One of the stories on a recent episode of the NPR daily podcast, Up First, was about the standoff between President Trump and the state of California. California wants to be able to maintain their own standards of emissions that are higher than other states, and their right to do so has been approved by Congress over a number of years.
Trump now wants to take them to court to force them to abide by the federal emission standards that will be coming out soon. Those standards are much lower than even what the Federal ones were, and the Governor of California is right in being concerned about what lowering standards will mean for the quality of air we breath and the effect carbon emissions has on Global Warming.
California wants to stick to controls they put in place that would require auto companies to produce vehicles that have greater fuel efficiency, with a goal of having a zero carbon footprint by 2045.
There is a lot more information about the battle between Trump and California’s governor in this excellent article in Inside Climate News “Trump Strips California’s Right to Set Tougher Auto Standards” written by Marianne Lavelle. She has the following quote from Gov. Newsom:
“You can’t get serious about climate change unless you get serious about vehicle emissions,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom said Wednesday at a news conference in Sacramento. “This is such a pivotal moment in the climate change debate, not just for California, but for our leadership around the world. It is a legacy moment.”
While I applaud Gov. Newsom for his efforts, a question that came to mind while listening to the NPR story is why do the auto companies have to rely on the federal government or the state government to tell them to build cars that have less emissions. They have to be fully aware of the fact that the auto emissions are the largest contributor to global warming, so why can’t they just step up and do the right thing?
Oh, I forgot. They’re probably controlled by the oil industry that doesn’t want cars to run more fuel efficiently because that will affect their bottom line. It’s really too bad in this day and age when we are facing such a climate crisis that corporations are still just looking out after themselves.
Don’t the people that run these companies have children and grandchildren to whom they’d like to give a planet that is livable?
FRIDAY FUN
It’s been a while since I posted some jokes to get the weekend off on a light note, so here are a few I snagged from The Laugh Factory.
A chicken walks into a library, goes up to a librarian and says, “Book book book.” The librarian decides that the chicken wants a book so he gives the chicken a book and the chicken walks away.
About ten minutes later the chicken comes back with the book, looking a bit agitated, saying, “Book book book.” The librarian decides the chicken wants another book so he takes the old book back and gives the chicken another book. The chicken walks out the door.
Ten minutes later the chicken comes back again, very agitated, saying, “Book book book!” so quickly it almost sounds like one word. The chicken puts the book on the librarians desk and looks up – waiting for another book.
This time the librarian gives the chicken another book and decides that something weird is happening. He follows the chicken out the door and into the park, all the way to the pond. In the pond is a frog sitting on a lily pad. The chicken gives the book to the the frog, who then says, “Reddit, reddit.”
It was a baby mosquito’s first day to fly out from home. When the mosquito came back home later that day, the father mosquito asked, “How was your journey?”
The baby mosquito replied, “It went great. Everyone was clapping for me!”
A circus owner walked into a bar to see everyone crowded around a table watching a little show. On the table was an upside down pot and a duck tap dancing on it. The circus owner was so impressed that he offered to buy the duck from its owner. After some wheeling and dealing, they settled for $10,000 for the duck and the pot.
Three days later the circus owner runs back to the bar in anger, “Your duck is a rip-off! I put him on the pot before a whole audience and he didn’t dance a single step!”
“So,” asked the duck’s former owner, “did you remember to light the candle under the pot?”
That’s all for me, folks. I do hope you have a great weekend. I’ll be at an art show in Sherman, TX today and tomorrow, sponsored by the Sherman Art League. See you back here next week. Be safe. Be happy.