration’s decision to reject the California standards amid a hail of lies, despite the legal and technical advice of EPA’s professionals). But now they are trying to seal the deal with Congress.

A couple of quick thoughts:

The car companies and car dealers continue repeating several big lies:

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Gary A. Patton
Executive Director
Planning and Conservation League

Last week, in a move that is sure to leave President Bush's stocking dripping with fossil fuel derivatives, the Bush Administration denied California's request to implement AB 1493, which limits greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles. Enforcement of California's law would require a waiver from the U.S. EPA under the federal Clean Air Act. Bush officials balked at California's attempt to regulate greenhouse gases and cited the new federal fuel economy standards in their Santa-baiting waiver denial.

In just about every other part of the world, smarter heads prevail. Here are three examples of cities that are cutting greenhouse gas emissions and increasing their resilience to global warming impacts (earning them candy canes, sugar plums, and new socks):

by David Dayen [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

“Congress must not let the president stand in their way,” the Sac Bee editorializes this morning, with regard to the new energy bill passed by the House of Representativesand currently being debated in the Senate. The Bush Administrationopposes the higher fuel economy standards which the bill would enact,and which is estimated to save the country 1.1 billion barrels of oilper day by 2020.

Mike Huckabee, riding on the support of Evangelicals, southerners, and conservatives, is now second in the polls behind Rudy Guiliani for the Republican nomination, reports the San Francisco Chronicle. Huckabee's response: "Why not me?"

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

Maybe we are finally doing something about global warming: theHouse of Representatives has passed a major energy bill, by a 235-181vote, that would increase vehicle fuel economy standards by 40% to35 miles per gallon, reports the LA Times. But the bill faces a tougherbattle in the Senate, and is strongly opposed by the BushAdministration, which is concerned about measures that would repeal $13billion in tax breaks for oil companies, and require utilities togenerate more power from alternative energy sources. Should it pass, itwould mark the first time fuel economy standards have been raised since1975.

Economic analysts are making dismal predictions about the California economy in the next year, reports the San Francisco Chronicle. Tighter creditand falling home sales will contribute to slow growth and an elevatedunemployment rate. The state budget deficit is also expected to widen,and decreased public spending is in turn expected to slow down therecovery.

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Rosemary Shahan
Board Member
Speak Out California http://speakoutca.org/

Amid all the well-deserved homage being paid to Nobel prize winner and former Vice President Al Gore, is a message unique to Californians.

Washington is too beholden to the gas, oil, and auto industries to seriously address global warming. The Bush administration is hell-bent on denial and delay. Bush, Cheney, and their rapacious cronies in the dinosaur energy biz are preoccupied with devising ways to block California's landmark global warming law, AB 32 (Nunez).

In Congress, the Senate voted to raise fuel economy standards for automobiles, only to have the popular mandate stymied in the House by powerful and profoundly destructive Rep. John Dingell of Detroit, married to a GM executive and notorious for blocking desperately needed progress in automotive technology on everything from seat belts and air bags to stronger bumpers and improved fuel economy.

Until we have a new Presidential administration that is pro-environment, and Rep. Dingell leaves Congress, the only way we will make progress on auto fuel economy- the leading way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions- is for the states to lead. By default, California is on the front lines of the battle to curb the climate-changing gases that are destroying our planet.