Grassroots CAFE rallies?

Obama will be a focus of the UAW in Chicago this weekend

This weekend automakers and their unions will hold rallies in Chicago and St. Louis in an attempt to gain support for a "balanced CAFE approach like Hill-Terry" writes the DetroitNews. That approach would require a 35 mpg mandate for cars and 32 mpg for light trucks by 2022 versus 35 mpg for all vehicles by 2020.

Sadly, even 35 mpg by 2020 will do nothing to reduce foreign oil dependency when consumption increases by a few percent every year. Ultimately, the entire current CAFE debate is an absolute joke and a complete waste of time.

Hot on the heals of my Chevy Tahoe hybrid test drive, I am empathetic to GM's concerns, for example. 35 mpg could kill not just the Tahoe, but the Tahoe hybrid, the Yukon hybrid, the Escalade hybrid and on and on.

Still, if GM is able to develop lithium batteries for the Chevy Volt and for the plug-in Saturn Vue hybrid, then GM can turn the Tahoe hybrid into either a lithium powered Tahoe, or a plug-in Tahoe hybrid. Such a vehicle, I'm confident, could hit 35 mpg by 2020 - probably pretty easily.

If not, which is more important, the ability to buy a Tahoe hybrid or the end of foreign oil dependency?

Still, when studies suggest that as much as 70 percent of the real cost of gasoline is hidden, some of that hidden money needs to be redirected to help automakers. Inevitably, while cheap oil and gasoline has helped automakers via highly-profitable gas-guzzlers, it has also helped the government hide, literally, trillions in military spending - that should also be addressed.

Don't like CAFE? Fine. Let's create a gas tax. Buy any vehicle you want, but start paying more of your share of the real cost of gasoline.

Finally, if automakers want to educate the public on the costs of 35 mpg, then I say SHUT UP when it comes to CAFE rallies. If U.S. automakers want to educate the public, then educate them on the dangers of foreign oil dependency and the realities of what it would take to end foreign oil dependency.