“Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman accused President Biden of being “willing to sacrifice the American auto industry and its workers in service of its radical green agenda.”
I mean we could try and transition workers from a more negative industry type to a positive one…but that seems like a lot of work and less profitable, so never mind.
What the actual fuck is wrong with Republican politicians? I mean, I already know what’s wrong with Republican voters - brainwashing by years of Fox “News” - but the politicians? Are they all literal sociopaths?
The philosophy behind conservativism is to stay still. Conserve the status. Do not progress.
But you’re describing a standard Dem. Repubs are actively trying to drag us backwards. They are regressives.
I’m already depressed as it is. Why do you have to do me in like that?
That’s a popular misconception. The philosophy behind conservatism is to perpetuate hierarchy. The ideology was developed by literal monarchists, and when the “divine right” excuse became untenable they moved on to others like racism and capitalism, but the goal remained the same. It only seems like they want to maintain the status quo because the historical status quo was hierarchical, but rest assured: if society were magically egalitarian instead, conservatives would vigorously try to make sweeping, wholesale changes to create a hierarchy from scratch.
Are they all literal sociopaths?
Yes. Just pick one and pay attention to what they do and say for a little while.
No, they’re just doing what they’re being paid to do by special interest groups aka big business. It’s not a bug and it’s not a feature; it’s the point. Optimal profits this quarter. Every quarter is a new quasi generation of executives who want a good quarter before moving on after x quarters.
This is republican assholes wanting to protect their oil wealth. Has nothing to do with workers.
Imagine actively destroying the place your kids live to get more money. They’re psychopaths
What’s the plan if we run out of oil? I mean seriously, it’s gonna happen eventually. Even if you want to ignore the science on climate change, you can’t ignore basic laws of the universe that oil is a finite resource. If we don’t have a plan for when it runs out, there will be utter chaos.
Die. We will die. The only crutch that props up our massive jump from 1 billion pre industrialized society to our current 8 billion human beings on this planet, has been cheap and plentiful fossil fuel. Notably, it is the only thing that has allowed us to practice agriculture on a scale that supports our population growth. When it’s gone, there is nothing to replace it, short of a miracle fusion revolution.
The average carbon cost to produce an electric vehicle is about 6 tons on average, not including the battery, about the same as an ICE vehicle. Where does the energy for auto manufacturing come from? Primarily coal and natural gas, with a sliver of insubstantial wind and nuclear power. About 7 barrels of oil go into each and every tire on the road (between expended energy and actual petroleum products in the tire). Charging the battery? Coal, natural gas, and the same trickle of alternative sources mentioned above.
Speaking of those alternative energy sources, what do we use to make them? Building a nuclear power plant is likely the most carbon intensive process ever devised, from the machinery that moves the earth, to the foundry that makes the steel. As much as I’ve always wanted to believe in a cozy eco future, every time I squint a little I can see that it’s all just a coat of green paint over the same old oil field. The people trying to sell you on oil, and the people trying to sell you on alternatives to it, are doing the same thing. Selling you something. That’s all that matters to them.
There is no feasible alternative that changes the outcome. There is no replacement for what has allowed us to create wonders and horrors beyond our ancestors wildest dreams, and sustain a population far beyond anything we could have achieved without fossil fuels. When oil finally becomes unproductive, so will the mechanisms that hold our current civilization together, and we will wind up back in 1810 if we’re lucky, or 400ad if we aren’t.
Call me a doomer and downvote me or whatever. It doesn’t matter.
Yeah I was heavily into peak oil once, too.
Don’t underestimate the power of literally everyone on the planet really really wanting to avoid that situation. Life finds a way.
99.9% of those people have no power to change anything of consequence, and most of the ones who have the power think their money will protect them.
That’s all great, but the real thing that will stop it is economics. We have a PHEV and I calculated it out and we pay $8 per gallon equivalent compared to $5.50 for regular gas. That’s a pretty big difference. Right now we ignore the EV part of the vehicle. (Live in California and I pay $0.50/kwh.)
We’re planning on getting solar shortly and that may make it feasible, but until then, it’s not.
Where in California are you? Here in SoCal with SCE their PRIME Time Of Use plan is $0.26/kWH from 9PM - 4PM. Totally works for my family since we work from home and drive EVs locally. We also have a 2019 Prius which gets us about 50-55 MPG and 500+ miles on a full tank for longer drives.
Edit: I should add that the standard Time Of Use plan is $0.38/kWH from 9PM - 4PM. Peak hour usage from 4PM - 9PM is somewhere between $0.53 - $0.62/kWh I think.
We mainly charge our car overnight and it works out well for us.
I’m in the SF bay area.
The off-hours rate for my electricity is $0.04 cheaper than the prime hours rate. It’s laughable. $0.51 vs $0.47. Why bother even thinking about it at that pathetic difference? It’s certainly not going to change the math much.
Ouch!! That is brutal. Do you see a lot of EVs on the road there?
Inb4 “both parties are the same”.
While I hate stuff like these rollbacks, we are already starting to see EVs save people money on gas and service, and they are stupidly fast compared to ICE counterparts. That’s something Americans of all stripes can get behind.
Once I tried an ebike, I realized I never wanted to go back to gas engines. So fast, so much torque, and pennies to charge vs $70 gas tanks at Costco (even more at a normal gas station). It just makes economic sense to run PEVs in all major urban areas in addition to mass transit.
With traffic and some protected bike lanes, even a conventional bike can almost beat a car in a 7-14 mile drive in my city. An ebike makes it even easier.
I’d be riding an ebike right now, if I knew how I could park it safely :/ do you typically bring it with you?
I use an Oxford Monster chain and U lock. I park my bike in highly visible areas. Registered it with 529 garage and have the tracking sticker on it. And if I’m really sketched out, I activate a bike alarm that is ungodly loud.
Mostly, it’s about making your bike harder to steal. Cutting through 12mm chain and a standard ulock sucks. Getting caught with it being easily identified on 529 makes it risky to steal and easy to be returned. Some cities also do bike valet or bike lockers.
So there are politicans who really believe that climate change is a conspiracy? Or they just don’t care for the future?
Electric cars aren’t going to fix climate change
Electric trains might, but we’re even worse at building them than cars.
Are we? Diesel-ev hybrid is fairly effective and proven. Making a pure ev would just mean taking the diesel out, adding more batteries and installing electrical rail or over head trolley cables to charge them. Trains run on a schedule, so logistic planning should be straight forward.
Are we?
Recently, yes. California’s spent 16 years not building rail. The Gulf Coast states have been tearing their rail out and replacing it with highways for over a decade. The Upper Midwest has just kinda given up on doing anything useful, and just watched its transit infrastructure collapse.
The problem is that highway advocates don’t solve the problem of “who’s going to pay for all this?”. The reason infrastructure in America is in disrepair is that funding for highways is supposed to be gotten from tolls and road taxes. But since everywhere in America is a freeway… there’s no funding for repairs.
Expecting the Government budget to cover maintenance of infrastructure is wishful thinking… unless you’re also willing to agree that the military is allocated too much money.
funding for highways is supposed to be gotten from tolls and road taxes.
Regressive taxation leads to overfunded main roads and underfunded side streets.
Expecting the Government budget to cover maintenance of infrastructure is wishful thinking
Roads are fundamental to the operation of any government. It isn’t simply that states need to maintain roads. It is that states need roads in order to exist.
Roads are fundamental to the operation of any government. It isn’t simply that states need to maintain roads. It is that states need roads in order to exist.
Is it right to say then, that the users of the roads pay for maintenance? Do you expect the government to print more money to pay for maintenance?
Edit:
Regressive taxation leads to overfunded main roads and underfunded side streets.
As opposed to both main roads and side streets being underfunded without tolls and road taxes? Do you expect Government to print money to pay for all this?
