Stopping the Spread . . .
November 4, 2023
If it hadn’t been for Florida, it is very possible the entire country would still be living under a “mask” regime. By ending the “masking” regime in Florida, “masking” became harder and harder to maintain-in-force elsewhere – because Florida’s example proved that it was ok to take off the “mask.” More to the point, it made it clear the ongoing insistence upon “masking” in other states (and by the federal government) was silly – and tyrannical.
This method could perhaps be used to stop the spread – of EVs.
Like “masks,” electric vehicles are not something put on the table by the door (so to speak) that anyone who wants one can decide to pick up if they want to. They are being shoved at all of us, just the same as “masks” were when we tried to enter a store without one.
Only it’s much more subtle when it comes to EVs.
People aren’t – yet – forced to buy one. But alternatives to them are being forced out-of-production (effectively) by federal regulations designed to be impossible to comply with. The pending (it goes into full effect in 2026) federal requirement that each car-maker’s entire roster of models average close to 50 miles-per-gallon, for example. The only way a car-maker can achieve such a “fleet average” – this is the terminology – is by building more EVs and fewer vehicles that aren’t. Each EV bumps up the “fleet average” – because each EV gets to claim it averages an “MPGe” that is much higher than the miles-per-gallon achievable by any non-EV.
A quick example:
The Ford F-150 Lightning, which is the battery-powered iteration of the F-150 half-ton pick-up truck – is credited by the federal government as delivering 68 “MPGe” – more than meeting the pending/2026 almost-50-MPG federal mandatory minimum. On the other hand, a V8-powered F-150 only averages 19 MPG.
Each non-electric F-150 made by Ford lowers its “fleet average” – and that increases the cost of making them (and so, selling them) via the fines applied by the government for failing to achieve the mandated-by-the-federal government “fleet average.” Ford is incentivized -via threats, in other words – to make more 68 “MPGe” Lightnings, even if it can’t sell them or ends up selling them at a loss – in order to offset the drag on its “fleet average” of non-EVs such as the V8 F-150, which it is incentivized to make fewer and fewer of – until only a very few are still being made and those priced so extravagantly that only a very few, very affluent people are able to afford them.
That’s the game that’s being played.
It’s one that we can’t win – at least, not by playing it.
So, let’s not.
Just the same as the “masking” game would never have ended if we’d all continued to play that game.
All it would take is for one state to declare itself a sanctuary state – for cars (and trucks) with engines. Federal regulations are, after all, federal regulations. If a vehicle is made for sale and use in a state, then – arguably – federal regulations do not apply.
Global War on Food and Dissent