OT: Calif. Sues Six Carmakers over Greenhouse Gases

[Rodger Tellefson]

Again STOP stereotyping Californians. I our travels cross country in the past couple of years we've found that most, not all, big cities are very much the same. When you live in an area you don't see the faults as much as someone looking in from the outside. As I stated in a previous post our observation during our travels was that because much of the country that is not as populated where there are ranches, farms, etc. rely on their neighbors for help. That is not as prevelent here in California. When you take a good hard look at our Great State of California you'll find that probably 3/4 of it is agricultural, desert, and mountains. One significant thing that we do have is the Coastal Redwoods, just standing next to one of those giant, hundreds if not thousands of years old, trees makes one realize how insignificant we really are. Just look up the Redwoods on line to see what I mean.

 

[Richard L]

Actually, I love northern California. Especially San Fransico and Marin county, etc. I don't particularly care for southern CA, especially the LA area.



Austin,

So what's wrong with Country music and pick up trucks???



...Rich

 

[Nelson Atwell]

California shares some of the blame. They need to beef up their roads and public transit system. If their highways weren't in gridlock, then people wouldn't spend much of their commute idling and dumping wasted exhaust into the air.

 

[Ryan Schaecher]

I lived in Ramona (outside of San Diego... think massive wildfires) between 1987 and 1996. I love the area for it's beauty and weather.... but the politics of the state dumfound me. The people of SoCal (that is Camp Pendalton south) are pretty centrist, no real extremes on either side. But having been up and down the state over the past 20 years, I have seen that the plitics, common sense and general attitudes of the people go further left the further north you get. There are exceptions and I don't want to generalize, but when it comes to the liberal Mecca... is there any question that the state and more specifically the SF Bay area is where the rest of the leftists bow to?



Also, when it comes to kook laws, lawsuits and regulations, usually the People's Republic of Kommiefornia leads the way. It's also the home of Michael Newdow ('God' out of the pledge), the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, Hollywood, etc. San Fransisco was also the place where the city council would not let a private organization bring several retired warships (including the USS Iowa battleship) in to the bay to become museum pieces (and tourist attractions bringing in all kinds of $$$$, which the bankrupt state and city need) because they were "war relics" and "this piece loving city is no place for a warship"....



I can't wait to see the complete and utter failure of this lawsuit (assuming that the manufacturer's were meeting PRK's obscene emission standards) and the stinging defeat this will bring the goobers that control the state.

 

[Fred]

Maybe they need the $$$ from the carmakers to help pay for more public housing and free medical for non-taxpaying illegals. Why? Why did I say it??? :lol:

 

[Rodger Tellefson]

Nelson, I hear ya on the public/mass transit, but so far any attempt at doing so has been just a token mainly aimed at commuters and has caused traffic jams where it crosses intersections here in Sacramento. They need to put the money they're going to spend on lawyers sueing the auto makers into efficient mass transit similar to what they have in Europe. BTW, we did not notice any mass transit in Oklahoma City, Dallas, and Louisville even though I will give them the benefit of the doubt. What we thought was particularly interesting was that we saw more freeways being built in the vicinity of Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas than anywhere else we traveled. Hummmmm, did someone say Pork Barrel? If we truely want to ruduce pollution and greenhouse gases we need to build mass transit instead of freeways, but that would hurt the oil companies and auto makers, and their stockholder (i.e. you & I) in the pocket book. So we are in this love / hate relationship with our vehicles (especially the ST) and freeways.



edit: I do agree the Los Angles or Lost Angles (i.e. LaLa Land) can be a bit wierd. I have a sister who used to haul horses out of Montana, and she picked me up on one perticular trip and picked up a draft horse, very big horse, named FeFe. :lol:

 

[Nelson Atwell]

OK City has a bus system, but it isn't very robust. The city is pretty spread out, but even during rush hour one can drive the length of the city in about 20 minutes due to the numerous interstates that traverse our town. Los Angeles would need many more highways to accomplish the same efficiency, but if they were able to pull it off, it would reduce the gridlock and make for more efficient use of automobiles.

 

[Ryan Schaecher]

There are ZERO interstates in the town I live in, though they are building one (well, modifying Hwy 63 into I-555). But we do have a "new" mass transit system (for a town of 60,000???)... it can't even pay for itself...