Free Republic

As some conservatives celebrate the repeal of Australia's carbon tax, a dose of caution is warranted: Australia still has carbon taxation on its agenda. This repealed legislation is apparently going to be replaced by the multi-billion dollar "Direct Action" climate change policy that Prime Minister Tony Abbott has long been promoting. Thus, one form of carbon pricing gets replaced by another form of carbon pricing, neither of which is acceptable. Many critical thinkers about climate science got excited over Abbott's public statement that the "science behind climate change was 'crap'"? A little -- more accurately, a lot -- premature that...

Noah Rothman wrote up Quinnipiac’s gubernatorial poll yesterday, prompting me to wonder over at Townhall whether the polling outfit was holding back its Senate numbers for separate release. We now have our answer. A virtual deadlock, and advantage Gardner: The closely-watched U.S. Senate race is tied with 44 percent for U.S. Rep. Cory Gardner, the Republican challenger, and 42 percent for Sen. Mark Udall, the Democratic incumbent, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today. Another 10 percent are undecided. This compares to the results of an April 24 survey by the independent Quinnipiac University showing Sen. Udall at...

SYDNEY (AP) — Australia's government repealed a much-maligned carbon tax on the nation's worst greenhouse gas polluters on Thursday, ending years of contention over a measure that became political poison for the lawmakers who imposed it. The Senate voted 39 to 32 to axe the 24.15 Australian dollar ($22.60) tax per metric ton of carbon dioxide that was introduced by the center-left Labor government in July 2012. Conservative lawmakers burst into applause as the final tally was announced. Prime Minister Tony Abbott's conservative coalition government rose to power last year on the promise of getting rid of the tax, assuring...

Penguins are on the front line of climate change, as rising global temperatures melt the ice the iconic and lovable creatures call home. Scientists who count the birds are finding that penguins are beginning to feel major impacts from the drastic changes to their habitat. But, perhaps surprisingly, the breeding populations of three brush-tailed species of penguins inhabiting the Western Antarctic Peninsula, where the temperatures are warmest, are not all falling as the ice is quickly melting.

… Opponents of the carbon tax implemented in 2012 had the media largely on their side. Electricity prices soared—not mainly because of the tax, but because power companies were spending billions on infrastructure. Most electricity users were compensated for the added cost of the tax, but many of them didn’t know that. And rising gas prices fed the fury—even though the tax didn’t apply to gasoline. Australia’s experience illustrates how easy it is to scuttle complicated environmental laws, and serves as a warning to President Barack Obama, whose recent proposal to force a 30 percent cut in power plants’ carbon...

Hank Paulson (ya know: the guy that “managed” the financial crises in 2008) had a recent op-ed in the New York Times warning America of the next great crises. According to George W Bush’s former Treasury Secretary, climate change is the next sub-prime mortgage disaster. Or something. Writing in the New York Times, Paulson lays out his case:Looking back at the dark days of the financial crisis in 2008, it is easy to see the similarities between the financial crisis and the climate challenge we now face. We are building up excesses (debt in 2008, greenhouse gas emissions that are...

Prime Minister Tony Abbott reintroduced legislation to the Australian Parliament on Monday that would repeal a carbon tax that the nation’s worst greenhouse gas polluters have to pay. The opposition center-left Labor Party and minor Greens party used their Senate majority in March to block the bills that would remove the 24.15 Australian dollar ($22.79) tax per metric ton of carbon dioxide that was introduced by a Labor government in July 2012. The bills were defeated 33 votes to 29. …

This is how stupid we've become: Does Obama do one stupid thing to cover for the other stupid thing? Does he do the stupid prisoner exchange to make up for the stupid carbon plan? Or is all the stupidity organic? Getting past the fact that none of this makes anybody in United States look very good, I think these are legitimate questions. Because it seems to me that Obama has waved the red meat, and the conservative lions have attacked. The red meat in this case being the exchange of prisoner Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl for five Taliban terrorists. CNN...

During a recent visit to Daemen College, Democratic National Committee Chairwoman, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, was asked what was needed to break the gridlock in Congress when it comes to fighting Climate Change. Her answer: Elect fewer members of the Tea Party (00:00-00:14) Video below: Reporter: ‘What can we do to get the Congress unstuck and stop denying science?” Wasserman Schultz: “Elect fewer members of the Tea Party. That’s the political answer.” Congresswoman Schultz then proceeded to mock Marco Rubio’s belief that man made Climate Change doesn’t exist and she continued to spread the myth that 97% of scientists believe in...

.................Premier Li Keqiang last week declared war on pollution, which is expected to speed up the process of turning China's limited environmental levy into a full-blown tax targeting the nation's major polluters. But the all-out efforts to combat China's disastrous pollution levels might get in the way of plans to tax carbon dioxide emissions in a bid to stunt the rapid growth of greenhouse gas emissions, Zhu Guangyao, the vice environment minister, said...... A carbon tax is increasingly controversial among lawmakers, said Zhu, adding that an environment tax would be easier to push through without carbon in the mix. The...

At a hearing Thursday on the Keystone oil pipeline, James Hansen, former director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, testified before Congress that 100 percent of the proceeds from a proposed carbon tax should go to the public, because liberals will try to use part of it to “make the government bigger.” “An important point is that such legislation I think needs to be introduced by conservatives, because I’m afraid liberals will try to take part of the money to make the government bigger. Not one dime should go to the government. 100 percent should go to the public,”...

The Dems have told the big lie on climate change so many times they actually believe the lie. Period! Last November, Obama signed an Executive Order in which he declared: "The impacts of climate change -- including an increase in prolonged periods of excessively high temperatures, more heavy downpours, an increase in wildfires, more severe droughts, permafrost thawing, ocean acidification, and sea-level rise -- are already affecting communities, natural resources, ecosystems, economies, and public health across the Nation. Just one problem, none of that is true. 2013 was the year which saw the fewest days with temps of 100 degrees...

Is there such a thing as "global warming pragmatism?" Robert J. Samuelson, who writes on economics for the Washington Post, thinks so -- and he's just flat wrong. Samuelson seeks to bridge differences over a polarized and contentious issue: "man-made" global warming. Problem is, Samuelson's bridge is plenty of girders, cables, concrete, and asphalt short of making it to the other shore. Samuelson is much taken with the work of an MIT economist, Robert Pindyck. Pindyck, according to Samuelson is a difference-splitter. Can't say that global warming is overstated, but can't say it's understated. When in doubt, tax -- carbon...

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was set up by the United Nations in 1988 and has been trying very hard to demonstrate the threat of a dangerous human influence on climate due to the emission of greenhouse gases. This is in line with their Charter, which directs the IPCC to assemble reports in support of the Global Climate Treaty -- the 1992 Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC) of Rio de Janeiro. It is interesting that IPCC "evidence" was based on peer-reviewed publications - but (reluctantly) abandoned only after protracted critiques from outside scientists. E-mails among...

While the country is immersed in Obamacare headlines and a congressional tussle over delays and mandates, the Obama administration is stealthily moving toward unprecedented control over private property under a massive expansion of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Water Act authority. The proposed rule, obtained by the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee in advance of EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy’s testimony at a Thursday oversight hearing, widely broadens the definition of waterways over which the federal government has jurisdiction to as little as a water ditch in a backyard. The Clean Water Act redefinition of “waters of the United States”...

Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., said Tuesday that she would continue to put pressure on the administration to speed up its review of the Keystone XL pipeline. "I intend to see if we can push forward the approval of the Keystone pipeline," Landrieu told reporters after a meeting the senator held with Premier Alison Redford of Alberta, Canada, to discuss a way forward on the pipeline, which, if built, would bring crude from Alberta's oil sands to Gulf Coast refineries. "The ball is in our court and I hope the United States will make a decision," Landrieu said. "So I'm going...

The Geneva talks on Iranian nukes have turned into a "pull my finger" charade. Iran says that it's only making electricity, not nuclear bombs. The U.S., Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany are somehow all supposed to agree on reeling Iran in -- but let's face it: Russia and China are close Iranian allies and trading partners, while even Germany and France have significant geopolitical ties to Russia through, for example, the European defense conglomerate EADS and the Nord Stream pipeline running Russian gas into Europe. And Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman reportedly bragged to Russian journalists at the...

The UN wants $100 billion from wealthier countries (about $2.4 billion from Australians or $100 a person). The Australian government has produced a position statement for the Warsaw UNFCCC conference. It is unusually brutal. I don’t think I remember seeing the phrase about socialism “masquerading as environmentalism” in an official statement before. (I’m sure readers will correct me). It’s good to see some recognition that the science has become less clear, and that it may become more so. Essentially, the new Australian government ‘s message to the UN is: we are reducing CO2, but we’re not giving you a...

Over 600,000 bats were killed by wind energy turbines across the United States last year, with the highest concentration of kills in the Appalachian Mountains, according to new research. "Dead bats are being found underneath wind turbines across North America," Hayes wrote. "This estimate of bat fatalities is probably conservative."

Forty years ago this month, in 1973, we were in the midst of the Arab Oil Embargo. At that time, President Richard Nixon issued a Kennedy-esque challenge to America. He said, “Let us set as our national goal, in the spirit of Apollo, with the determination of the Manhattan Project, that by the end of this decade we will have developed the potential to meet our own energy needs without depending on any foreign energy sources.” If Apollo and the Manhattan project had not gone as well, we would still be peering at the moon wondering what the surface was...