Today's orders by President Obama mandating higher CAFE standards (to at least 35 miles per gallon) by 2011 would be more newsworthy had he not written them, and there are numerous pending lawsuits challenging the denial of the "waiver" letting California adopt the stricter standards; they weren't going particularly well for the Bush administration. Observers say that failure to approve the California standards was "exhibit A" for the need to change by most enviro groups. "The days of dragging its heels are over. Our administration will not deny facts," Obama said today. Now -- forcing that much redesign and retooling when people aren't buying any kind of car is going to require some real cash, which is hard to come by at this moment. Washington seems to love handing out money to all kinds of investment bankers with no idea of what they will use it for while imposing extremely harsh standards on companies that are #1 (GM) and #3 (Ford) in their field, it wouldn't take much to loose faith that Washington is going to help pay for this unfunded mandate. Maybe if Washington required banks to lend the money, then the credit markets would loosen up enough to make it possible to raise that kind of cash. "Our goal is not to further burden an already struggling industry, it is help the automakers prepare for the future," Obama made sure to say. Obama calls the CAFE rule changes a "downpayment" towards his Green Economy.
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