"A common effort, made in good faith, to solve our toughest problems"
May 19, 2009
In his announcement today of a new unified automobile fuel efficiency and emissions standard, President Obama applauded the diverse group of stakeholders that came together today to embrace a bold solution to the long-standing problems of pollution, climate change, and our dependence on foreign oil.
This is an extraordinary gathering. Here we have today standing behind me, along with Ron Gettlefinger and leadership of the UAW, we have 10 of the world’s largest auto manufacturers, we have environmental advocates, as well as elected officials from all across the country.
And this gathering is all the more extraordinary for what these diverse groups — despite disparate interests and previous disagreements — have worked together to achieve. For the first time in history, we have set in motion a national policy aimed at both increasing gas mileage and decreasing greenhouse gas pollution for all new trucks and cars sold in the United States of America.
…That’s what’s been missing in this debate for too long, and that’s why this announcement is so important, for it represents not only a change in policy in Washington but the harbinger of a change in the way business is done in Washington. No longer will we accept the notion that our politics are too small, our nation too divided, our people too weary of broken promises and lost opportunities to take up a historic calling. No longer will we accept anything less than a common effort, made in good faith, to solve our toughest problems.
…At a time of historic crisis in our auto industry, when domestic auto manufacturers are making painful choices and restructuring their businesses to be viable in the future, this rule provides the clear certainty that will allow these companies to plan for a future in which they are building the cars of the 21st century.
Yes, it costs money to develop these vehicles, but even as the price to build these cars and trucks goes up, the cost of driving these vehicles will go down, as drivers save money at the pump. And this is a point I want to emphasize: If you buy a car, your investment in a more fuel-efficient vehicle as a result of this standard will pay off in just three years. In three years’ time you will have paid off the additional investment required. So this is a winning proposition for folks looking to buy a car. In fact, over the life of a vehicle, the typical driver would save about $2,800 by getting better gas mileage.
The fact is, everyone wins: Consumers pay less for fuel, which means less money going overseas and more money to save or spend here at home. The economy as a whole runs more efficiently by using less oil and producing less pollution. And companies like those here today have new incentives to create the technologies and the jobs that will provide smarter ways to power our vehicles.
… We have over the course of decades slowly built an economy that runs on oil. It has given us much of what we have — for good but also for ill. It has transformed the way we live and work, but it’s also wreaked havoc on our climate. It has helped create gains in prosperity unprecedented in history, but it also places our future in jeopardy.
Ending this dependence will take time. It will take an incredible effort. It will take a historic investment in innovation. But more than anything, it will take a willingness to look past our differences, to act in good faith, to refuse to continue the failures of the past, and to take on this challenge together — for the benefit not just of this generation, but generations to come.
Read President Obama’s full remarks . . .
"A common effort, made in good faith, to solve our toughest problems"
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He said “historic calling”? I heard “historic color”, but that doesn’t make much sense, does it? I guess he meant to say calling. And actually I don’t hear so well. But I tape stuff and listen over again, and I still got “color”. That bird that was singing the whole time he was talking, maybe it wanted to catch a fly that flew in the President’s mouth just on that word?
I actually saw it on [The Daily Show], which this week got to combine two running themes, that President Obama sounds authoritative and momentous whenever he talks (recently they used the tape where he orders a hamburger), and that quite often he is saying the same things that the guy before said – yada yada, borders, security, faith, defend, the people. (At least the way they edit clips on the show.) But it sounds very different when he says it, instead of a bit player in a cowboy movie. Look up “nuclear” in a dictionary and there are two pronunciations now. Apparently the disease President Bush has is called metathesis.