Great Gas Guzzlers Fuel Oil-Feeding Frenzy

Re “State’s Auto Emissions Bill Is Just So Much Gas,” Commentary, May 8: Convincing people to stop driving gas-guzzling cars is like convincing a fat man to stop eating doughnuts. The man is going to fight--even though his doctor has told him that eventually he’ll have a heart attack or diabetes. Well, the U.S. will face its own health crisis if we don’t reduce our consumption of oil. Detractors of tailpipe emissions measures like AB 1058 say that such regulations will eventually have us driving tiny little cars. Has anybody been to Europe lately?

Nothing but sexy little cars getting 50 miles per gallon. It’s no wonder Europeans think we’re pigs; we drive 6,000-pound cars just to move our body and a bag of groceries around. Then we go to war in the Middle East to protect our sources of foreign oil so we can continue driving our gas guzzlers. It’s like a fat man fighting to keep eating doughnuts. With conservation we can eliminate our need for foreign oil. If each of us makes an effort, we’ll all benefit.

Robert Marcos Fowler

Encinitas