Huffington Rebuffs SUV Owners

FORUM l They are the darlings of the American road — rough, rugged, and roomy! But sport utility vehicles are also inefficient, oversized, and environmentally unfriendly, according to author and social commentator Arianna Huffington, who brought her strident anti-SUV crusade to the Kennedy School Forum in January.

Taking a swipe at “crooked CEOs” and “spineless” politicians, the former conservative diva called the popularity of SUVs in this country “a case study of the collusion between corporate America and Washington.”

If not for the automakers and their lobbying, she says, “there would not have been this big loophole for SUVs to not have to comply with fuel efficiency standards.” And with millions of the gas guzzling vehicles on the road, Huffington explains, the gas companies make more money, as do the foreign countries that supply the fuel. Ads produced by Huffington’s group, the Detroit Project, go so far as to link SUV sales to support
for terrorism.

So why aren’t Washington politicians doing anything about it? Huffington blames the “lobbyists…working around the clock to undermine the public interest. The only thing we have is the countervailing force of the people’s power when we choose to exercise it.”