No climate debate? Yes, there is

Boston Globe ^ | July 1, 2009 | Jeff Jacoby

[MartinaMisc]

IN HIS WEEKLY address on Saturday, President Obama saluted the House of Representatives for passing Waxman-Markey, the gargantuan energy-rationing bill that would amount to the largest tax increase in the nation’s history. It would do so by making virtually everything that depends on energy - which is virtually everything - more expensive.

The president doesn’t describe the legislation in those terms now, but he made no bones about it last year. In an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle in January 2008, he calmly explained how cap-and-trade - the carbon-dioxide rationing scheme that is at the heart of Waxman-Markey - would work:

“Under my plan of a cap-and-trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket . . . because I’m capping greenhouse gases, coal power plants, natural gas, you name it . . . Whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was, they would have to retrofit their operations. That will cost money, and they will pass that [cost] on to consumers.’’

In the same interview, Obama suggested that his energy policy would require the ruin of the coal industry. “If somebody wants to build a coal-fired plant, they can,’’ he told the Chronicle. “It’s just that it will bankrupt them, because they are going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s being emitted.’’

The justification for inflicting this financial misery, of course, is the onrushing catastrophe of human-induced global warming - a catastrophe that can be prevented only if we abandon the carbon-based fuels on which most of the prosperity and productivity of modern life depend. But what if that looming catastrophe isn’t real? What if climate change has little or nothing to do with human activity? What if enacting cap-and-trade means incurring excruciating costs in exchange for infinitesimal benefits?

[Right Wing Assault]

Jacoby treats this as something he has just discovered. If he, his paper, and the rest of the MSM had been doing their job, they would have shown both sides of the story all along.

Now that they are realizing what a disaster some of obi-one’s policies might be, they are finally starting to do their job of telling the other side.

Even liberals have a limit of what they will stand for.

[hoosier hick]

Jeff Jacoby is one of the good guys— he just happens to be published in the Boston Globe....

hh

[DHC-2]

It seems “environmentalism” is not different than any other religion today. You have to “believe to see.” Etc. Why couldn't we start treating it like a religion, then go for separation of church and state. That would give the libs some pause. :-)

[PreciousLiberty]

I was surprised to see no reference to the suppressed EPA “no global warming” report. So, I sent him an e-mail recommending a followup article. :-)

[opus86]

Obama can get away with saying “there’s no debate” because most Americans aren’t paying attention. And if they continue to ignore what’s going on our leftist Congress will pass some form of a cap-and-trade bill.

[steelyourfaith]

 

Beam me to Planet Gore !

[Howie]