sidebar on smog actions

[Pottree@domain.elided]

In a message dated 8/24/2002 10:37:43 PM Pacific Daylight Time, 
owner-alfa-digest@domain.elided writes:


> I understand protecting our rights as classic car owners but I don't think 
> this means we should deny all attempts at limiting pollution from internal 
> combustion engines. (In fact, I encourage the guvmnt to limit emissions 
> from cars... they aren't doing enough! Anyone who lives in CA or Houston or 
> any other city with ozone alerts should agree). 

I have just returned from a trip that included a visit to St. Petersburg, 
Russia.  If you want to see and smell some foul air, visit there!  I am sure 
there are numerous sources for their problems other than cars and trucks, but 
the city of 5.5 million is choked with traffic and if you are anyplace at all 
near it you can't help but smell, see, and even feel the waves of unburned 
gases and particles rolling from the vehicles.  They also smoke cigarettes a 
lot there (perhaps one more reason they have a third world life expectancy) 
and it is amazing they don't explode when they strike the matches, because 
the air smells very strongly of gasoline fumes: if you came into your garage 
in the USA or western Europe and smelled something like that, you'd 
immediately fling open the doors and call the fire department.

So, one of the things to take into account when lambasting efforts to clean 
the air and keep it that way is the choking, gasping alternative: if you just 
are annoyed at the idea of ANYBODY telling you what to do and how to do it, 
if you have a knee-jerk reaction to any proposed smog measure, my suggestion 
is to get a life.  If you have specific reasons to object to rules, you 
undercut your own case by admitting you don't care what is in the legislation 
because you don't like it on principle, and then you compound the trouble by 
dragging in red herrings that are beside the original point... and most 
certainly off-topic here.

Plus, suggesting your personal views are best supported by a nuclear attack 
on our State capitol puts you on almost anybody's fruitloop list.

If you have questions, answers, news, or views that are pertinent to Alfas, 
let's hear 'em.

If you are looking for a soapbox for political rantings, there are many 
places just for that purpose.  Go play there.

Charlie
LA, CA, USA
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