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What a very interesting discussion. Allow me, however, to return to Paris for a moment:
Socialism is not relevant to this discussion. The EU is trying to improve air quality in cities by reducing pollution from vehicles. This is done by enforcing increasingly strict standards for fuel efficiency and particle emissions, thus leading the industry to build more fuel efficient cars. (Btw this is also reducing our dependency on foreign oil, which is good.)
In large (and very polluted) cities such as Paris more needs to be done to improve the air quality. Right now the air pollution is a serious health hazard, as it is in most large cities. For this reason some cities ban certain vehicles from specific areas. This is normal in most large European cities.
The (democratically elected) officials of each city decide if and where this is necessary. If the citizens don't agree they can change it by protesting or by voting for someone else in the next election. Hopefully I don't need to tell you that all members of the EU are democracies...
Generally people accept these bans as neccessary for health reasons. Remember: Europe is a very densely populated area compared to the US. And we need to breathe just like Americans do.
Now, feel free to return to the political debate.
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