I have worked with EPA and California for decades and this does not sound like the people the I have been talking to and dealing with. It is an outrage. Johnson, like the Medieval dick-weed before him, Levitt, need to be hung by the balls and fed Ex-Lax.  

Onward through the fog

I am literally shocked by how outrageous and disgusting this decision is. At what point do we conclude that our Constitution and our civil rights are truly at risk? This EPA decision is defying the courts and the will of the people.

I'm pleased that after 30 years this country finally got the gumption to improve the CAFE standards. But they fall far short of what California mandated.

There is no way on God's green earth that this decision could have anything to do with the will of EPA staff (with the possible exception of one or two highly-placed Administration butt-kissers).

Besides, Steven Johnson has shown himself over and over to be a happy doormat for the White House, so long as they pat him on the head and make him feel important every once in a while.

This I know firsthand.

Agency.

You know, just in case you guys forgot what you're supposed to be doing.

I wish I could make an intelligent comment, but my brain seems to be awash in four-letter words.

EPA staff have not forgotten.  Please don't confuse career staff with the Administration-appointed bosses.

The staff will long outlast those guys, and have been laboring under the radar for 7 years now.

I am as outraged as the rest of you.  Is there anything we can do?  Obviously contact our senators and congresspeople to have them support the House and Senate Oversight committees and encourage them to expose how this "decision" was made.  Anything else?  

GreenMom - and your green sisters, brothers and fathers who are at EPA.  Is that the answer - waiting it out for another 12 months, plus the transition time?  Perhaps you in your cubicles have more power than you think. . . There's incredible power in collective action - far more than another street rally or the rest of us flogging each other to "write your senator and congressman." As if.

So California and Massachusetts and others will sue and they will win because based on prior EPA waivers for California there is no legal justification for denying this waiver - but at what cost to tax payers. And of course that means more delay. And more inefficient cars and trucks get built and sold that will then be on the roads, polluting for years to come. Remember, California's rule - and all the other states along with California - was scheduled to become effective next fall, with the 2009 model year. EPA's rules don't go into effect until 2012? That is not acceptable. There is simply no more time to waste.  

No, I think its time for direct action. We need the courage of our convictions.

will stand for long."

Would you care to expand on that?  How do you expect the counter-suits to play out, and more importantly, how long will it take?

I shouldn't have said that. I don't think it will stand, but the lawsuits will no doubt take quite a bit of time to play out. By the time they're over, we'll probably have a new president and a new head of EPA and the issue will be moot anyway. This was all about pushing things off until Bush is out of office -- that seems to be his sole goal now.

grist.org

The ancient chinese bureaucracy used civil service exams to get the best people into government (according to a history channel presentation).

Those exams were gamed.  Incompetents filled the bureaucracy and the empire was soon over run by its enemies.

The bushies appoint monkey wrenchers into head positions of the bureaucrcy, an even more effective tactic to destroy government.  It's a self fullfilling raygun revolution prophecy, government can do nothing right.  

Therefore, the best policy is to turn everything over to contractors.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

We do not have a government that wants to protect us and our children so we need to take it upon ourselves to put it right.  
I don't do much car shopping - and when I do it is a very used model I am looking for to fit my budget - but for those of us who do, we need to use our power as consumers to enforce our own standards.  
Simply do not buy the cars that don't meet our standards and leave the others in the showrooms. Big automakers will get the message soon enough.

Until auto and oil company stockholders see the results of such government decisions in their personal bottom lines we won't see different government policies.

And we can't wait for 2016 to react.  Even I will need a cleaner car that I can afford before then.  I just hope it is not an old hybrid with a battery about to go bad when I get it.

I'm not going to expound on the idea of thousands of career scientists, engineers, and policy geeks etc. at EPA rising up against the Administration in the streets -- it'd be cool, but get real.  Let me count the reasons it won't happen.

Plus a lot of great groundwork has gotten done at EPA -- real work hasn't ground to a halt just because the Administration is screwing around on the big ticket policy stuff.

And hey, many of us are quite politically active in our non-work lives, around just these issues in which we have expertise, and around many other issues too, and at the state and local level as well.  

David Roberts said,
The 'patchwork' line is completely disingenuous. There aren't multiple standards in different states. There's one: California's standard, which other states can choose by law to adopt, or not. Seventeen states, representing over half the U.S. population, have pledged to adopt it.

The proposed California greenhouse gas standard is only one of the California auto emissions standards.    The California auto emissions standards are an all-or-nothing package deal -- other states can't pick and choose which of the California standards they are going to adopt.    Also,  a state may have to be an air-quality non-attainment state to adopt the California standards -- I don't know.

4. Johnson said he was denying the waiver on the basis of section 209 of the Clean Air Act. He said this request for a waiver was "distinct from all prior requests," in that the previous requests regarded local pollutants, and GHGs are global pollutants. Thus, California does not meet the "compelling and extraordinary conditions" called for by the Act.

IMO Johnson is right.    California cannot significantly affect climate change in California by regulating greenhouse gas emissions in California.  

This flies in the face of the clear language of the CAA and the just-passed energy bill, both of which explicitly reserve for California the right to exceed federal fuel economy standards.

I have been following this issue for a long time,  and I am not aware of any such language in the CAA and the just-passed energy bill.    Please quote your sources.