‘Cap-and-trade: Obama’s ‘economic dagger’

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Mar 15, 2009

‘Cap-and-trade: Obama’s ‘economic dagger’

By Examiner Editorial

Prospects for passage of President Barack Obama’s cap-and-trade solution for global warming have become decidedly chillier since the idea was first proposed in 2002. Obama wants to cut CO2 emissions 80 percent by 2050.

He’s got his work cut out for him. Not only are hundreds of credible climate scientists now publicly debunking former vice-president Al Gore’s claims of apocalyptic environmental disaster, a new Gallup poll reveals that 41 percent of Americans believe such alarms are “exaggerated.” Most significantly, more than 650 prominent international scientists now oppose the findings of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC), which are the basis of the Obama proposal.

By our math, the 52 authors of the IPCC report who are climate scientists are out-numbered 12-to-1 by their scientific critics. Former Senate Environmental Committee chairman James Inhofe, R-OK, insists that the IPCC report, funded by government grants and liberal-leaning foundations, was written by “bought and paid for” scientists with a pre-determined agenda. Inhofe has opposed the cap-and-trade concept ever since the original McCain-Lieberman bill was introduced in the Republican-controlled Senate. Only two of his Senate colleagues offered to join Inhofe then. Now, more than two dozen have joined the growing ranks committed to defeating the identical Warner-Lieberman bill.

Citing a recent Pew Poll in which Americans ranked the economy at the top - and global warming at the bottom - of a market basket of political issues, Inhofe calls cap-and-trade legislation “a form of global taxation” and believes it can be defeated again, even though it has the full backing of the Obama administration. The realization is slowly but surely growing here that duplicating Europe�s failed cap-and-trade scheme would be a knock-out blow for the U.S. economy because it would dramatically increase energy costs and cripple the nation’s dwindling manufacturing base.

The Detroit News aptly called cap-and-trade “a giant economic dagger aimed at the nation’s heartland.” Even Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, D-ND, warned that the president’s $3.5 trillion budget “can’t pass here” if it contains cap-and-trade provisions that virtually guarantee a stratospheric rise in energy costs for families and businesses.

The Obama administration has already signaled its intention to limit the supply of energy by blocking funding for a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain and canceling existing federal oil and gas leases. Less supply inescapably means higher prices. So let us hope that Inhofe’s bold assertion that “we are winning the argument with the American people” is correct. If it is, it comes just in the nick of time. Read more here.