California Is Destroying Its Own Economy. Now It Wants To Destroy Yours

California has a long history of bad policies that have contributed to destroying its economy. California's mismanagement of forests has led to dense growth of the underbrush, which turns small fires into infernos that cost lives and destroy billions of dollars of property. Their decision not to enforce criminal laws in Los Angeles and San Francisco has led to out-of-control crime waves that are forcing the richest and most talented residents to leave. Their over-regulation and sky-high tax rates have punished small and medium-sized businesses with job losses as business owners also headed for Texas, Florida, Arizona or somewhere else with more reasonable policies. Now California has outdone itself. As reported in this article, California is putting in place its plan to ban sales of new gasoline-powered cars by 2035. Of course, there's no good reason for such a law. There is no climate change emergency. There is no existential climate crisis as the alarmists claim. There may have been very slight warming from 1995 to 2005 (which is perfectly normal) and there is no evidence either that CO₂ is the principal cause, or that human activity is a material factor. Climate change itself happens all the time and had happened long before the invention of the automobile. The Medieval Warm Period from about 950 AD to 1250 AD featured unusually warm temperatures in the North Atlantic region. This was the period when the Vikings roamed as far as Canada and farms were thriving in Greenland in areas now covered in ice. The Little Ice Age, which reached an intense phase from 1650 to 1725, featured frozen canals in Holland; one reason the Dutch are such competitive speed skaters today. In London, you could cross the frozen Thames River on ice, and winter carnivals were held on the frozen river. Both of these episodes occurred centuries before the invention of the automobile. If California forces all new car sales to be electric vehicles (EVs), you can expect permanent energy shortages there as the power grid attempts to deal with increased electricity demand to charge batteries on the EVs. You can also expect hours-long waits at the charging stations as is already the case today in China. The California ban on internal combustion engines will cause chaos and is best understood as a political stunt by Governor Gavin Newsome as he prepares to run for President in 2024 against the mentally impaired Joe Biden. Newsome's ideological blindness and quest for power will ruin our largest and most beautiful state and probably ruin the entire country in the process. Let's hope that the myths and fallacies of the climate alarmists are revealed and understood by Americans before this law comes into force. Let's also hope that Gavin Newsome hits a brick wall of voter rejection once he does try to run for office outside of La La Land.

Jim Richards