Global warming?

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Redux

The spin is to suggest that the oil/gas lobby has as much influence now as it did during the Bush/Republican majority years...which is how I interpreted Merc's "fantasy because of lobbyists" remark.

The only thing that changes in Washington is who are the whores in Congress going to get their next contribution from and which whores are in charge. Politics does not change.

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Yet you choose to ignore the facts I posted about the contributions of China and India to the worlds problems. You are among those partisans that would love to see us spend ourselves into the third world cleaning up our emissions while these "emerging countries" have to do absolutely nothing. You fail. Again.

Right...my goal is to make the US a third world country rather than demonstrate leadership.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Redux

Right...my goal is to make the US a third world country rather than demonstrate leadership.

You are blinded by idealistic thoughts of "leadership" while the realists laugh at you.

[TheMercenary]

And in another few years as China and India build a few more coal fired plants each week.

[TheMercenary]

Ok, this was funny.

[TheMercenary]

A more realistic assessment.

This paper assesses the prospects for implementing greenhouse gas controls in the United States. One basic fact frames the analysis. Namely, controls stringent enough to actually stop global climate change would as yet still cost more than the damage expected from climate change. Although a modest level of emission control could yield more benefits than costs, even modest controls face formidable political challenges. The opponents of emission controls hold great organizational advantages over the proponents. To be sure, a strong surge of public sentiment might politically overwhelm all these objections and barriers. But public support for emission controls is too tepid for that to be likely any time soon. Moreover, overcoming these domestic problems, could it be done, would be only the first step toward a viable international control regime, without which national controls would be futile. And the anarchic nature of the international system makes global environmental agreements notoriously difficult to reach, to sustain, and to enforce.

Forces operating beyond the narrow arena of national and international environmental policy will also heavily influence the prospects for emission controls. Several likely trends suggest that these prospects are ebbing rather than rising. Predictable national security and fiscal policy challenges may well out-compete the climate issue for both public attention and economic resources. At the same time, the emerging globalization of the natural gas market will spark new conflicts between the goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and that of decreasing America's dependence on foreign energy.

Other factors, though, have been cited as reasons for hoping that this unfavorable tide could be stemmed and even reversed. One of these, a possible disruption of Persian Gulf energy supplies would—on closer investigation—have quite unfavorable implications for the prospects of U.S. emission controls. Other factors could indeed enhance the prospects for emission controls, e.g., a large, favorable partisan shift, important scientific breakthroughs, or diplomatic pressure from Europe. Although these possibilities cannot be ruled out, they are too speculative to form the basis for an adequate strategy for managing climate policy. The realistic political response is simply to admit that the current and likely future political constellation of forces is unfavorable to the implementation of all but modest emission controls and to adjust the goals of climate policy to match the political realities. An explicitly Fabian strategy would eliminate the benefit-cost problem because gradually slowing the growth of emissions would cost far less than Kyoto-like rapid emission reductions. And such a policy could also be shaped to achieve non-climate benefits. Concretely, linking mandatory emission controls to a plan for "tax shift" promises political and economic advantages. And emission controls may actually confer useful diplomatic benefits on the United States.

http://www.earthscape.org/pmain/sites/cpc.html

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

A more realistic assessment.


http://www.earthscape.org/pmain/sites/cpc.html

We've been down this road before and I agree that there is not unanimity among the scientific community.

Because you find one assessment you like, doesnt change the broad, overwhelming consensus within the scientific community.....and you still cannot identify one credible national/international scientific body that would support your position.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Redux

We've been down this road before and I agree that there is not unanimity among the scientific community.

Because you find one assessment you like, doesnt change the consensus....and you still cannot identify one credible national/international scientific body that would support your position.

You are a joke. You must have your hands over your ears. I have posted numerous links from credible sources. I feel no responsibility to go back and find them for you because you choose to ignore them. In your own words, "I agree that there is not unanimity among the scientific community." And in the very next sentance you contridict yourself.

[TheMercenary]

Another more realistic assessment.

Research and insights taken from the field of political economy suggest that institutions limit the extent to which efficient policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are likely to be adopted. High transaction costs among nations, as well as domestic constraints like voter xenophobia and distrust of markets in the United States and ineffective legal and economic institutions in China, discourage international agreement. The United States must focus on limiting economic harm from adopting poorly designed policies and developing strategies for adaptation or technology-driven geoengineering. Most importantly, the lessons of political economy must become central to the study of climate policy, including a healthy exchange of views between political economists and climate modelers.

Resident Fellow
Lee Lane
Ideas drawn from the works of Douglass North and those of other political economists suggest that institutions limit the extent to which efficient policies to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are likely to be adopted. Most analyses of the costs of making steep GHG emission cuts conflict with these realities. Problems arise at both the international level and within nations.

Internationally, no third party institutions exist to enforce agreements, and nations differ widely in their interest in restricting GHG emissions. Therefore, high transaction costs will attend efforts to reach and maintain broad GHG controls. So far, those transaction costs have blocked agreement, and there seems little reason to expect that these constraints will soon vanish.

Institutional constraints also exist within key nations. In the United States, widespread voter xenophobia and distrust of markets contribute to adoption of cost-ineffective policy tools, and legislators' incentives to serve constituency interests further supports adoption of regulatory and subsidy programs that greatly increase costs of mitigation. China's legal and economic institutions could not currently apply an effective GHG cap-and-trade or carbon tax. These kinds of GHG controls require the full rule of law, market prices for energy, and market discipline for major industries. In China, the prospects for such a transformation remain highly uncertain.

The most likely course for future climate policy is drift and fragmentation. Some countries, including the US, may adopt GHG limits. One key question is whether this country will be able to make policy changes to limit the economic harm from adopting poorly designed policies. A second is whether it will be able to develop options for adapting to climate change or finding means that prevent warming despite continuing GHG emissions.

Exploring these options will require a new, broader focus for climate policy analysis. To achieve this wider view, the lessons of political economy must become central to the study of climate policy. An initial step toward this goal would be to encourage a systematic exchange of views between the climate modeling community and leading scholars in the traditions of political economy and institutional economics. . . .

http://www.aei.org/publications/pubI...pub_detail.asp

LOL......the joke is on you, dude.

No contradiction.

To wait to act until there is unanimity is shortsighted and an appeasement to the oil industry that we saw for the last eight years.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Redux

LOL......the joke is on you, dude.

No contradiction.

To wait to act until there is unanimity is shortsighted and an appeasement to the oil industry that we saw for the last eight years.

I know, do a poll.

And you still cannot identify one credible national/international scientific body that would support your position!

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Redux

And you still cannot identify one credible national/international scientific body that would support your position!

I put my weight in the credible experts I have quoted, not some nameless faceless ex-lobbyist on a forum. Sorry to disappoint you.

[TheMercenary]

A good discussion in this link shows the proposals and how they work.

This is a quote to the portion that makes my point:

But the problem here is the instantaneous cost that firms have to shell out in order to continue doing business in the year after the cap is established. Estimated costs for U.S. utilities alone—not counting greenhouse gas emitters in manufacturing or other sectors—are in the range of $40 billion per year using current permit prices as they are being traded in the European market. Not only will businesses scream bloody murder, the public will also, since most of that cost will immediately hit consumers’ wallets as the prices of energy, goods, and services rise and keep rising every year as the cap tightens. Not only will costs of everything increase, but the impact will be highly regressive, landing harder on the poorest of the population, who spend a greater percentage of their household income on energy than do the wealthier. Finally, there is the politically unacceptable transfer of wealth from coal states to natural-gas states such as California, where incomes are considerably higher.

http://www.american.com/archive/2009...tep-is-a-doozy

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

A good discussion in this link shows the proposals and how they work.

This is a quote to the portion that makes my point:


http://www.american.com/archive/2009...tep-is-a-doozy

That "research" is among the arguments that purposely misrepresent one particular MIT study and the authors of the research are outraged at the blatant misrepresentation.

"It's just wrong," said John Reilly, an energy, environmental and agricultural economist at M.I.T. and one of the authors of the report. "It's wrong in so many ways it's hard to begin.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-me...ht-switch-tax/