And so it begins - the assault on coal and trucks.

On one hand Obama says he wants tax increases on the wealthy which he claims will `help` the middle class, while at the same time he dismantles our energy delivery systems which will not only raise prices but create shortages. What he really wants is to change the US into a third world banana republic.

I hope the 50.9% of voters who returned this guy to the WH enjoy their lives of poverty and despair when Obama`s Utopia comes to pass.

The EPA has done so much for us serfs that we´re all going to be wealthy and live forever.

If air pollution is so bad now and apparently worse in prior years, (think of the 1960s when you could smell the exhaust of the car in front of you at a stop light), then why am I and so many other people my age so healthy and living so long? I played with mercury, cleaned asbestos breaks, removed lead based paint, inhaled and got chlorinated solvents on my skin, etc.

As a former environmental manager I see no reason that EPA shouldn´t be reduced to 1/8 its present size. Heck, give the problem to the states and abolish EPA.

When is the EPA´s job done? I suggest now.

When I was growing up in Vermont, sometimes I couldn´t see Breadloaf Mountain because of the smog drifting up from Mass. and NY. Disgusting flatlander country. Now the air is crystalline, in Vermont and also here in Virginia. No doubt it could be even more crystalline. But who would notice, other than the EPA?

The only significant remaining air pollution source in this part of the country is forest fires. I expect to see those outlawed before we get to diesel vehicles. Sulfur emissions from diesel vehicles have been reduced to a small fraction and there is very very little soot emitted from a modern diesel engine.

The article doesn´t seem to mention any EPA standard for particulate emissions from volcanoes. I wonder why?

Over 50% comes from car and truck engines. Amazingly, wood smoke represents 10% in states like WA and CT. Industrial was only 14%. Agricultural burning was 6%. CA and NY are regions with probable non-compliance issues. The life shortening that I saw on quick scan was on the order of 3 years. This is already a problem with ships sailing into non-compliant ports. They may even need to have separate natural gas driven engines when they near ports. This will ultimately be the test of the desire to regulate - when the EPA tells you that fireplaces and barbeque pits are prohibited and schools, hospitals, and Al Gore need to have an environmental plan and paperwork for their carbon emissions.

I was born in a coal mining village and my family moved to a 24/7 steel-producing city when I was five. For about 15 years I lived in a highly polluted, sooty atmosphere where a light-colored shirt could be worn only once before it needed serious laundering. It was in the industrial part of the UK, from whence the term "satanic mills" became famous.

My parents lived in that same atmosphere for around 45 years, grandparents even longer. Dad, who worked down in the coal mine with little or no pollution controls, lived to be nearly 85 and by then had emphysema--he also smoked unfiltered cigarettes for 70 years.

An uncle, who was born in the same village, and also worked in the mine, is still alive--and living in the house where he was born. Must be over 90. My friend´s mother from the same village lived there until her husband died about two years ago and moved to a smaller house a couple of miles away. She has to be in her 90s.

There are hundreds of "survivors" from and in the village. Although such an atmosphere probably irritates those with asthma, I suspect they simply didn´t stay for long and simply moved to cleaner air.

A lobbyist FTA said, "It makes no sense to risk economic harm when the public health necessity of these regulations is ambiguous at best." I agree.

Look for unemployment to skyrocket unless the goobermint can fake their books again.

After the gulf oil spill, Lisa jackson came to Clearwater to document how pristine the beach was. All they did was bulldose the oil over with new sand.... and pass a law that prevents any digging on the beach.

During her visit, a father with his family asked why his kids couldn´t build sand castles anymore. She laughed & walked away.

Lisa is an evil reparations seeking beyotch.