City Council, New Emissons, The Printed Blog.
Good morning!
Yesterday’s Detroit City Council meeting yielded some interesting results; WDET’s Rob St Mary will tell us what happened.
Also, one of the issues which will affect the future of the U.S. auto industry is higher emissions standards. Should the country just conform to California’s standards? We’ll talk with Tom Walsh, business writer for the Free Press and Kim Hill of the Center for Automotive Research. After, we’ll hear the environmental take from Charles Griffith, Clean Car Campaign Director at the Ecology Center in Ann Arbor.
Michigan Roundtable for Diversity and Inclusion will hold a day-long conference Friday, January 30 at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit, looking at how government policies helped create segregation that has led to inequity among races, and how best to overcome that legacy. We'll talk with the roundtable's keynote speaker, Dr. John A. Powell, Executive Director of the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at The Ohio State University
While Detroit's major daily papers are planning to limit their printing and delivery, a Chicago company is doing the exact opposite - with the writing of the internet. Josh Karp, founder of the Printed Blog, joins us.
The American Alliance for Manufacturing says new provisions are necessary in the Economic stimulus package to force states and consumers to ‘Buy American.’ But, with so many companies manufacturing products overseas, does it even make a difference anymore? We’ll hear from Scott Paul, Executive Director of the AAM.
Also, this week’s Metro Times questions the plethora of mayoral candidates running in the city of Detroit. MT writer Curt Guyette joins us.
Listener Comments
As much as I agree that closing down Gitmo is the right thing for
our country to do to regain our global moral authority, this decision -
to allow as many as fifty different emissions standards to exist within
our borders - is tantamount to what Brazil allowed to happen when building its national railway system - it allowed each state in its
Federation to establish its own guage for railroad track. As a result, there was never a single continuous railroad that could deliver products, food, construction materials or people from one area to another. This prevented their nation from becoming the economic powerhouse it could have become.
Likewise, this emissions policy will not only make the manufacture
of motor vehicles in the US more complex, it will add a tremendous cost that will be pushed to the consumer. On top of high gas prices that will top $4.00/gallon with or without speculators pushing futures prices through the roof, how will the less affluent among us ever be able to purchase a new car and participate in the "clean air" policy our nation will have effectivly shoved down their throats?
If our nation is serious about a comprehensive energy and CO2
emission policy then a single vehicle emissions regulation would suffice. The government regulators simply need to select the most stringent requirement and make it the US standard. If that standard happens to be the California standard, then so be it.
How many post-2000 US made vehicles are in California? Perhaps a "carbon" tax should be levied on every vehicle over 10 years old to get people thinking about trading for a more current model. California could use the revenue and this would put choice in the hands of the consumer.
Perhaps it's time to adopt a European model - one that via tax incentives promotes cleaner and more fuel efficient vehicles and establishes mass transit. That idea seems to fit better with the needs of consumers and doesn't hamstring the manufacturers.
The manufacturers are desperatly trying to reduce costs through controlling build complexity and material costs.
This policy, if passed, will put the auto industry in further jeopardy of failure.
Regards,
Gregg
Gregg
Go Big 3, keep shoving that stuff down our throats until you fail, give yourself a bonus, and live in a secure location with the millions that you didn't earn, but received anyway.
Here’s an idea: Every year at re-registration time, the owner of each vehicle gets a tailpipe emissions test, and tells how many miles they drove, they pays for their pollution or gets a rebate on a prepaid registration fee.
This creates a demand up situation.
I caught most of the show in which Tom Walsh and Kim Hill were the guests. I've become increasingly frustrated over discussions of the auto industry since they are so many times discussed in isolation from other issues, industries and factors. The auto industry is part of a system, a global system or an equation if you will. It was so refreshing to her Kim Hill express the systemic nature of what confronts us. We will not arrive at any effective outcomes if we deal with problems in isolation from each other. It is basic math- if you change one factor it will have an effect on all other factors as well.
I propose that all of these larger property owners pay a vacant property tax, in which those monies are put into a metro Detroit homeless fund. It would deter the property owners from keeping empty buildings, as well as help those who are stuck in the streets.
I don't know just an idea