Surprise: Many Pop-Up Chinese Coronavirus Sites Are Fake

By William Teach January 9, 2022 – 7:00 am

Do any state, local, county, or federal authorities ever consider checking these places?

Pop-up Covid testing sites could be rife for nefarious activities, experts warn

Sandra Jaramillo needed a negative Covid-19 test to return to work but was coming up empty on finding a same-day test due to overwhelming demand.

Jaramillo was experiencing headaches and a fever, and with limited options, she decided to stop at a pop-up testing site set up in the parking lot of a church near her home in San Antonio.

Under a small tent, she was told to give her driver’s license number, date of birth and email address before she was handed a swab to administer the test on herself.

That was more than a week ago, Jaramillo said, now panicked that her personal information may have been be compromised.

No one ever answers the number listed on the information sheet she was given, and the voice mailbox is full.

“At this point, it’s making me feel like I am being scammed,” Jaramillo, 32, said. “It’s been terrible. It feels like there is no choice and nowhere to turn [for a test].”

Not sure about your area, but, here in Wake County people can set an appointment to get tested, which “allows the county to prioritize residents who are symptomatic, have been exposed to COVID-19 or are at higher risk.” There are also multiple avenues via the NC Dept of Health and Human Services. The idea is to stop the needless tests because people are scared. People who really do not need a test. I’ve had two tests this whole time. One was because I was flying to see the parents, did not want to possibly expose them. They other because I felt sick (though no elevation in temperature at all), came out negative. Just a cold

Pop-up testing sites have cropped up on street corners, in parking lots and on shopping properties across the country, but health and legal experts say many of these are unregulated and could be rife for nefarious activities like identity theft.

In the last few weeks, legislators and attorneys general in several states including Illinois, Maryland, California, Texas and Pennsylvania have said they will be investigating and introducing regulatory legislation overseeing these operations.

If I see a setup like that, I’m suspicious, especially if asking for all that information, which was never necessary at the Wake County sites in this manner, and, they had profession setups and credentials. At government buildings. Anyhow, the article goes through many examples, and that authorities are trying to go after them and warn people. It was just a matter of time before this happened, what with the media and Democrat driven hysteria. Oh, and most is happening in Democratic Party run cities, which love them some shady criminal activity.

Meanwhile

Omicron spike in most vaccinated German state heralds nationwide surge

The northern German maritime state of Bremen has the country’s highest COVID-19 vaccination rate by far, but it has become the hardest-hit by the rapid spread of the Omicron variant, reporting the highest infection rate of any region in Germany. (snip)

Close to 84% of the population in Bremen, the smallest of Germany’s 16 federal states with fewer than 700,000 people, are double-vaccinated, compared with a national figure of around 72%. Some 44% have received a booster shot, compared with 42% nationally.

On the plus side, hospitalizations are pretty low. And the notion of Wuhan flu becoming endemic is becoming more likely

(The Conversation) On the other hand, pandemic viruses may also gradually settle into a relatively stable rate of occurrence, maintaining a constant pool of infected hosts capable of spreading the virus to others. These viruses are said to be “endemic.”

Examples of endemic viruses in the United States include those that cause the common cold and the seasonal flu that appear year after year. Much like these, the virus that causes COVID-19 likely won’t die out, and most experts now expect it to become endemic.

Time to stop freaking out. We should all just relax, take appropriate measures (wash your hands, keep your distance, at least for the time being, try and avoid touching your face, avoid contact, like shaking hands. Just be cautious), and learn to live with it.

Read: Surprise: Many Pop-Up Chinese Coronavirus Sites Are Fake »

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Climate Cult Wants Military To Do Their Part In Mitigating Climate Crisis (scam)

By William Teach January 8, 2022 – 3:00 pm

Well, might as well. The military leadership is doing all they can to make the U.S. military virtually worthless in protecting the nation from threats

‘We Must Do Our Part to Mitigate Climate Change’ – The Military’s Pollution Problem

In the fall of 2018, Neta C. Crawford, a political science professor at Boston University, prepared to teach a class on climate change designed to help students think about the issue in a big-picture way. Crawford’s research expertise is in war, so she wanted to include a statistic on the military’s contribution to greenhouse gases.

“I thought, ‘Well, maybe I should just tell them what the emissions are for the U.S. military,’” Crawford says. “It was meant to be a line on a slide in a lecture.”

But when she went to look up the figure, she couldn’t find anything reliable. Instead, she found scattered and incomplete data on how much fuel the military consumed and how much carbon it emitted. The information that did exist largely didn’t include overseas operations, even though the United States had been at war for nearly two decades. Major categories of fuel consumption, like much of the fuel used for aviation, seemed to be missing.

In 1997, the Kyoto Protocol—the world’s first legally binding, international climate treaty—created a reporting loophole for militaries, exempting many of the greenhouse gases emitted during military operations from counting against a country’s emissions totals. While the 2015 Paris Accords did away with this exemption, they didn’t replace it with an obligation. Rather, the decision of whether to report military emissions—and how to calculate them—was left up to individual countries.

The result is a gap in our understanding of the United States’ climate footprint. Research from academics like Crawford, who now studies the issue, shows that the Department of Defense is a major producer of greenhouse gases, with more emissions than many industrialized nations. The United States—and other countries—have said they are committed to reducing military emissions, and earlier this summer, NATO released its Action Plan on Climate Change and Security, acknowledging that better emissions data would help guide member states’ military planning. But there is no consistent methodology and reporting requirement for these emissions. As the United States and other countries work toward net-zero emissions by 2050, Crawford and others say, the lack of clear data from the U.S. Defense Department—the world’s largest employer—and other militaries is a major stumbling block.

Who cares? This is just silly. Military vehicles, planes, ships, and helicopters need fuel. They don’t run on unicorn farts and green feelings.

Crawford’s hunt for a clear statistic on military emissions to show her class led her to a new research focus: trying to puzzle out just how much fuel the U.S. military consumes and thus how much carbon it emits. Using Department of Energy data, Crawford found that the U.S. military is a major polluter. Since the beginning of the Global War on Terror in 2001, the military has produced more than 1.2 billion metric tons of greenhouse gases. Crawford acknowledges her data is likely incomplete—but even with the available data, she found that the U.S. military emits more than entire countries like Portugal and Denmark, and that the Department of Defense accounts for nearly 80% of the federal government’s fuel consumption.

Some of this is because the U.S military owns a lot of property—and has a lot of buildings to heat and power. In 2018, the Defense Department had some 585,000 facilities, spread over 27 million acres in 160 different countries. Each of these buildings emit greenhouse gasses; in 2013, Crawford’s report found, the Pentagon building itself emitted more than 24,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent. Crawford found that installations account for about a third of Defense Department energy consumption. But the overall number has slowly decreased over the last decade, in large part due to energy initiatives across the service branches.

Let’s be honest: this is all about reducing the effectiveness of the U.S. military, because the leftists who make up the Cult of Climatrology have despised the military since the 1970’s. They couldn’t defund it, so, they’ve worked to destroy it from the inside, and have been doing a good job as of late, what with all the Wokeness, letting in the gender confused and giving them transition services (meaning they aren’t actually doing their military jobs), reducing standards, training on CRT, and so much more. You aren’t going to replace a tank or military jet that uses fossil fuels with a “green” alternative and have a viable fighting force.

Read: Climate Cult Wants Military To Do Their Part In Mitigating Climate Crisis (scam) »

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If All You See…

By William Teach January 8, 2022 – 1:00 pm

…is a great greenspace that would be perfect for a wind farm, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Real Climate Science, with a post giving an Arctic meltdown update.

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SCOTUS Seems Skeptical Over Biden’s Vaccine Mandate

By William Teach January 8, 2022 – 10:30 am

The oral arguments were a little crazy at the Supreme Court, at least from the silly liberals on the Court. I can’t find where OSHA mandates a vaccine for anything else, and one of the arguments is that the mandate is requiring people to do something when not at work. Wearing a hardhat is one thing; sticking a vaccine in your body is another. Would liberals be OK if the Biden admin mandated that all females in the U.S. military be on birth control, because a woman getting pregnant would cause problems with the military mission?

The Supreme Court just signaled it could block Biden’s nationwide vaccine mandate

The future of the Biden administration’s COVID vaccine and testing mandates appears to be in jeopardy following arguments before the Supreme Court on Friday, potentially doing away with nationwide workplace rules around COVID, and creating major uncertainty for companies across the country.

As new cases of COVID surged nationwide this week, justices heard oral arguments on Friday to determine whether or not to halt federal vaccine and testing mandates for health care workers put in place by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and a mandate for private employers with at least 100 workers put in place by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

Business lobbies, religious groups, and states with Republican leaders have led legal challenges against the mandates, arguing the agencies implementing them are overreaching their authority. On Friday, Scott Keller, a former solicitor general of Texas, argued in front of the court that the OSHA mandate will likely harm the U.S. workforce should employees quit over these vaccine mandates.

Meanwhile the Biden administration has contended that these mandates are necessary to protect workers and health care providers amid a global pandemic. “The court should reject the argument that the agency is powerless to address the grave dangers,” U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar said while arguing for the merits of the OSHA mandate.

Reading all sorts of different outlets, she was unable to explain why it was a grave danger now, when it wasn’t a grave danger 9 months ago. Nor why the mandate was set to be implemented 3 months after the OSHA regulation came out.

Justices Elena Kagan, Stephen Breyer, and Sonia Sotomayor seemed to be in support of mandates, particularly in regard to a mandate for health care workers.

“There are 750,000 people who got this yesterday. Hospitals are full to overflowing. There is a problem. It seems to me that every minute these things are not in effect, thousands more people are getting this disease,” Breyer said Friday.

Yet, depending on the area, you are seeing anywhere from 40% to 79% of the cases being vaccinated people. Two of the lawyers arguing against the mandate had to do so remotely, and both were vaccinated.

Labor and employment litigation expert Jim Paul of Ogletree Deakins tells Fortune he came to the same conclusion: “Although my crystal ball has been broken during the entire pandemic, it seems that a majority of the justices are leaning towards staying the enforcement of the OSHA ETS [emergency temporary standard],” Paul says, adding that all of the justices asked questions and commented during the OSHA portion of the oral arguments on Friday.

When it comes to the health care worker mandate, many are prognosticating that it may well stand (and we’ve already seen lots and lots of health care workers quit/be terminated over mandates). For the business one, another question is “when does it end?”

(USA Today) During more than three hours of arguments, Chief Justice John Roberts said that the federal government appeared to be trying to “cover the waterfront” and require vaccines or other COVID-19 policies for much of the nation rather than for limited populations. That, Roberts suggested, should probably be a decision for Congress rather than federal agencies.

“This has been referred to – the approach – as a workaround,” Roberts said of the requirements. “Fifty years ago Congress passed a general provision but I think certainly it’s hard to argue…that that gives free rein to the agencies.”

Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch noted it is states that usually set public health requirements.

“If there is an ambiguity, why isn’t this a major question that therefore belongs to the people’s representatives in the states and in the halls of Congress?” he asked.

All those vaccines you take to go to school are mandated by the States, not the federal government, hence why SCOTUS never took up cases involving mandates from states and colleges.

Will ‘Forever Boosting’ Beat the Coronavirus?

A year ago, just two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine — or even one, in the case of Johnson & Johnson’s formulation — were thought to offer sufficient protection against the coronavirus.

Now, faced with the extraordinarily contagious omicron variant, Israel has begun offering fourth doses to some high-risk groups. On Wednesday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention expanded eligibility for boosters to adolescents and backed away from describing anyone as “fully vaccinated” because two shots no longer seem adequate.

Instead, one’s vaccination status will now be “up to date” — or not. It’s no surprise that many Americans are wondering: Where does this end? Are we to roll up our sleeves for booster shots every few months?

Again, I recommend getting vaccinated. I recommend taking the booster. If this is still around come April, I’ll get another booster. I don’t like to be sick, even if the symptoms are mild. It’s not up to the U.S. federal government to mandate this. Especially when it will be open ended. If they want to do this, have Congress try and pass a law.

Read: SCOTUS Seems Skeptical Over Biden’s Vaccine Mandate »

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NC Gov Roy Cooper Embraces “Environmental Justice” Or Something

By William Teach January 8, 2022 – 7:00 am

Cooper has generally been a rather normal Democrat, as required in a Southern state such as North Carolina. Perhaps he’s thinking of actually running for president in 2024, as there’s no way Biden will have his party’s support

Cooper embraces ‘environmental justice’ with climate change order

st greta carA day after the one-year anniversary of an event that laid bare the political divisions of a nation already undergoing a racial reckoning, Gov. Roy Cooper on Friday signed an executive order that acknowledges an extricable link between the threats of climate change and the vulnerability of underserved North Carolina communities least equipped to deal with its impact or embrace the opportunities of a green economy.

Cooper’s order enhances earlier state goals for reducing carbon emissions and adding electric vehicles while aiming to ensure that areas left behind from North Carolina’s growth are protected environmentally and empowered economically.

“For too long, our low- and moderate-income communities, our communities of color, our indigenous communities have been disproportionally impacted by pollution and climate change,” Cooper said before signing the document during a ceremony at N.C. A&T State University. “With this order, we commit to increase the goals of greenhouse gas reduction, and move more quickly to clean transportation and to curb environmental injustices that affect our most vulnerable communities.”

Cooper’s order calls for a 50% reduction in the state’s greenhouse gas emissions from 2005 levels by 2030, and “net-zero” emissions no later than 2050.

Interesting that he took a short fossil fueled from Raleigh to Greensboro, about an hour and a half drive, to yammer about Evil fossil fuels, eh? What, exactly, is Cooper doing in his own life and that of the Governor’s office?

The document also sets a goal of adding at least 1.25 million registered zero-emission vehicles in North Carolina by 2030, and having zero-emission vehicles account for 50% of new auto sales in the state in 2030.

People are already mad about paying MSRP for new vehicles, and prices higher than MSRP for used cars. As it stands, only a bit above 10% of new cars sold are hybrids. Regardless, this is all climavirtue signaling to the climate cult, and Elites like Cooper will make no changes in their own lives.

Meanwhile

Climate change means you could see more armadillos in North Carolina

Over the past couple years, there has been an increase in armadillo sightings across the Carolinas, and officials with the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission says it’s due to climate change.

Armadillos have been spotted in 23 counties across North Carolina, including Wake and Durham. Since 2007, there have been as many as 30 sightings of armadillos in Wake County.

This is all your fault.

Read: NC Gov Roy Cooper Embraces “Environmental Justice” Or Something »

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There’s A Real Danger In #LetsGoBrandon Or Something

By William Teach January 8, 2022 – 6:45 am

Fortunately, the Credentialed Media is around to keep this going. Maybe we should all go back to #FuckJoeBiden?

If you have trouble with the link to the Charlotte Observer, try the Yahoo one, in which Excitable Peter Horn loses his mind

Back in Charlotte for the holidays, I was out on a walk when I noticed my parents’ neighbor’s truck. It’s a big truck. White, newish, plastered with bumper stickers in dense but ordered rows — mostly political, some football-related. Among many others was “Mean Tweets 2024” and “Let’s Go Brandon.”

This, from a purportedly serious man. A grown-up by most senses of the word, likely born in the 1950s. A man with grown children of his own, a respectable career, two bowls of water by his mailbox for passing dogs and a nativity set in the front yard.

I stopped and stared for a moment, wondering, how did we get here?

I don’t mean the polarization. How did we reach this level of absurdity, where ”serious people” are comfortable putting thinly veiled ”F— Joe Biden bumper stickers on their trucks, like a group of 12-year-old boys snickering over walkie-talkies because surely Mom and Dad don’t know that word really means penis.

I don’t read the Charlotte Observer all that much, going with more local Raleigh outlets, but, I’m not finding, with a few searches, any complaints over the massive amount of vile invective thrown towards Trump, his wife and child, Mike Pence, everyone who worked in his administration, as well as Republicans like Mitch McConnell, Ted Cruz, and so many more. How many called him pResident? Orange man? Assassination chic? Kathy Griffin “beheading” Trump?

I could keep going and going, and, no complaints from the Charlotte Observer. There are throw pillows, bumper stickers, and t-shirts, among others, at Amazon, Etsy, and more. Tons of nasty stuff from celebs and music (or, considering what they made, should it be “music”?) people, even those in the media. And big media.

For those unfamiliar with “Let’s Go Brandon,” it’s a viral slogan that’s coded criticism of President Joe Biden. It started when an NBC Sports reporter suggested fans at an Oct. 2 Talladega race were chanting “Let’s Go Brandon” during an interview with NASCAR driver Brandon Brown. They weren’t. They were actually chanting “F— Joe Biden.”

It’s all just so juvenile. So pathetic.

Sure thing, Chump. Those of us blogging during the Bush43 years thought it couldn’t get worse. But, we should have know that Democrats could add a 12 to the amplifier.

And Trumpism is Steve Bannon trying to “kill the Biden presidency in the crib.”

Right, right, like Democrats talking about impeaching Trump before he even took office. Like Dems coming up with the BS Russian collusion.

“Let’s Go Brandon” isn’t just another silly, immature bumper sticker. It’s the latest shiny object in the GOP’s culture war quiver to distract from the truly nefarious, anti-democratic process at work. A process that seeks to limit access to voting, cast doubt on our electoral process and potentially upend the American experiment because their guy lost.

Sherman Potter Bull Cookies

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Surprise: Warmists See Those Not On Their Side As Enemies

By William Teach January 7, 2022 – 5:22 pm

This is something that those of us who have been watching have been trying to tell the average Republican, namely, that, if you aren’t a Progressive, you are not a political opponent, but, an enemy

View from the Left: Fight our true enemies in climate change, white nationalism, disease

Whenever we’re on the verge of avoiding disasters and accomplishing something meaningful for America’s future, international welfare and life itself, obstructionists sabotage our progress. Both major parties, GOP extremists especially, take the myopic view human existence revolves around profligate economies ? prices at pumps, tenderloin sales (subsidized by taxes), mortgages; car loans.

Levying a $175 billion/year, decade-long tithe on tax-avoidant rich and corporations to fund Build Back Better is somehow too expensive, delaying passage of transformative, desperately-needed initiatives. Yet, the world’s most gluttonous military budget ($770 billion/year or $7.7 trillion projected over 10), emptying the government’s coffers, sails through Congress without a hitch. Because it didn’t hurt his coal investment business, even Joe Manchin shut-up and voted “Yes,” costing each of us taxpayers $5,000/year on average.

Where Build Back Better lessens global warming impacts and prescription drug costs, expands Medicare coverage to hearing aids and eyeglasses, and trims college and childcare bills, a mere quarter of the Pentagon budget goes to personnel. The rest vanishes into military-industrial-complex black holes. Ignored are America’s most dangerous enemies: climate change, white-nationalist militias, zoonotic diseases and a pseudo-Dark Age, fact-averse reliance on beliefs instead of scientific evidence and competency. Neutralizing those enemies remains top priority in 2022 as it has been for decades.

See? If you’re engaged in Wrongthink, you are an enemy. Period. They really do want to get rid of you. You are not entitled to your opinion, you must think exactly like the Progressives/Warmists. You cannot cite actual facts, only Cult approved “facts”.

Countless human, plant and nonhuman animal lives depend on Paris Accord objectives being met. Extinction rates are tragically high and warmer temps, extreme weather and rising seas will destroy critical infrastructure and properties, escalating insurance claims and costs. Even before wildfires, floods, and whirlwinds wreak havoc, shifts in societal risk perception will lower property values in danger-prone areas. U.S. storms produced 23 million more lightning strikes in 2021 than 2020, and in recent years, hundreds of millions of farm animals have died with thousands of Americans from unseasonable jet stream swings, floods, firestorms and heat waves caused by climate change.

As glaciers and sea ice continue to shrink, darker, newly-exposed surfaces absorb rather than reflect the sunlight, retaining more heat. If polar feedback loops speed out of control, oceans will rise catastrophically. The figurative and literal tip of the iceberg: climate change drives every priority.

Yup. It’s a cult. And it’s becoming more and more dangerous, more willing to label those with different political beliefs as enemies, and, once they start doing that, violence from the climate cult comes next.

Read: Surprise: Warmists See Those Not On Their Side As Enemies »

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If All You See…

By William Teach January 7, 2022 – 1:00 pm

…are electric wires which need to be replaced due to ‘climate change’, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Raised On Hoecakes, with a post on SEALs getting an injunction on COVID jabs.

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People’s Republik Of California Looking To Try Passing Universal Healthcare

By William Teach January 7, 2022 – 10:30 am

The last time California bandied this about, they learned that it would cost at least twice the current budge of the state, and there was no real way to pay for it. There would be a hundreds of billions shortfall. Also, while a majority support universal healthcare in theory, when it comes to seeing taxes and such going up only around 42% supported this. Democrats never give up on their ideas, though, because this is not about taking care of people, it’s about controlling people

Democrats propose California universal healthcare, funded by new income, business taxes

California would enact a sweeping, first-in-the-nation universal healthcare plan under a proposal unveiled Thursday by a group of state Democratic lawmakers, providing health services to every resident and financed by a broad array of new taxes on individuals and businesses.

Though some of the policy details of the ambitious plan were laid out last year, the way to fund it had not been determined. The proposal, now laid out in separate pieces of legislation, faces significant hurdles in the coming months — first at the state Capitol, with opposition from groups representing doctors and insurance companies, and then possibly at the ballot box, as voters would have to approve the taxes in an amendment to the California Constitution.

They didn’t know how to pay for this in 2017, and they still have little idea

Assembly Bill 1400 would create “CalCare,” a system governed by an independent board of directors that promises access to any doctor, regardless of network, and a wide variety of medical services. The new entity would push to bring payments to providers more in line with the costs of care and would seek to negotiate lower prices for prescription drugs. The plan includes long-term care coverage and services for senior citizens and disabled people, and would remove barriers based on a patient’s immigration status.

And would see doctors and medical facilities heading for other states.

The plan’s proposed tax increase might present the most difficult political hurdle: As a constitutional amendment, it would require a supermajority vote in both the state Senate and Assembly and then ratification by voters in either the June or November statewide election. While Democrats have held a supermajority of seats in both houses for the better part of a decade, they have rarely found enough support within their ranks for a broad-based tax increase.

The constitutional amendment would impose a new excise tax on businesses equal to 2.3% of any annual gross receipts in excess of $2 million. A new payroll tax would also be created, equal to 1.25% of total annual wages and collected from businesses employing 50 or more people. An additional payroll tax would be required for employers with workers earning more than $49,900 a year.

Good luck with that. Remember this oldy but goody from the Obamacare era?

“I was laughing at Boehner — until the mail came today,”

Waschura said, referring to House Speaker John Boehner, who is leading the Republican charge to defund Obamacare.

“I really don’t like the Republican tactics, but at least now I can understand why they are so pissed about this. When you take $10,000 out of my family’s pocket each year, that’s otherwise disposable income or retirement savings that will not be going into our local economy.”

“Of course, I want people to have health care,” Vinson said. “I just didn’t realize I would be the one who was going to pay for it personally.”

Personally, I think California should give it a whirl. You can’t have an experiment without an experimental group. And anyone who voted Democrat in the state should not be allowed to escape to another state.

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Shocking: Driving Around In An EV Is Not That Convenient

By William Teach January 7, 2022 – 7:00 am

Even in a much smaller nation like the U.K. things are tough. This reminds me of one of the reviews of the Chevy Volt, where it was very cold and the driver didn’t want to turn on the heat in order to save charge, with her toes freezing

I drove an electric van cross-country for a month. It was cheaper than a normal car, but the challenges showed how far EV travel has to go.

Electric vehicleI want to get an electric vehicle one day. The reduced environmental impact and lower cost are appealing — but their range and the process of charging make me anxious to take the plunge, even as EVs go farther and charging points become more common. AutoNation CEO Mike Jackson said in February that most EV drivers were still not taking overnight trips away from their home-charging setup.

If people are afraid to take their average $54,000 vehicles on an over night trip, we, that’s rather a problem, eh? In fairness, people probably didn’t drive their Model T’s and such too far over a hundred years ago

By chance, I got the opportunity to have a monthlong test drive and experience what relying on an EV to travel long distances is really like.

In my day job as a TV and events presenter, I had to drive with a colleague around Britain working at food events. When my client offered me an electric Volkswagen ABT Transporter, I jumped at it.

The ABT had a range of only 80 miles, so my trip required numerous charges during the day and constant planning. Each morning, rather than setting a location in a GPS and simply setting off, we’d have to map the route via fast-charge points, individually checking each point against recent Google reviews to ensure they were in service.

Also, in fairness, that’s rather short for range. It also, get this, costs around $51,000 U.S. Yikes! It’s also a van.

Apps like PlugShare and Zap Map allowed for route planning. User-sourced data theoretically allows drivers to see which charge points are out of service or in use, but even using this information I found issues with one in four of the 36 charge points I visited over the month.

At some charge stations, these apps showed there was a free charging point because there were several. But at one, it turned out to be only possible to charge one vehicle at a time.

This wasn’t an isolated incident. We had to wait at times for a charge point for up to 45 minutes. Repeatedly doing this could add hours onto a longer journey.

You could fill your tank in under 10 minutes and be back on the road. You could also get a hybrid. I was seriously considering the Honda Accord Hybrid Sport, but, the leasing isn’t that good yet, and, a Civic Hatchback EXL is about $4k less.

Anyhow, there were lots of problems, and, really, do you want to plan every darned trip that much? When I drive north to see the parents, my only plan is to get gas before or after Baltimore, because I don’t want to stop anywhere near that dangerous city. That’s all I need to worry about. If I want to get off 95 to get food or use the bathroom, no worries.

Elsewhere in EVs

Chevy unveiled its cheapest electric model yet, a $30,000 crossover SUV

The automaker took the wraps off of its upcoming Chevrolet Equinox EV, a small electric SUV that will cost around $30,000 in its base configuration. The Equinox EV will bring another low-cost, electric option to the country’s most popular vehicle segment: compact SUVs. (snip)

GM didn’t offer many details about the Equinox EV. The SUV will be available in both fleet and retail versions, have RS and LT trims, and use GM’s new Ultium battery platform. Judging by the photos GM shared, we can see that the Equinox EV will have a large touchscreen and a second driver-facing display. A slim light bar stretches across the SUV’s front end.

The big one is the range. How much will you get for $30,000? A Civic hatch EXL (I ordered mine in Meteorite Gray) gets 31/29/35. With a 12.39 gallon tank, that’s an average range of 433 miles. My Accord Sport does about that with an average of 32 and a bigger gas tank. I don’t have to worry about finding a gas station. The Civic is $28460, with leather, sunroof (don’t care), remote start, seat heaters (don’t car), blind spot monitor, power seat, and more. And will hold a heck of a lot more value than a Chevy, regular or EV.

But, everyone is trying to get in on this trend, including Sony, regardless of whether there is consumer demand, which there really isn’t. And, lots of outlets are now saying how bad EVs will be in the cold and snow, like when everyone was stuck in northern Virginia. And this is all to deal with an imaginary, made up problem.

Read: Shocking: Driving Around In An EV Is Not That Convenient »

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