hatred of minorities and liberals and so on...

You will never ever find a liberal doing this, you will never ever find a pro civil rights person doing this...

This is one more way the white racists can act out against a society that elected a Black man as president, a society that allowed a movie to be made about global warming that they didnt understand by a man they hated, a white Black man, Al Gore...

any white person who isnt a racist might as well be a Black person to these people

I know it doesnt seem to be sensible on it's face that racism is directly tied to this, but it is

Koch bros are rabid racists, duh, we all know that, and they use the racism of the idiots to do shit like this

we are broken, we cant be fixed the normal way

and a major college town, where my family home is, every weekend. Sometime within the last year (about a year ago) I saw one of these trucks - it had big metal tubes - curved and pointing behind them. Suddenly black smoke appeared. I wondered about it - as I hadn't seen it before - was the exhaust on purpose, or was the driver having an extreme problem with his vehicle?

I saw the truck again on the commute a few months later - only remembered from the strange metal tubes - but this time it wasn't emitting smoke.

Only realized, this past weekend, that the first viewing - and the smoke - was for my benefit (I drive an older Prius.) I guess I got "coal rolled".

Here is the question - does a protest (or bullyish behavior staging as a protest) - have any effect if no one knows that it is a protest action?

I drove behind this vehicle for miles (there were only a few minutes of the heavy smoke) and did spend a little time thinking about it - but in terms of a car problem issue (is this driver in growing crisis per a serious break down possibility.)

I didn't for a second think that the driver was targeting me for bursts of heavy smoke; I wondered if the driver might shortly need road assistance.

Dumb targeted protest, imo, ever. In that view it seems like a waste a lot of money, when no one knows that you are protesting or trying to make a statement.

Now that I know - my reaction will be "keep wasting your money" - and a big shrug (as my nearly 10 yr old Prius delivers it's 50 mpg usage - compared to the money the protester sends out.)

and here is the proof.

(W. C. Fields )

First of all, these are diesel trucks, they burn diesel fuel not gas. Second, the article implies this is a new phenomena, when in fact its been going on for a decade or more. Third, this is not wide-spread, I've not seen one instance of "rolling coal" despite living in a state with a substantial redneck truck-driving population. Fourth, these trucks don't spew soot continuously, its an "on demand" feature. I think the idiots mostly do it in front of their buddies.
All in all, the story (and there are already several DU threads on it) strikes a hysterical and hyperbolic tone that really isn't warranted. This isn't a wide-spread "movement", nor is it appreciably growing. Its just a relatively small group of dumb-fucks with more money than brains.

Must be a slow news summer; this one is popping up everywhere.

allow law enforcement to require spot-testing of vehicles that appear to be violating emissions standards. The first time one of these idiots loses their emissions inspection will be the last time they do it.

it would be considered emitting unnecessary smoke in NY and tampering with emission controls both are ticketable offenses

375.28 a,b,c,d,e fines go to $750 and cannnot be wavied.