Squeeze Play

 Since 1992, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has been trying to “find ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions globally in an equitable way.”

 

Through this Convention, “every country on Earth is treaty-bound to ‘avoid dangerous climate change,” and has done so via regular gatherings.  The most recent was only weeks ago, entitled Council of the Parties, or COP26.

 

Sounding very important, COP26 was well-attended in Glasgow, Scotland, by world representatives including President Joseph Robinette Biden and John Kerry, from the United States.  Both American representatives agreed that climate change represents an existential threat to the Earth, a sentiment agreed upon by most attendees.

 

Forget the existential threat of systemic racism, or systemic economic inequity, or education disparity, or systemic crime, or energy, jobs, or corruption, this COP26 was laser-focused on climate change.

 

Boltneck Kerry piously addressed the Council on America’s sin of using irreplaceable fossil fuels to keep our citizens warm, lighted, and able to prepare food, through electricity.  Sins, indeed.

 

Poor countries seem to be given a free pass on their pollution transgressions because of their inability to be financially extorted the way more affluent nations have been.

 

Kerry’s horse face explained that the United States was willing to sacrifice comfort for long-term global goals toward climate stability which, by “expert” estimates, would mean great discomfort and sacrifices primarily by American citizens.

 

Gone would be the days of spacious vehicles, recreational boats and jetskis, and thermostats set at comfortable levels.  But all would be for the common good of attempting to avert climate change.  Yea!

 

President Biden mumbled his way through his allotted address time at COP26 to make similar concessions and promises of austere future existences of hard working Americans who have earned their place at the table of rewards of air-conditioned summers and warmer winters.  Alas, both Biden and Kerry felt otherwise.

 

Promising that major American automobile manufacturers would be making electric vehicles (EVs) by 2030, to appease this punitive Convention left me with more questions than answers for this climate change brain trust.

 

The United States Postal Service (USPS) has been a dismal failure for decades, losing a pleasantly surprising $9,200,000,000 in 2020.  That figure is “pleasant” because it was expected to lose billions of dollars more.

 

What could possibly turn this economic boondoggle around?  The definitive answer is new postal vehicles.

 

This brilliant idea will buy as many as 165,000 new trucks for the USPS, some of which may be hitting the streets in 2023.  The contract was awarded to a Wisconsin company through the equally genius Build Back Better plan which awards $6,000,000,000 to help speed production of the mail trucks.

 

According to The Daily Times story, appearing its November 12, 2021 issue, “Climate activists have pressured the USPS for the better part of a decade to retool its fleet.”

 

A Democrat California representative, Jared Huffman, put this legislation together.  His take was, “we ought to step up and do something.  This isn’t gonna fix everything.  But it’s a very nice first step.”

 

Not being sure what the second step will be, $6,000,000,000 is lot of money.  But the kicker is that this “first step” was rued by Huffman because “the USPS contract that allows for the production of gas-powered vehicles undercuts the climate goals.”  Uh, oh!

Sweet new USPS non-EV truck

 

“Gas-powered vehicles” you ask?

 

Yep.  Those 165,000 new USPS vehicles are NOT EVs, rather they are nifty-looking gas-powered trucks that the COP26 was promised would disappear in order to save the planet.

 

Maybe Biden and Kerry will have continued luck goading Congress into squeezing more money out of United States citizens for other hare-brained projects in the future.  Let’s hope they don’t run out of other people’s money, though.