You have to love this headline:

“Cheney accused of blocking Californian bid to cut car fumes”

Only the MSM would use the word accused to describe an act that is instead laudable.

The US vice-president, Dick Cheney, was behind a controversial decision to block California’s attempt to impose tough emission limits on car manufacturers, according to insiders at the government Environmental Protection Agency.

Staff at the agency, which announced last week that California’s proposed limits were redundant, said the agency’s chief went against their expert advice after car executives met Cheney, and a Chrysler executive delivered a letter to the EPA saying why the state should not be allowed to regulate greenhouse gases.

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In an editorial, the New York Times described the decision as, “an indefensible act of executive arrogance that can only be explained as the product of ideological blindness and as a political payoff to the automobile industry”.

Johnson said that because Bush signed an energy bill last week which raised fuel economy standards, there was no justification for separate state regulation. The president, the agency said, had provided a “clear national solution” and there was no need for a “confusing patchwork of state rules to reduce America’s climate footprint from vehicles”.

What arrogance of my home state to believe that automakers should be forced to customize cars state by state.   One national standard should be it. 

Thank you Mr. Vice President for doing your best to stop the insanity.