7thriv

California grossly miscalculated pollution levels in a scientific analysis used to toughen the state's clean air standards, and scientists have spent the past several months revising data and planning a significant weakening of the landmark regulation, The Chronicle has found.

The pollution estimate in question was too high - by 340 percent, according to the California Air Resources Board, the state agency charged with researching and adopting air quality standards. The estimate was a key part in the creation of a regulation adopted by the Air Resources Board in 2007, a rule that forces businesses to cut diesel emissions by replacing or making costly upgrades to heavy-duty, diesel-fueled off-road vehicles used in construction and other industries.

340 per cent?! This from the side of the political spectrum that always bows low to "science" and chortles over Sarah Palin's inability to name her favorite Supreme Court case. Maybe conservatives are "stupid" because we don't understand the science behind global warming, but at least we haven't been implementing legislation and ordering businesses to retool (when they aren't fleeing the state) based on bad science and bad math.

This, by the way, is not CARB's first mistake

The overestimate, which comes after another bad calculation by the Air Board on diesel-related deaths that made headlines in 2009, prompted the board to suspend the regulation earlier this year while officials decided whether to weaken the rule.

Despite all this, the reporter writing this story describes CARB as "powerful and well respected." "Well respected" by whom?! (I don't doubt CARB's power). Honestly, how can CARB - or its proposed solutions to the hoax of Global Warming - retain any respect after all of this? Yet, the state's political class, led by the usual moderate Republicans, is fighting tooth and nail against a proposition that would suspend implementation of CA's goofy green legislation until unemployment falls below 5.5%.

But, hey, Meg Whitman fired her maid. And, Christine O'Donnell said she dabbled in witchcraft.