This is a good start. I'm hoping that as progress is made, he'll go further and also start working towards emission-free vehicles and those for which MPG is irrelevant.

The big three have been producing vehicles that already meet these standards in Europe for quite awhile, now. Time to bring the GOOD cars, the ones they sell everywhere else, home to the US.

ANOTHER Executive Order???

Wow, he must be trying to get in the Guinness Book of World Records or something.

Is this one #6? In the first 6 days?

Does the power of these things worry anyone else?

should remember it was their fellow-Republican Ahnuld who lobbied for stricter laws governing the fuel economy of cars in California. Aren't recall elections great?

Plural of "memorandum" is "memoranda."

But the Democrats promised they wouldn't bring back the Fairness Doctrine!

No.... Obama's use of power doesn't bother me in the least. Most of the EO's he's issued are simply what the public voted for: reversals of boneheaded policies of the Bush Regime. Bush used the power of the presidency to do exactly what he (Bush) wanted to do. Obama is doing what the majority of the voters wanted.

As for devolving the power to regulate CAFE standards down to the state level, the 'States Rights' Party, Republicans, should love it. Isn't this what they're always pushing for? (unless of course the state voters want to do something that the Repubs disagree with...)

This is a pretty weak and disappointing action by Obama. It was widely reported at the time that EPA had done the full analysis on the waiver approval and had it ready to go when political interference killed it. In other words, there's nothing left to study. Someone at EPA has the decision sitting on their hard drive already. All they need to do is print it out and give it to Lisa Jackson (the new EPA administrator) for her to sign.

No, because the executive orders he is issuing are within the authority he was granted by Congress and the Constitution for those particular items.

Now Bush's "signing statements," on the other hand, were an entirely different story.

And in other instances, Obama is directing the Federal government to act in accordance with statutes promulgated by Congress and orders from courts.

No car manufacturer is going to make 50 different engines for each state with different fuel standards. They're going ot make an engine for the state with the strictest standards. Now, Obama gets to give power back to the states (ie, regulating their own air), while at the same time creating a market force that compels manufacturers to provide strict fuel economy, while saying that the Federal Government (ie democrats) didn't raise fuel economy and put an undue burden on auto manufacturers. Well done.

"No car manufacturer is going to make 50 different engines for each state with different fuel standards"

They won't have to. The Clean Air Act allows only two emissions standards: Federal or California. The states all have to choose between the two. They can't go out on their own. Since there currently is no EPA GHG emissions standard for automobiles, they would be choosing between the DOT CAFE rules or the California emissions rules. But still just two choices.

Thus far, Obama is largely reversing Bush's executive orders, which there were an awful lot of. Since the policies and regulations were introduced via executive order, it's appropriate to reverse them via the same.

Should you be worried? Only if you're a right-wing tool!

I'm not being snarky here, but the plural of "memoradum" is "memoranda" ... not "memorandums".