On June 2 the EPA will release its proposals designed to regulate carbon emissions from existing power plants. To put this in historical perspective, these new regulations come less than fifteen years after George W. Bush promised to deliver them on the campaign trail in 2000.
The public will have a year to comment before the rules take effect. We don’t know yet what the rules will be, but because this new regulatory scheme comes from the EPA’s existing authority rather than from new legislation, we already know some important things about what won’t be in these new rules.
Without new legislation we cannot get the kind of comprehensive, globally significant, Pigovian marketplaces that would be most effective. What we’ll have instead is some combination of new rules power plants must follow and a fresh patchwork of additional rule-making and taxing authority granted to state governments. In short, this is the worst case scenario for carbon regulation.
This approach will likely be the Obamacare of carbon regulation. It means we will add a fresh new layer of regulatory burdens to our energy markets while failing to deliver any nationally or globally effective regimen. We will add new costs to energy, but only in certain markets and for certain users. It will lay on additional cost and complexity without solving the core problem – the central theme of the Obama Era.
Democrats can only bear some of the blame for this outcome. The best approach to carbon reduction was developed by Libertarian economists decades ago and incorporated by Republicans, briefly, into legislative proposals. If Republicans weren’t in full retreat from reality on all fronts we would have been operating under this scheme for more than a decade already.
Instead of writing millions of lines of new rules dictating in ever finer detail the operating procedures of energy producers, simply apply a tax on carbon, paid at the point of generation or import. That’s it. From there, you could potentially allow producers to “trade” credits created through offsets, like carbon capture. You could use the revenue to provide a tax credit to lower income families hit harder by higher costs, use the funds for remediation. You could also use the money to “buy back” carbon, essentially setting up a market for carbon sequestration.
Countries that did not match our carbon taxes, or failed to consistently impose them, would face steep import duties which would be directed into the carbon fund. The impact to countries like India and China would be steep and immediate, helping to curb the urge to skirt the carbon regime.
The carbon tax would change the market balance among other products like cars, solar panels, and other technologies. Alternative technologies would get the boost they need without government intervening to pick winners and losers. Funds would be available to fuel a market for remediation which does not exist today. A market approach has vast advantages over the clumsy hand of regulation.
This is just one more example of the national and global cost of a Republican Party that has opted out of reality. As in the debate over health care, sound, market-focused Republican voices are completely absent, replaced by shrill denial. Simply voting for Democrats is not a solution. We desperately need the Republican Party to sober up.
Chris Ladd is a Texan living in the Chicago area. He has been involved in grassroots Republican politics for most of his life. He was a Republican precinct committeeman in suburban Chicago until he resigned from the party and his position after the 2016 Republican Convention. He can be reached at gopliferchicago at gmail dot com.
GOPLifer 
Interesting discussion of carbon tax. Those who favor a carbon tax will be interested in Citizen’s Climate Lobby, an organization lobbying Congress for a revenue-neutral carbon tax that hey call “Carbon Fee and Dividend.” Instead of lowering taxes, they would have the Treasury return the tax revenue to households on a per capita basis. It’s a very professional bi-partisan organization supported by Republicans Bob Inglis and ex-Secretary of State Schultz.
I should have included the URL: http://citizensclimatelobby.org/
“Under my policies, the price of energy will necessarily skyrocket”
ruh-roh
http://freebeacon.com/issues/report-epa-could-be-relying-on-fraudulent-data/
http://freebeacon.com/issues/report-all-thermometers-could-be-wrong-too
Tracy won this one. And it wasn’t close.
You can’t even read graphs, how do you know who ‘won’?
poor Crogged.
Geologists rock.
Yes, and Tracy is our rock star.
LOL. I suspect most of the folks frequenting Chris’ blog think my head is simply full of rocks. You ladies, on the other hand, should never be taken for granite. 😉
Dan and Crogged, it’s not about ‘winning,’ it’s about making prudent and just policy choices, such that we leave this world a better place than we found it for those who come after us.
Back in the day, 2nd year geology students were required to take a course in historical geology. In an early lecture, my prof for this course introduced us to the concept of Deep Time. We all know our lives are fleeting, but we generally grossly underestimate how fleeting our lives really are in comparison to geologic timescales. If the history of the earth were compressed into a single day, a human lifetime would last a mere 0.001 *seconds*.
This ol’ rolling stone we call our home has been rolling around the sun for a long, long, long time. It’s the height of human hubris to think that our species’ activities over the course of a single human lifetime are going to have any significant or lasting effect on the planet as a whole. In fact, the same statement can be equally applied to the *entire history* of our species. In the grand scheme of things we aren’t the flea on the tail of the dog; we are the dust mite on the flea on the tail of the dog. Our planet has its own life; that life moves to its own rhythms, and those rhythms operate on timescales beyond human ken. So maybe we all ought to just take a chill pill, before we blithely go jacking with the lifestyles of our children and grandchildren on the basis of observations spanning a couple of decades, and on mathematical models created by a science in its infancy. Just sayin’.
BTW, for elegant portrayals and discussion of Deep Time, I refer you to John McPhee’s “Basin and Range,” Gregory Benford’s “Deep Time,” and Stephen Jay Gould’s “Time’s Arrow.” All three are excellent, thought provoking reads.
“It will lay on additional cost and complexity without solving the core problem – the central theme of the Obama Era.”
LOL. Actually, it is the defining problem of centrally planned economies. The Obama EPA is instituting Obamacare-like complexity because the current administration and the stalwarts of the modern Democrat party think this sort of nonsense is *precisely* what the nation needs. And then they’ll blame pathetic GDP growth on the greed of the private sector. Marvelous.
Assuming that global warming due to anthropogenic factors is significant, and that global warming is a real problem (both of which strain credulity), then a carbon tax *combined* with import tariffs would be a reasonable approach. Of course, if put into practice the only negative externality likely to obtain would be continued downward pressure on the effective wealth of the average American. Thanks, but no thanks. I’ll take a pass.
So do you think business as usual can continue long term with zero bad effects?
define business as usual, long term and bad effects
We’ve had Obama running roughshod over laws since he showed up, is the new normal?
dems show no regard for debt long term or in the present,
and y’all don’t think that’s important which tells me you wouldn’t recognize bad effects no matter what
Well, fly, I’m an earth scientist by training and early career, so I tend to be a bit phlegmatic about all of this climate change hysteria. My discipline was stable isotope geochemistry; one of the primary uses of stable isotope geochemistry in geology is for the study of paleoclimate. To put it a little more bluntly, the discipline would not exist were it not for the fact that the only constant in climate *is* change. As constantly changing climate was the planetary norm long before humans emerged on the scene, I tend to be a bit skeptical about human impact on the same.
Yes, CO2 is a weak greenhouse gas. Yes, humans are producing CO2. Ipso facto, humans must be contributing in *some* way to climate change. However, based on our current state of knowledge, I suspect we’ll need several *thousand* more years of observation before we can reliably state exactly what that impact is, and whether it is significant. In this type of inquiry the scale of a single human lifetime is utterly irrelevant. You have to approach the problem from within the context of geologically significant time frames. Sadly, the Al Gores of the world don’t seem to grok this basic fact.
BTW, a brief survey of climate variation in Europe over the past several thousand years quickly reveals that warm periods were generally epochs of rapid cultural development and expansion of civilization. Conversely, cold snaps were generally bad news, at least as far as civilization is concerned. As an example, you might look up the Viking settlement of Greenland and its sad demise, viz. with respect to climate change. In the grand scheme of the human condition, warmer is better than colder.
OMG–really? I’m a geologist, trust me when I dispute what those so-called climatogolists say has to be on par with..well…..it stands on its own as top ten weak sauce reasoning for dismissing the majority of rational PhDs as ‘hysterics’ by comparing geologic time frames to climate time frames. Anyone here been alive since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution–we can accept just the letters N and O in your response as you must be pretty weak yourself.
oh my! geologic time can’t be compared to climatic time. I’m not a geologist by training but I play one with the work I do. Crogged buddy, you better stick to polishing your rocks.
Tracy, are there precedents in the geological record for climate changes as fast as what we have experienced in the last 50 years? In terms of temperature or atmospheric CO2 levels?
Crogged, I expressed an opinion based on my academic and professional experience. (I’ve done a fair amount of computer-aided basin modeling, as well. As a result, I also remain singularly unimpressed with extrapolations based on poorly constrained mathematical models driven by deterministic algorithms.) You, on the other hand, simply advanced an argumentum ad hominem. Now, if you’re done with the name calling, and would actually like to discuss the merits of the science, have at it. I’m your huckleberry.
subsidence in Harris County…we are adapting
JG, in answer to your query, yes. In fact, magnitude and rate of both sea level rise and temperature increase were *much* higher at the beginning of the Holocene than what we are experiencing currently. This has been true for all transitions between glacial/interglacial periods in the observable record.
We are currently in the subatlantic age of the Holocene, a generally colder period following the somewhat warmer Holocene climatic optimum. (I.e., we appear to be on the downhill slide to the next glaciation.) Geologic evidence suggests that the prior interglacial (the Eemian) was actually warmer than the Holocene overall, with sea level 5-8 m higher that present.
Interestingly, the interglacial/glacial transition is equally rapid, if not more so. The evidence is a little less clear in these situations, since the transition to sea level low stand is accompanied by much erosion, which obfuscates the record somewhat. We can track glacial retreat in glacial terrains quite clearly via moraines and other glacial geomorphologic features; such features are wiped out by glacial advances, giving the impression that the transition to a glaciated state is instantaneous, from a geologic perspective.
This observation has led to some joking about the recent cold snap around the Thorleifson household, with yours truly glibly remarking to his beloved, “This is how the next ice age starts.” Although I’m joking, I suspect I’m not too far off the mark when it comes to the actual event. Before glaciers can begin to advance laterally, they must first accrete vertically to significant ice depths. Think about how this must happen. One abnormally cool spring, the snow just doesn’t melt. This dramatically raises the albedo of the planet, and so the snow doesn’t melt the following year, either. And so on. Before you know it, Chicago is under a half mile of ice. 😉
It is worth keeping in mind that all available geologic evidence strongly suggests that the earth is still in an overall ice age; we happen to be enjoying life in an interglacial. Geologically speaking, the next glacial period is pretty much fait accompli, the efforts of the planet’s current crop of hominids notwithstanding.
damn silt fencing messing with erosion!!!
Chicago under a 1/2 mile of ice? It would certainly take the heat off the Cubs.
And JG, rise in CO2 concentrations *always* accompanies climate warming in the geologic record. This is an effect of oceanic carbon buffering as part of the carbon cycle. In other words, geologically speaking, CO2 rise is a symptom of warm climate, not necessarily a driver. That said, anthropogenic CO2 rise appears to be significantly faster and higher than what we observe in the Tertiary geologic record.
Nonetheless, most geologic evidence suggests that CO2 concentrations have been *much* higher than at present in the Mesozoic, and even the Paleogene. I suspect this may be an aspect of the planet’s overall biologic fecundity. Again, geologically speaking, we live in an era of low biologic fecundity. It is an ice age, after all. The last time we see evidence for CO2 levels as low as what we have today was in the Permian (the geologic age following the extremely fecund Carboniferous). It’s worth noting that the Permian extinction is the worst observed in the geologic record, marked by the disappearance of ~95% of marine life forms, and ~70% of terrestrial life forms. Perhaps elevated CO2 is not such a bad thing, after all.
Well, apparently Rep. Corine Brown D-Fla does! http://www.mediaite.com/tv/house-dem-makes-every-gop-argument-in-defense-of-obama-on-va-scandal/
Tracy, let’s be honest here. They beginning of the holocene saw temps rise by about 1.5°C over 1,000 years. Over the last 50-100 years, they’ve risen by 0.8-1.0°C. That’s a pretty big difference. Sternn likes to bring up the medieval warm period, in which temps rose about 0.5°C, then fell again over 800 years. You are arguing that CO2 trails warming rather than precedes it. That might have been true during some paleogeologic eras, but it is not trailing now. I think you’re ignoring a lot of anomalies here to support a comfortably ostrich position.
I should say, Tracy, that I agree with you that the cap and trade, over-regulation that Obama (and many other presidents) seem to prefer would not be my first choice. The carbon tax and tariffs model you mention would be much closer. I believe fossil fuel consumption incurs externalities that are not presently priced correctly. Rather than some bureaucratic behemoth to enforce caps and regulate a market, let’s simply tax carbon consumption at some level that recoups some of these externalities, with corresponding tax adjustments to be revenue neutral.
Love the movie Tracy and my hypocrisy only goes so far. I struggled to find the hominem in my “attack” and will have more to say in the morning. You are obviously an impressively educated man and should have the same for the Quant’s writing for PhDs in climatology rather than for Wall Street.
“Well, fly, I’m an earth scientist by training and early career,………….As constantly changing climate was the planetary norm long before humans emerged on the scene, I tend to be a bit skeptical about human impact on the same.”
I’m a biologist (to state the obvious), and as such I quite familiar with the dynamic nature of the earth’s climate, as well as the ups and downs in the history of life. I find this whole notion of because the earth has a history of changing without humans, so therefore humans can’t cause a change, to be a huge logical fallacy. Living things can and do have an impact on the conditions of the earth- you should be familiar with how the earth’s atmosphere changed from mostly N2 & CO2 to mostly N2 & O2.
“Yes, CO2 is a weak greenhouse gas. Yes, humans are producing CO2.”
And CH4, which is a stronger one.
“As an example, you might look up the Viking settlement of Greenland and its sad demise, viz. with respect to climate change. In the grand scheme of the human condition, warmer is better than colder.”
And is hotter therefore better than warmer? What this boils down to is that there are now 7 billion+ humans on the planet, all of who need to eat. The crops we depend on are adapted to the current conditions, as are the various food chains. Will life regroup if a radical change happens? Of course it will; you could reasonably argue that life has seen worse, given events like the Permian–Triassic extinction. But would WE survive it? Studies of effects of elevated CO2 on plants have been in the news lately. Sure the plants are happy to snap up all that extra CO2. But with some of the most important food crops, the plants have diminished nutritive value- so not a gain here. The CO2 is also lowering the ocean pH and it’s having a deleterious effect on some marine life. Some species are thriving with the change, and of course the food web adapts, but it’s not necessarily going to adapt in a way favorable to us, and more people turning to the oceans as a place to get protein. Kill off too much of the coral and the plankton and the other critters at the bottom, and you’re going to have a hard time getting that protein. The above is just a bit of basic biology and doesn’t even get into the possibility of shifting weather patterns, which throws even more wrenches into the food producing/procuring process.
“Assuming that global warming due to anthropogenic factors is significant, and that global warming is a real problem (both of which strain credulity), then a carbon tax *combined* with import tariffs would be a reasonable approach. Of course, if put into practice the only negative externality likely to obtain would be continued downward pressure on the effective wealth of the average American.”
You leave out a very important part of the equation, the offsetting tax cuts. As JohnGalt said above, we have not been realistic in pricing the effects of carbon. We could get away with it in the past, but with more people, and more people demanding more things, we can’t keep kicking that can down the road.
Simple question, Fly. With 7 billion human beings on the planet, what is the total biomass of humans compared to the total biomass of all living things on the planet?
Well, I wonder if ‘appeal to authority’ is a more apt description of your post than ‘ad hominem’ applies to mine.
I’m impressed with your knowledge of geological history and climate and given your job history, I’m sure you are adept at making mathematical models and developing the assumptions. You criticize those developed by climatologists, you may be absolutely right and I have no way of knowing. You are superior to me with regards to the details of the issue involved.
But there are places you could find out if your well considered exposition of prior geologic time periods and climate and developing mathematical models would help all of us–fly and myself published his link on this blog long ago.
Dr Neil Gammons, a graduate of Texas LIberal Commie…….I mean, Texas A&M, participates on the site and they expressly ask for comments from readers. Your knowledge could actually advance the study of what is happening, in fact, you could even help prove this is just an Al Gore conspiracy (for how long is poor Al, for whom more people voted for President than the ‘winner’, going to be a conservative punching bag?) and this discovery would be great. Really, sincerely, it would be. Historical even. I would accept the decision of the jury of climate PhD’s, as influenced by you as a great moment in the history of the world and science.
Then I would try to take public credit for ‘discovering’ you on a political blog and motivating you to harness your considerable talents and advance science. Just public credit, I wouldn’t ask for a dime of real money.
http://climatechangenationalforum.org/
Captain, how many of the other individual ‘biomasses’ drive cars or heat their burrows with fossil fuels.
Termites control the environment of their nests through ventelation and decomposition, basically burning fuel. Termites alone account for ten time the biomass of human beings. So it is a serious question in regards to what kind of impact human beings can even have on the global climate.
And termites aren’t creatures of instinct but make conscious decisions regarding their behavior and soon will be driving little tiny cars to eat little tiny wood burritos. Or we could eliminate all termites, or better, all other animal life and all drive Hummers via the offset from eliminating animal sources of carbon dioxide.
Why not just address my question? Are you afraid to answer it?
Ok fine, the total biomass of the planet is about 560 billion tons, humans account for about 6.7 billion tons. Really shows how little of an impact we can possibly have.
Sternn, when termites build a couple thousand of these, let us know.
Those are producing steam, John. And termites have their own version …
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mound-building_termites
Are those termites cycling carbon that was already part of the carbon cycle, or are they adding the carbon that had been sequestered out of the cycle for millions of years?
Yeah, it’s steam, Sternn. Because when a power plant combusts coal to generate heat, the only byproduct is steam. What color is the sky in your world?
Sorry to miss so much of the thread; all work and no play makes Johnny a dull boy.
Fly, with respect to logical fallacy, I must point out the opposite is also true. The current climate hysteria may very well be simply another example of Mathusian hubris, i.e. humans are the root of all evil, and there are too many of us, and we’re all gonna die as a result. Malthus was dead wrong; Erlich was dead wrong; I suspect Gore and Mann are dead wrong, too.
Further to Malthusian nature of the would-be climate police, you cannot help but note that all solutions proposed by the same are scarcity-based, i.e. we must give up our energy-intensive way of life in order to survive. Why is it that these folks are unwilling to aggressively consider *active* technological intervention in achieving direct control over our climate? Hmm. I believe the most probable answer to this question reveals a great deal about the psyches of our purported climate saviors.
I certainly don’t discount the notion that human activity has the potential to significantly effect the environment. Like many animals (my fav example being our friend the beaver), humans have been altering their environment since the get go of humanity. I have no doubt that our activities are having some effect on climate; I merely remain agnostic as to whether that effect is deleterious, or even significant. In my view the prudent strategies are the same that I apply to my aging prostate: 1) watchful waiting, and 2) first, do no harm.
JG, I’m not sure where you are getting your data. You might, for starters, take anything published by Mann or Jansen with a large grain of salt. You might also consider that the more recent the observational data is, the “noisier” it becomes. This is simply an effect of sample bias, and an illustration of how complex the problem really is. At any rate, I’ll happily stand by my observation that temperature and sea level shifts are considerably more pronounced at glacial/interglacial and interglacial/glacial boundaries than what we are currently experiencing. I’d be happy to place a bet with you, but our great, great, great grandchildren will have to collect on it, one way or another.
With respect to CO2 trends, the geologic record isn’t detailed enough to discern whether CO2 concentration correlation with temperature is leading or trailing. About the most we can say is that they track each other. My only point is that in the past CO2 levels have risen with increasing temperature with no anthropogenic contribution, and no other readily discernible external source of CO2. Certainly anthropogenic CO2 is rising at a rapid rate; I’m merely gently suggesting that does not imply anthropogenic warming, as well. We don’t have sufficient evidence to determine at this point whether CO2 rise is a significant *standalone driver* of temperature rise. Mind you, we’ll certainly find out one way or another over the next several hundred years. (Assuming combustion of hydrocarbons remains our primary source of energy. In other news, the National Ignition Facility has for the first time reported an energy surplus in their most recent fusion experiments. How cool is that?? https://www.llnl.gov/news/aroundthelab/2014/Feb/NR-14-02-06.html?utm_content=buffer07554&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer#.U4kAN_mwIUp)
Looks like people have moved on to other threads, but I’ll leave this here anyway.
“Fly, with respect to logical fallacy, I must point out the opposite is also true. The current climate hysteria may very well be simply another example of Mathusian hubris, i.e. humans are the root of all evil, and there are too many of us, and we’re all gonna die as a result. Malthus was dead wrong; Erlich was dead wrong; I suspect Gore and Mann are dead wrong, too.”
Malthus has been wrong so far. I hope he remains wrong. But as the earth is not infinite, the potential is there for him to be right someday (about the the end result, not the time or number of people).
Humans are the root of SOME evil.
Further to Malthusian nature of the would-be climate police, you cannot help but note that all solutions proposed by the same are scarcity-based, i.e. we must give up our energy-intensive way of life in order to survive. Why is it that these folks are unwilling to aggressively consider *active* technological intervention in achieving direct control over our climate? Hmm. I believe the most probable answer to this question reveals a great deal about the psyches of our purported climate saviors.”
The point of the carbon tax is to change the economic playing field to remove the unfair advantage that the dirtier forms of energy have traditionally had. Sure things like coal and oil are quite cheap, when you don’t have the calculate things like environmental damage or melding with unstable foreign countries into their total costs. Balance those books accurately, and assign the real costs, and more people are going to have incentives to develop and use alternatives. What if we had Manhattan Project caliber emphasis on things like improving battery storage (a major drawback of wind/ solar) and decreasing resistance across transmission lines (which wastes lots of energy)? And some people are very much on the active technological intervention end- I’m sure you’ve heard of carbon sequestration research.
Ah, but TThor, Crogged ain’t no Daisy. Just a poor soul, too high strung.
scroll down about 2/3 of the way down, under revisions
http://bea.gov/newsreleases/national/gdp/gdpnewsrelease.htm
Recovery!
Here’s what was in Bobo’s link:
“The analysis found that EPA’s potential new carbon regulations would:
-Lower U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by $51 billion on average every year through 2030
-Lead to 224,000 fewer U.S. jobs on average every year through 2030
-Force U.S. consumers to pay $289 billion more for electricity through 2030
-Lower total disposable income for U.S. households by $586 billion through 2030
With global carbon emissions expected to rise by 31% between 2011 and 2030, the Energy Institute’s analysis found that EPA regulations would reduce this overall emissions level by just 1.8 percentage points.”
https://www.uschamber.com/press-release/energy-institute-report-finds-potential-new-epa-carbon-regulations-will-damage-us
The comments below supply some missing context (51 billion out of what total GDP?) and point out it is entirely misleading to say ‘regulations cost jobs’ without pointing out there is a far bigger component to employment (the actions of the Federal Reserve in response to economic conditions).
Crogged, I realize that you want to keep the purple mountain majesties purple (as do I), but you’ve got to admit that the newest regulations will kill jobs, put a drag on the economy and disproportionately impact smaller communities.
I read Kruggy’s piece that Bobo posted, but I found the response weak.
No, I don’t have to ‘admit’ that–a bloody snowstorm is also a ‘drag’ on the economy, as were the decisions of insurance companies to hedge corporate entities holding bad home loans as assets and General Motors to dismiss competition from Japan back in the sixties. It’s that proportion which is missing from many people who label themselves as ‘conservative’, a lack of seeing an issue as part of a larger picture and how ‘principles’ make for great speeches but terrible policy. No government isn’t always a ‘problem’ just because government makes mistakes, markets don’t always make ‘right’ decisions because markets are creations, not forces of nature and sometimes a penny saved is a penny wasted.
oh yeah! the weather caused the economy to tank in the 1st quarter. That was a classic attempt at spin we had never heard from a precedent until Obama came along.
Crogged carries water like no other.
Dan. You’ve never been wrong and can’t imagine a world past the screen in front of your nose. What did giantreactionaryblogspot dot com have to say about all this? When you posted the BEA’s report from the last fiscal quarter, what did you have to say about it? Sorry, I just don’t recall, must be my grey hair. Was the BEA ‘spinning’ it? It’s funny, but accusations typically reveal more about the accuser than the accused. I’ve got your pitcher of water, bourbon after lunch.
surprised you didn’t make the tie-in Crogged. You were forwarding the premise of how little it will cost to implement your goals of whatever it is you are chasing for environmental reasons and flogging the GDP percentage pony so I linked to latest adjustment to rank the economic condition from a +0.1% growth initially reported to the revised -1.0%.
Obama has been in charge for 5 1/2 years. The economy is tanking. There is a reason the economy is tanking. Actually there are many of them but they are all tied to the policies you so slavishly defend.
That’s my point.
So how many other quarters have had negative results Dan? Tell you what, even include all the quarters of 2008 in your graph of ‘growth of GDP’ since 2008. I’ll wait here, and if you don’t do it, I’ll post a link in about 10 minutes.
But, of course, negative economic results are because Obummer, positive results are despite Obummer…….
nice try Crogged, link away
Are you satisfied with Obama’s economy?
Do you believe the unemployment numbers being reported?
Do you know the workforce participation rate is the lowest since Carter was in office?
Do you agree we need to offer amnesty to illegal immigrants?
And do you care what that will do the current citizens looking for work?
Dang Dan, did you realize you actually linked to the people who do the work of calculating GDP? Imagine that, this time you didn’t link to an unknown website which told people something they weren’t looking at! Strange, you may want to look at how they come up with GDP and the role of what you consistently seem to think is ‘wasteful’ uses of money.
Click to access 2013briefingslides%20for%20web.pdf
Let me tell you what I think about those things you asked about.
Yes, the economy has not been the greatest in a long time.
Did you see this line in the report you linked too?
“The decrease in real GDP in the first quarter primarily reflected negative contributions from
private inventory investment, exports, nonresidential fixed investment, state and local government spending, and residential fixed investment that were partly offset by a positive contribution from personal consumption expenditures.”
So how is there ‘negative state and local government spending”? Because every state must balance their budget. Who can run a ‘negative’ balance and has nearly every f_____g year since the Constitution was enacted?
So, if economic conditions are bad, and state and local governments can’t run a deficit, why shouldn’t the federal government? To whom is the money owed?
using your logic it should be the preferred tactic of the federal government to waste money just to make the economy look good
Obama has doubled the debt in 5 1/2 years. That you don’t see the problem is really your deal pal. You are basically saying this debt is good. Run along Pollyanna.
I’m sorry, you didn’t ‘use’ my logic, but applied your own misconceptions and conclusions about a subject you have difficulty grasping. Obama did not ‘double the debt’, when states suffered severe economic setbacks they can not, by law, just roll the expense to the next year. A state can’t decide to build a highway just because most working men and women have lost their jobs unless it can balance the state budget. The interaction of federal and state governments is NOT a business, and shouldn’t be held to that standard.
Are you satisfied with Obama’s economy?
Obama doesn’t have an economy. The United States has an economy. It is affected by the President’s priorities, Congress’s actions, and by millions of private economic decisions (keep in mind that ExxonMobil has gross revenue greater than the GDP for all but 6 states; Apple for all but 23 states).
It hasn’t been great for unemployment numbers. Then again, corporate profits are at record highs, as are stock market indices. It’s complex and without a punch line of an answer, Danny-boy.
Do you believe the unemployment numbers being reported?
Yes, broadly. The means of calculating these might not be 100% accurate, but they use common and accepted methodology. More importantly, this methodology has not changed in recent years.
Do you know the workforce participation rate is the lowest since Carter was in office?
Yes. We have been in a recession caused by fiscal contraction and these are historically slow to recover from. Were you aware that, starting in 2011, 10,000 members of the baby boom generation turn 65 and eligible for retirement each day? Might cut down on the participation rate.
Do you agree we need to offer amnesty to illegal immigrants?
Amnesty? In some cases. We can’t deport 11 million people. I’d take a lot of hard working immigrants, illegal or not, over many native born idiots.
And do you care what that will do the current citizens looking for work?
Not really. The evidence that immigration harms the economy is hard to come by (the consensus is that it is good for the economy). It may, in some circumstance, depress wages, but the evidence for that, even, is not all that convincing. I’m not sure this would be much of a problem – it might even help since illegal immigrants live partly in a shadow economy that is inefficient and under taxed, and legalization would bring them into the real economy.
JG wins the prize for rewriting historical precedent. GW Bush was blamed for every negative tick by the liberals and JG.
And JG would take an illegal immigrant over an ‘idiot’ citizen. Well, there you have his loyalty. Nuff said.
Cuffy trying to be cute…
Of course it’s Obama’s economy the same way he and his follow travelers blamed Bush for everything from the economy to foot fungus. And still when they think they can get away with it.
The methodology took a drastic change when they dropped long term unemployed from the equation. They being Obama and his team but you knew that and that’s why you qualified your comment with “in recent years’.
You have to ignore all the unemployed or underemployed recent college graduates to make your meme about boomers retiring work in your favor.
Where’d you get your 11 million? I’d straight up trade a working non-criminal illegal with a job over any democrat welfare laggard.
I can give you first hand evidence your take is absolutely wrong on displacing American workers for lower wages.
I saw you mention you are a college perfessor. It would really irritate me to know you taught any of my kids.
Make a deal with you two, when you decide to say things like “The methodology took a drastic change when they dropped long term unemployed from the equation.” why don’t you give some indication of a source for such a claim. I know you only get things from unimpeachable sources, but consider attributing factual claims as something which might help your arguments. Of course I did determine the methodology changed back in the 90s once, I suppose Mr. Obama could have done this between law classes? This is the internet, cut and paste is so easy, as opposed to faking footnotes like we did back in the day.
Yeah, Danny-boy, don’t send your kids to my university. They’d learn science and stuff. Best send them to a nice bible college where they won’t be exposed to any of the icky realities out there.
Okay Crogged, before I go look around I’m going to guess it was done to coincide with the release of 2nd quarter 2012 data in advance of the election.
Apparently Danny-boy and I would both rather take industrious immigrants over lazy native-borns, Kabuzz. Industrious immigrants is how this country was built, after all.
JG, some people in our country take pride in the fact they do not break laws and obey laws. You are not one of those. As long as someone is working hard for you, they can be and do illegality as the day is long. Again, it says more about you.
I know Hispanic Americans, legal ones work very hard and have a great work ethic. Maybe the IRS should take a peek at your taxes?
for Crogged, I missed it by a quarter
http://finance.townhall.com/columnists/johnransom/2012/01/07/obama_unemployment_magic_trick_indefinitely_detain_4_million_people_from_workforce/page/2
in your case Cuffy I’d give two illegals with a work ethic green cards to get rid of you specifically
Two illegals! Wow, I must be doing something right. I’d buy your plane ticket to Somalia, in exchange for nothing, just so you could enjoy your limited government paradise.
Thanks for the offer loser but I require an income. btw, my kids did fine in college and came out with math, computer science (UT) and engineering degrees (A&M) between them. And no debt. Appreciate your concern perfesser.
You “require” an income? Surely a rugged individualist such as you could make your way anywhere. Good for your kids. Hopefully they’ll be able to support you in your old age.
Dan-really. So now the Obama administration is ‘doing sumpin’ about the statistics regarding ‘labor participation rates’ which does damage to the calculation of unemployment? Is this how easy it is to bully ‘conservative’ readers into believing they are reading something critical of the other side–“The sun has always risen in the east, but since the Obama administration entered the office, the sun has continued to rise in the east!”
You said “The methodology took a drastic change when they dropped long term unemployed from the equation.”
I’m tired of educating you because you don’t really care about the information, but the bona fides of the source fitting into your calculation of political purity and your preconception of the world you believe exists. Your link has nothing to do with your claim.
The Obama administration, nor the Dems, nor the Huns have changed anything regarding the calculation of labor participation rates, which have gone down since the year 2000. Your link had nothing to do with your personal claim that ‘the methodology’ has changed. It has not.
For discussion of ‘labor participation rates’ read this and the comments below it. Please do what the author refused to do, explain how any action of the current administration attributed to declining labor participation rates, and this time understand the forest and don’t keep repeating, “A tree, a tree, a tree, a tree, a tree, a tree, a tree……..”
http://www.forbes.com/sites/gregorymcneal/2012/10/13/labor-force-participation-under-obama/
Thanks for that link Crogged. It ties in perfectly with what I said. How you think it helps your take is a mystery to me but go on believing it if it helps.
Good, glad you feel that way, I’m here to please.
Now let’s address your previous comment that I’m claiming ‘debt is good’ and I am “pollyanish”.
That construction makes me reconsider my thinking-maybe I am claiming ‘debt is good’ when in fact, it could be that debt is ‘bad’. So I think you need to write a report to your CEO and tell him ‘debt is bad’ and ask that your organization no longer borrow money, debt is bad, unless the CFO claims he is a Republican. Get back to us about your promotion.
poor Crogged
The Pentagon headed by Chuck Hagel has as much credibility as Barrack Obama on any subject he has attempted to tackle. Look at who is in charge of our nation. John Kerry is secretary of state. Oh yeaeth! the winter soldier himself that lied to the senate in his famous “Jenjish Khan” testimony. Secretary of the Treasury is Jack Lew. He had to go to writing class to learn how to sign his name. Go down the list and check out the cabinet in this administration. We are being led by imbeciles.
That the GOP led house doesn’t want to fund $35/gallon ethanol is a good thing to me. If the navy needs to raise their docks 7.5 feet big effin’ deal. You want to raise them now to make them unusable in the present? Sounds like typical liberal planning.
And don’t forget we have the most corrupt AG to every hold office in Eric Himpton Holder.
One million old white guys can’t be wrong………..
and a racialists such as yourself gives a nice balance by being persistently wrong…
Dan, try to relax …. Don’t you realize that everything will be all right? $35 per gallon ethanol doesn’t sound too bad. In the future, we will power everything with unicorn tears, eagle killing windmills, and owl pellets anyways.
And I thought you were an Elvis fan.
I’m completely on board with the boondoggle of food for fuel, wonder how many elected Republican’s from the Midwest are opposed to ethanol?
You are aware that AG Ed Meese resigned while under investigation by an independent prosecutor. And that AG Alberto Gonzalez resigned during bipartisan investigations of his firing of federal attorneys because of partisan politics. If Holder resigns, he’ll be in good company.
Danny-boy, you post a lot of BS about how horrible things are now, and how egregious are the sins of the Obama administration. Yet, there are precedents for everything. Nothing they’re doing now is new – it’s walking on ground well-trodden by R and D administrations alike. You will now pretend to be pure as the driven snow and that I tolerate lies. So that makes me a realist and you a hypocrite. I’d rather be me than you.
um…er Cuffy, since you brought them up let’s also mention a couple of other aspects here. Both Meese and Gonzales resigned because they believed they were becoming a distraction to their bosses. Neither were indicted for any crimes.
Eric Holder is hanging on to protect his boss. Its a metric that can only occur when a very compliant press gives the administration cover.
Thanks for allowing me to illustrate the distinctions.
“Becoming a distraction” to one’s boss is the boilerplate press release when someone resigns under suspicion.
why weren’t they charged Cuffy? You realize Holder is operating in contempt of the house right now don’t you? He’s being protected by an executive order. You good with that?
Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell is the former president and CEO of REI; I suspect you’ve never held such a high-profile, high-visibility posting in your life. Previously she worked in the oil and banking industries, also not generally regarded as easy pickings where, for example, whiny babies like you can do nothing while waving their arms and screaming instead of accomplishing anything. She holds a college degree in mechanical engineering, which is probably a higher educational attainment than whatever basket-weaving certification you might possess.
Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker was a co-founder of The Parking Spot, the fastest-growing company in off-site airport parking management, and one which many Houstonians use successfully. Dan, apparently, can’t create anything but mindless controversy. She holds an A.B. in Economics from Harvard and both a J.D. and an M.B.A. from Stanford. Dan might manage an A.B., but shows no indication of the knowledge or ability to make it to C or D, let alone any further in the alphabet.
Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez, a child of Dominican immigrants, put himself through college (at Brown University) by working as a trash collector and in a warehouse to supplement his scholarships and Pell grants. Then, during his time at Harvard Law, he worked as a law clerk for then-Attorney General Edwin Meese, who adults may recall was an official in the supposedly sainted Reagan administration. But inconvenient facts are seldom in the way of DanMan’s impotent slanders.
Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz is a nuclear physicist with a Ph.D. from Stanford. He’s been head of MIT’s Department of Physics and co-chair of MIT’s research council. DanMan apparently thinks of Sean Hannity as the source of all scientific truths, and has long since given up any ability to think for himself, let alone to produce anything that shows the merest iota of independent thought or initiative.
I could go on, but my rhetorical arm is tired from beating you.
I recognize Pritzker as a huge bundler for Obama. Are any of the other picks bundlers as well? Perez stands out in my memory as a huge labor union guy, let me check to confirm. Sally Jewell? never heard of her. Ernie Moritz intrigues me as he stepped on Obama’s toes by accident early in his appointment but has been quiet for awhile. Since I can’t figure what benefit the department of energy has ever accomplished since it was created in Carter’s term I don’t hold out much hope for his impacts being consequential unless to stymie as Obama wants to do.
The DOE runs America’s nuclear facilities and is ultimately responsible for our nuclear arsenal. Other than that, you’re right, they don’t do anything useful.
that was being done prior to the DOE being created biggun
and they are doing it now. Which is more important before or now?
The DOE is doing a great job DanMan. So far they have made sure no new nuclear plants get built.
before, we didn’t have the DOE to get in the way
I am good with it. When the contempt charge was based scoring political points for supporting conspiracy theories.
More “liberal tentacles” in action, the Pentagon takes this issue very seriously:
http://io9.com/the-pentagon-wants-to-tackle-climate-change-but-cong-1581721471
“This kind of talk makes conservatives grouchy. They’ve spent years making the case that climate change is the latest fad in environmental hysteria, a liberal plot to “create global government” and a scheme for scientists and universities to keep their pockets lined with grant money. And now conservatives find themselves at odds with the guardians of our national security? (Awkward!)”
The spectacle of RWNJs pointing themselves into such a corner would tend to give me a good belly laugh, except this really isn’t a laughing matter.
So conspiracy theorists, how and why is the Pentagon involved in wealth redistribution schemes? Extra credit for particularly twisted convolutions.
Still going over your head, Fly. Or is it that you just can’t accept the fact that nature is not static, evolution is a real thing? The cliamte changes, it always has and always will. We either adapt or die. We human beings do not control such things.
Living things can and do affect the environment, Sternn, otherwise we’d have no O2 to breath. Just because the climate can and does change on its own does NOT preclude things we choose to do also having an effect. It’s not OR, it’s AND.
No answer for the Pentagon “siding with the liberals” other than to mindlessly repeat your simplistic screed of denial, eh?
Apparently it’s going over most everyone’s heads, then. I know you didn’t read the article, so here’s a relevant passage, which is quoted from the DoD’s quadrennial defense reviews:
“As greenhouse gas emissions increase, sea levels are rising, average global temperatures are increasing, and severe weather patterns are accelerating. These changes, coupled with other global dynamics….are threat multipliers that will aggravate stressors abroad such as poverty, environmental degradation, political instability, and social tensions—conditions that can enable terrorist activity and other forms of violence.”
Now, they don’t actually state that any of this is caused by AGW, just that the change is happening and we need to be prepared for it, which is so logical that one would think most people would agree. Apparently not House Republicans, who tacked an amendment on the recent Defense Appropriations bill to prevent the military from spending money to plan for these adverse effects. Why? It’s getting warmer, the sea level is going to rise. Fly’s link includes a map of what impact that will have on the Navy’s Atlantic Fleet HQ in Virginia, which will someday need to move to Richmond.
JG, you also have the major insurance companies taking this seriously, and well as companies like Royal Dutch Shell investing in R&D for carbon sequestration. Follow the $ applies here too. Even someone who doesn’t understand the science could look at who is taking this seriously, and who is changing their minds (and in what direction), and see that the “It’s all a liberal scam” response is not a logically valid counter argument. But some people are just very attached to their conspiracy theories.
Ok, so what plans do either of you have to restore the glaciers that covered North America many thousands of years ago?
Sternn, you’re just being stupid now. Smart people who run multi-billion dollar organizations are contingency planning for events that expert scientists (as opposed to you) predict are very likely to happen.
When people contingency plan for health problems, income disruptions and pension savings, you think this is a good thing. When they contingency plan for increased future costs associated with climate change, it’s a bad thing. Conservative logic at its best. It doesn’t matter whether this is AGW or your natural climate change (for which there is zero precedent of changes occurring this rapidly). It’s changing. Smart people prepare for it.
that a hilarious take Cuffy. Contingency planning. Is the what we are doing with Obamacare too? What is the contingency for regaining any credibility in that boondoggle? Single payer like the VA system?
What is the contingency for bankrupting the nation? Strapping the next generation with more debt?
Anybody spending money on the consequences of gorebull worming predictions is doing so with other people’s money. Like every initiative liberals have.
Oh, I am sure the military will make it’s way through this ‘crisis’. Just ask the scientists that told us we were entering a new ice age starting in the 80’s. They were sure of it. Made the covers of several magazines. I guess the military purchased extra gloves and long underwear.
Climate change is cyclical. We will have to adjust as it happens. Weather predictions are useless after three or four days. In Texas we think whoever believes the weatherman is either a new comer or an old fool.
yep, for the first time in a combined 25 years of having a pool in Houston I turned on the heater for Memorial Day. My data set tells me we should enjoy the cool while we can.
Here buzzy, in simple terms ever you can understand:
http://mobile.rawstory.com/all/2014-05-28-neil-degrasse-tysons-most-anticipated-cosmos-except-by-climate-change-deniers#1
There NEVER was a scientific consensus for global cooling, but repeating ignorant lies as always easier than coming up with an actual science based rebuttal.
Stern the glacier comment is truly asinine. Why would we even want to to that even if we could? The earth as it is now is quite good at supporting human life. The whole point of all this is for us not to mess that up, something that we absolutely could do, you head in the sand notwithstanding.
What the H E double hockey sticks do the House Republicans think they are doing in telling the military how to plan for contingencies? Where is the delegation here, why are they substituting their judgement? Would it kill you to just once, say that the House Republicans have overstepped here?
The house happens to control the purse. If they don’t want the military to play stupid games with the shrinking funds afforded the military it is their duty to exercise their authority. Quite unlike the Dem led house that ceded that authority to the EPA a few years ago.
You ever work in an organization where the ‘accountants’, who aren’t even accountants, determine the strategy and direction of the organization?
“The shrinking funds afforded the military”?
In constant dollars, today’s military budgets have rough parity with Reagan’s 1985 Cold-War-busting defense expenditures and with the military budgets around the time of the 1967 Tet Offensive.
In other words, your comments bear little or no resemblance to reality, Dan.
As usual.
Crogged, I am sure the GOP sees the obvious tie to the administration’s alarmist tactic’s.
Yes Buzzy, the military is absolutely chock full of those people, moles planted by Dems thirty years ago at West Point and Texas A&M. Now they’ve infested the Pentagon and are going to insist on planning for events blog commentators can’t imagine, amongst other revolutionary ideas.
“Yes Buzzy, the military is absolutely chock full of those people, moles planted by Dems thirty years ago at West Point and Texas A&M.”
Crogged, SHHHH! It’s not time to reveal the master plan yet!
So what did the Chamber of Commerce really find about the ‘costs’?
“But a funny thing happened on the way to the diatribe. The Chamber evidently made a decision that it wanted to preserve credibility, so it outsourced the analysis. And while it tries to spin the results, what it actually found was that dramatic action on greenhouse gases would have surprisingly small economic costs.
The Chamber’s supposed scare headline is that regulations would cost the US economy $50.2 billion per year in constant dollars between now and 2030. That’s for a plan to reduce GHG emissions 40 percent from their 2005 level, so it’s for real action.
So, is $50 billion a lot? Let’s look at the CBO’s long-term projections. These say that average annual US real GDP over the period 2014-2030 will be $21.5 trillion. So the Chamber is telling us that we can achieve major reductions in greenhouse gases at a cost of 0.2 percent of GDP. That’s cheap!”
Ooops, sorry Bobo–you got it.
Lo. The chamber of commerce has issued a report on the economic impact of reducing greenhouse gases by 40%.
https://www.uschamber.com/press-release/energy-institute-report-finds-potential-new-epa-carbon-regulations-will-damage-us
Krugman says it’s cheap climate protection:
“So, is $50 billion a lot? Let’s look at the CBO’s long-term projections. These say that average annual US real GDP over the period 2014-2030 will be $21.5 trillion. So the Chamber is telling us that we can achieve major reductions in greenhouse gases at a cost of 0.2 percent of GDP. That’s cheap!
True, the chamber also says that the regulations would cost 224,000 jobs in an average year. That’s bad economics: US employment is determined by the interaction between macroeconomic policy and the underlying tradeoff between inflation and unemployment, and there’s no good reason to think that environmental protection would reduce the number of jobs (as opposed to real wages). But even at face value that’s also a small number in a country with 140 million workers.”
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/05/28/cheap-climate-protection/
that’s the same chamber of commerce advocating for amnesty…pass
Bam!
[The sound of Dan’s mind closing.]
Since the Chamber had to outsource the economics, I suggest you offer to find a way to deport 15 million people, for free, since it’s the patriotic thing to do.
hey guys, you endorse liars, not my fault you have no credibility left
The problem, Danny-Boy, is that you think everyone who disagrees with you has a credibility problem. That is easier than formulating coherent arguments about why they are wrong, which you appear incapable of doing.
Cuffy, was Krugman lying when he praised the VA as the model for healthcare in the US? Something you didn’t even know about.
He wasn’t lying, but he could be wrong. Is infallibility your only requirement for determining truth?
no Crogged, motive does however. When people with megaphones are consistently wrong I like to know why. In Krugman’s case I merely have to look at his motives to categorize his agenda for what it is. Even though you don’t enjoy the megaphone aspect it is the same with you.
Really, you know my motives and Krugman’s? Like you I can guess Krugman’s motives because he has a long, published history. I know you disagree with much he says, but you really don’t have any special insight to his motives, especially if you think they aren’t aligned with you. Do you have some passage where Krugman calls for imprisoning Baptists or something? Or is it that he wants ‘destruction of the world as we know it’ or some other doggerel you read about someone writing about Krugman?
I know you have the passage where he was wrong about the internet and its impact, what else do you have? Krugman has consistently said if he is ‘right’ it is about one thing it is what happened in 2008 and the correct fiscal response we should have had. Look at this graph and tell me how it proves he was wrong.
tells us what you think that graph shows Crogged, and recall that food a and fuel are not counted in the CPI because their prices are too ‘volatile’.
Fun fact. When Obama came into office the average price of regular gas was about $1.85. It hasn’t been below $3.00 in close to 5 years now.
and the same Krugman who was xlaiming how well the VA works for our injured Vets in 2011. http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/378684/krugman-2011-va-huge-policy-success-story-josh-encinias. Never did see Crogged respond to the links about the long term unemployed being dropped in the unemployment calculations or to TThor’s calling him out for argumentum ad hominem.
Sorry to step on your point Bobo. Wow, now the Chamber of Commerce is ‘liberal’? Man, dude, how can you fight all the tentacles?
NP 🙂
Does Jesus love me? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBALcN701NU
Why did you post this? I watched the entire thing waiting for the punchline. It didn’t come. Maybe I’m just tired, and forgive me if I missed something, but why did you post this horrific crap? I’ve only been in class for a few days. What in the hell did I miss?
Regardless of Fifty comments, thanks. Great to be reminded.
I’m pretty sure that the Lord was crucified for my sake. The nails would’ve been in the wrist. A good Roman would have no compunction about taking blood. Maybe two strikes. You don’t believe in Jesus, Fifty?
Hardly – at least nothing like in the way you do. I am not a mystic. I am an atheist.
A little something something for all of us experts.
http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175584/
#yesallwomen
Meh. Got to the point where the author shows a lack of knowledge and just started making things up. No sense in reading any further.
I’ve said before, just as observation, you are irony free…..
!
I like how she fights, struggles, annihilates and causes other references to mayhem and chaos to factor into her existence on every level.
And only $125 for an autographed Noam Chomsky book!!
As usual, Dan whines, but offers nothing.
from the look on her face I’d say another casing is due at any moment
Extra points for adding condescension to dismissal.
I’ll add them to my total.
Off topic but relevant. The TEA Party had a good night last night. People are so fed up with the status quo. I mean, GOP and conservatives. Dem’s love the status quo.
Its a good thing you do not belong to a party. Someone might accuse you of being a Republican.
Do you think GOPLifer would accuse Kabuzz of being a republican?
By the way, Kabuzz, haven’t you gotten the message yet? The tea party movement is dead and has been for years. 🙂
Cappy – Yes, I believe Buzzy could be called a Republican. However, he has claimed multiple times he does not belong to a party. But given his history of only whining about Democrats his claim rings hallow.
Crogged – Unfortunately, 3% was all they needed. People cannot complain about their representatives if they do not vote.
That seems to have gone over your heard, Turtles. You are basically saying we and Lifer are the same.
Turtles, that is b—-t, of course I can complain about it even if I don’t (or can’t) vote, especially when my “choice” is between a rabid ex sportscaster or a plodding ideologue. There are many things we could do to make voting easier, even with IDs. Voting could take place on weekends or over a period of days. Absentee voting could be made simpler and we could even vote over the internet. Of course when a party consists of scared septuagenarians, low percentages are good percentages.
Voting does take place over a matter of days. I voted last week. I think maybe there was one other person there at the time.
You’re right Captain, I stand corrected.
I voted last week also. Crogged, you have to get up to snuff on the many times one can vote. Weekends are not good simply because poll workers are mostly volunteer and it takes a lot of people to run an election.
Turtles, your response demonstrates the huge ignorance you and the liberal left possess of the TEA Party. Maybe if the democrats actually wanted something besides the status quo, they can see their ranks growing.
Since we are now off topic, this is an excellent article showing the history of the religious right movement in America:
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/05/religious-right-real-origins-107133.html
Crogged – I work as an election official and I can attest to you that many times there are times when literally no one is there to vote. We could make voting easier but let be honest. The hurdles to voting are not that high for a majority of voters and even before voter ID laws the % of those voting was horrible.
Low voter turn outs generally do favor the extreme candidates because their natural offset is missing. We should be ashamed that these people are even able to make it on the ballot much less become heads of our state government.
75, that claim has already been shot down just as the claim that the tea party movement didn’t start until after Obama was elected.
What happened yesterday was the run off’s Turtles. If you want to end the elongated time of elections, how about having a simple majority to win your ballot instead of the 50%+ rule.
Your 3% rule is an average. Some precincts had 80% and again, some precincts didn’t even have a candidate in the run off.
I would love to see actual evidence that disproves the facts cited in the article Capt.
Please, provide.
Quite simple, the religious right got started with Roe vs Wade. It isn’t based on slavery, Jin Crow or segregation. That is just the usual weak talking points the left throws out so much it no longer even has any punch, like saying the only reason in the world we don’t support Obama and all he is doing is because he is half black. There is no possible way we would disagree with him or his actions if he was white. Nothing more than garbage.
Sternn, I realize you’re a thick-skulled idiot, but even you should understand the idea of “evidence”, as johnofgaunt75 requested. Instead, you’ve just provided your unvarnished say-so — which is, as ample prior experience demonstrates, thoroughly unmoored from reality.
Even if we confine ideas of the “religious right” to abortion, they didn’t start with Roe v. Wade; they started in the 1820s, with the so-called “Second Great Awakening” of the early nineteenth century. Under the English common law on abortion which applied at the time of our nation’s independence, abortion was prohibited *only* after “quickening” (the start of fetal movements). Starting in the 1820s, anti-abortionists began passing further restrictions.
Your bigotry and ignorance comes from a very old strain indeed.
Fine, Owl, it started in the 1820s. That still has nothing to do with segregation or racism.
Roe v Wade started the Moral Majority which started the Christian Coalition and on and on.
You liberals get your talking points and run with them. Like gossipy old ladies at a church social.
Well, actually, Sternn, it does.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_fundamentalism
“A third stream was Princeton Theology, which responded to higher criticism of the Bible by developing from the 1840s to 1920 the doctrine of inerrancy. This doctrine, also called biblical inerrancy, stated that the Bible was divinely inspired, religiously authoritative, and without error….”
And if the Bible is without error, then God approves of slavery, right?
I mean, let’s not forget the earnest testimony of that prime traitor, Jefferson Davis, that slavery “was established by decree of Almighty God…it is sanctioned in the Bible, in both Testaments, from Genesis to Revelation…it has existed in all ages, has been found among the people of the highest civilization, and in nations of the highest proficiency in the arts.”
Or we could listen to authorities like Richard Furman, president from 1821 to 1825 (his death) of the South Carolina State Baptist Convention: “the right of holding slaves is clearly established in the Holy Scriptures, both by precept and example.”
Embrace your historical and ideological connections, Sternn.
You just now discovered that there were slaves before white men came to te Americas, Owl? Amazing. What will you learn tomorrow?
I studied Latin, Sternn. I’ve read about the Servile Wars, rather than just watching *Spartacus*, if you’ve even managed that. (Spoiler: he dies in the end.)
Of course, since you apparently have never bothered to educate yourself more than the average half-rotten papaya about history, law, chemistry, meteorology, statistics, or any other field of human endeavor, I understand your confusion.
Really, what good do you accomplish around here? Other than as a punching-bag, laughing-stock, and waste of time, I mean?
You’re all over the place today, Owl. Including shooting down 75’s claims about the religious right movement.
I like the height of owl’s perch, makes the fall that much funnier every day
3 percent of registered Texas voters are so fed up.
Cappy – I answered your question “Do you think GOPLifer would accuse Kabuzz of being a republican?”.
Yes and in turn Buzzy has to admit GOPlofer is also a Republican. I do not see the issue? They do not have to believe the same things to be equally called a Republican or do party members need to be in complete agreement with each other without varying beliefs?
GOPlifer not lofer.
Aha! I see it happens to you, too.
How was the claim that the Tea Party movement did not start till after Obama was elected? You have not proven that there were any official tea party demonstrations, protests, websites, or even organizations prior to the election of Obama.
There is no official Tea Party, Turtles. It is simply a grass roots movement that started while Bush43 was president. People didn’t like the way republicans were spendng after Bush43 became president and didn’t like some of his foriegn policy.
While we may be working within the GOP, it doesn’t mean the establishment republicans are the same as us.
Sure there is. There is an official tea party caucus in the Texas legislature and the US legislature and there are many groups that claim the mantle of tea party. Just because there is no single tea party organization does not mean there is no tea party MOVEMENT as I claimed.
Yes, there is a movement that got started right around the start of Bush’s second term.
It’s been clearly documented that Citizens for a Sound Economy (CSE), founded by the Koch Brothers in 1984, started the Tea Party movement in 2002, though it didn’t really take off until later.
http://web.archive.org/web/20020913052026/http://www.usteaparty.com/
Owl, are you certain it wasn’t Howard Dean that started it with his September 24, 2003 speech?
Well, let’s look at what Dean said then, shall we, Sternn?
http://www.crocuta.net/Dean/Transcript_of_DemocracyFreedomAction_Sept23_2003.htm
“The extreme right wing of the Republican Party has shown nothing but contempt for democracy. From the impeachment of a sitting President, to the recount in Florida, to opportunistic redistricting efforts in Colorado and Texas, and now in the recall effort in California, a narrow band of right-wing ideologues have subverted the democratic process whenever they haven’t liked the outcome….
“With mouse pads, shoe leather and hope, we are building an American community strong enough to take on the power of money in politics and deliver the White House to its rightful owners — We the People.”
Gosh, I had no idea that the Tea Party movement held such ideas. Oh, wait: they don’t.
As usual, Sternn, you are full of shit.
Didn’t exactly work out as Dean planned, did it Owl? I think that’s kind of funny, but it didn’t fit with your Soros talking point for the day.
Buzzy – Every precinct had runoffs. State wide runoffs are still voted upon each precinct. As for the rest of your comment about the time length of elections I made no reference to that subject.
Something for kabuzz to read:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/the-problem-with-blaming-both-sides-in-politics
…if it’s not too long for his endurance.
two liberals agree the GOP is the problem in politics, man who could see that coming?
This article says that a power plant is cleaning up its emissions and not raising electric bills. I found it in Laboratory Equipment this morning.
Excerpt:
“But Homer City also shows how political and economic rhetoric sometimes doesn’t match reality. Despite claims by Republicans and industry critics that the Obama administration’s regulations will shut down coal-fired power plants, Homer City survived — partly because it bought itself time by tying up the regulation in courts. Even environmental groups that applaud each coal plant closing and protested Homer City’s pollution, now say the facility is setting a benchmark for air pollution control that other coal plants should follow, even if it took decades.
“If there is a war on coal, that plant won,” says Eric Schaeffer, the executive director of the Environmental Integrity Project and a former enforcement official at EPA.
The owners of the massive western Pennsylvania power plant — which releases more sulfur dioxide than any other power plant in the U.S. — have committed to install $750 million worth of pollution control equipment by 2016 that will make deeper cuts in sulfur than the rule it once opposed.
Last month, the Supreme Court upheld the EPA’s rule in the case initiated by Homer City Generating Station.
GE Energy Financial Services, the plant’s majority owner, now says it can do it — and without electricity bills increasing for the two million households it provides with power.”
http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news/2014/05/filthy-power-plant-finally-get-clean
Acid rain was the environmental problem of the ’80s and there was dire predictions on both sides. Northeastern lakes and rivers would be sterile for decades. Pollution control at generating plants would be cost-prohibitive and kill the economy. A middle ground was found and the economy was not destroyed (at least not by utility costs) and the ecosystems have recovered. As a side note, nobody really argues that human activity did not generate the pollutants that caused acid rain. The source was then and is now clear; a case in which humans certainly changed the environment across a fairly large swath of land.
There was a time when rivers were so polluted they would actually catch fire and burn. That didn;t cause global warming, global cooling or climate change at all. Some regulations are necessary and proper, but we don;t need overregulation for the purpose of wealth redistribution.
JG: because of the repeated dire — and false — warnings about job killing, etc. it’s very difficult for me to take the CoC or anyone like that seriously. It’s as if they crafted their message before the did any analysis.
Sternn, what standards do you use to recognize “over-regulation”?
Is it just what the little voices in your head tell you? Or do you require an injection of thoughts from right-wing media to tell you what to believe?
GE can do a lot of things others can’t. Like pay zero in taxes on $14billion in revenue in the US last year.
A good analysis of cap and trade here, and why Republican opposition to market based solutions is a strange hypocrisy.
Click to access 2012-012.pdf
Bobo: I wish it were that easy in the area where I live. Quite a few plants have had to close over the past years. Although some of the plants were heavy polluters and no one is sorry to have cleaner air, you also have to consider the economic impact where there are a limited number of well paying jobs.
From: http://www.azcentral.com/business/consumer/articles/20131230aps-closes-units-corners-power-plant.html
“The plant and a nearby coal mine generate about $225 million a year in economic benefits to the Navajo Nation and New Mexico economies, according to APS.
Unemployment on the reservation is about 50 percent, so the more than 800 jobs at the plant and mine are critical. More than 80 percent of the positions are held by Native Americans. The operations are responsible for about 30 percent of the Navajo Nation’s general fund.”
OBJV, like you, I hate to see people lose their jobs. But employment on the reservations has been a problem since their beginnings. Great white leaders saw fit to provide the native Americans with the poorest land and resources.
I’m pretty sure that the CEOs of the polluting plants would never walk up to a stranger on the street and sock him in the stomach.
Yet they have no problem knocking the breath out of strangers remotely. And they don’t have to pay for it. Instead, the injured have to use money earned on their jobs to pay for the damage done to them by somebody else.
Air pollution makes us stupid, shortens our lives, causes cancer at low levels, and brings on heart attacks.
If ALL economic factors were considered, our ‘cheap’ energy wouldn’t be that cheap at all.
Exposure to Particulate Air Pollution and Cognitive Decline in Older Women
archinte.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1108716
Prenatal polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) exposure and child behavior at age 6-7 years
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22440811
Prolonged exposure to air pollution is significantly associated with an increased risk for lung cancer, according to the results of a new meta-analysis.
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/807579
Main Air Pollutants and Myocardial Infarction, A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis
JAMA, February 15, 2012—Vol 307, No. 7
Bobo, In this case, the Navajo were given their ancestral land – dry and barren as it is. What do you propose to make up for loss of their income? Have them make more trinkets to sell to tourists? Open up more casinos? There are not very many well paying jobs here in NW New Mexico except in the energy industry. (My husband, luckily, has a job with a company producing natural gas.) Surely, we have room for a middle ground
Listen, I’m all for cleaner air for health reasons and with so many national parks in the area, keeping pollution at a minimum would be wonderful, but he Obama administration intention seems to be to raise environmental standards to an impossible level and intentionally shut down all plants that use coal. Unfortunately, job killing standards hurt smaller communities disproportionately.
We should solve this now, on the back of clean air, when it has never been solved in the whole history of the reservations?
Yeah, right.
Why not solve it on the back of the energy industry? They produce the air pollution and they have some jobs to offer. They could create jobs cleaning up their own mess.
I was thinking a better title for Mr. Coates’s article would have been:
THE CASE FOR GIVING BACK TO BLACKS WHAT WAS STOLEN FROM THEM
RETURNING sounds better than “giving back,” because the word “giving”‘ has negative connotations now, implying welfare, and “giving back” sounds too charitable, as in “giving back to the community.” Therefore:
THE CASE FOR RETURNING TO BLACKS WHAT WAS STOLEN FROM THEM
tutt, interestingly under the logic used to justify reparations, we could have an article titled:
THE CASE FOR TUTTABELLA RETURNING TO CAPTAIN STERNN WHAT WAS STOLEN FROM HIM
The Spanish and Mexicans enslaved Navajo and other native peoples in southwestern states, therefore since you have Spanish/Mexican ancestry and Cap is part Native American, reparations are due. We’ll leave it up to you and cap to negotiate. 😉
Food for thought. On that note, I think I’ll take my lunch now. 🙂
How about “restoring”?
“Restore” is good but it sounds too abstract, like “reparations.”
“Return” is more concrete. What I like about Coates’s article are the concrete examples of stolen wealth.
Although “return” is probably too concrete, especially at this stage.
I come up with the following progression from reading the article:
1. Illustration of outright stolen wealth/property/body, for the loss to really register with us
2 Idea of returning same stolen wealth/property/body
3. Impossibility/impracticality of doing so
4. Therefore, reparations as the only alternative left, in order to provide some restoration of what was lost.
5. Leveling the playing field/providing opportunities not enough. They should have had that from the beginning.
Mr. Coates’ work had its intended effect on you Tutts. 4am musings?
Dan, I always appreciate a logical argument and a fresh perspective. My interest in this subject is not that much of a stretch, as I am basically sympathetic toward the cause of racial justice. It’s just that up to now I had not seen an approach that peaked my interest. I do think it’s rather late for reparations except for those directly affected and still alive. The main lesson to take from this, I think, is for it to really sink in, the clear cut examples of stolen wealth, not just some vague “inequality,” that explains more clearly the situation Blacks find themselves in today, not to make a million excuses for them, but just so that we’re a little less judgmental.
Seems that the new EPA rules are expected to expand cap n trade programs in the states. Even China is going to start experimenting with a trail version that could cover 250 million people.
http://mobile.politico.com/iphone/story/0514/107135.html
And at the end of the day, it is still all just one big wealth redistribution scheme, from the rich and middle-calss to the poor, from the richer nations to the developing and poor nations. It will do nothing to change the global climate or prevent it from changing. Putting tariffs of imported goods will only hurt the end consumer, less buying power. It hurts domestic companies and further weakens our economy.
We already have solid regulations to cut back on pollution here, probably too many as it stands now.
” Putting tariffs of imported goods will only hurt the end consumer, less buying power. ”
This has already been explained to you, but you refuse to listen. If you properly make compensatory cuts in FICA and income taxes, the customers don’t feel the tariffs. They also then have more opportunity and incentive to choose goods that cause less pollution. More power to their purses, not more wealth to China. They would be freed of the burdens of a system that never did accurately calculate true costs.
You’re arguing for tax cuts for the rich? Really? Of course the products are still more expensive and that price tag is what the consumers see.
I have explained the results of tariffs before, but I will do so again. The company I worked for several years ago imported steel, manufactured a product and exported it for a good profit. Then the Bush43 steel tariffs hit, profits became losses, prices went up to the point nobody would buy the product. The company was setting up shop in Scotland and preparing to ship our factory to Canada. We got an exemption just in time to halt the export of the manufacturing company, but we did lose possible U.S. jobs and an expansion of our facility to Scotland. U.S. steel companies either could not or would not make the steel we needed.
No to tariffs, no to punishing people for using electricity. Just … no.
“You’re arguing for tax cuts for the rich? Really? ”
That’s because you pigeonhole people Sternn. If I express a view on something that’s to the left of yours, of course I must subscribe to the extreme left-wing view on everything. And since “compromise” is a dirty word to you Tea party types, you act shocked that someone would propose making a compromise.
Your tariff example is too simplistic, but that will have to wait for later.
I do admit being suprised that you want tax cuts for the rich and cutting social security benefits for new taxes in other areas, but we all know how that works. Complain about lost revenue and cuts to social security benefits later and raise those taxes again while not cutting taxes in those new areas. Like the claim to offer amnesty by securing the borders, or tax increases with spending cuts. The compormise tends to go one way. Fool me once …
My tariff example is based on reality and fact, reality and facts I witnessed and had to deal with. Is reality and are facts too “simplistic” for you to accept?
The day taxes and FICA gets cut by the government, hell will freeze over.
Net revenue stays the same, in the beginning, because the carbon tax replaces what the FICA and income tax brought in.
rrrrriiight, revenue neutral he says
if you like your plan, you can keep your plan. Period.
Even if one rejects that humans are causing climate change or believe that excess carbon dioxide emissions is not pollution, one can still decide that generating electricity from coal is extremely dirty and in many cases fatal.
In addition to various greenhouse gases, coal power plants emit countless other pollutants and particulate matter. This type of pollution has been reduced over the years but, at its heart, coal is still a very dirty fuel. It is dangerous and harmful to the environment to extract from the ground and, once burned, it causes serious harm, especially to people with respiratory conditions. I think it is just common sense that we should move away from the dirty and frankly disgusting fuel.
One could but this one doesn’t.
All that awful coal you don’t want us to burn in our clean coal burning generators will be shipped over seas to China and India to be burned in their…eh, lesser than clean plants. Or Germany, who is restarting a lot of their formerly shuttered plants. Or any other various and countless countries.
Is cost ever a variable in your common sense calculations?
Coal is not clean and the statement “clean coal” is, frankly, a joke.
Again, if we disregard climate change, I would be perfectly happy sending our coal to China or India or Germany so that they could burn the coal there. Again, forgeting green house gasses for the moment, the other types of pollution found in coal emissions have a primarily local affect or regional at best.
And cost is always a variable.
The local air pollution in Houston is terrible and the best way to solve this problem would be to prevent people from driving on certain days. Such a move though would cost too much and thus, we try to mitigate the problem with other measures (to varrying levels of success).
It’s a balancing act.
Cost is always a variable.
However, for far too many Republicans, is seems to rank as the *only* concern and to serve as a frequent excuse for inaction.
The energy from thousand windmills would not be enough to power the kiln necessary to produce the cement content required for the foundation of a single turbine.
I’m not sure what the cost of the hundreds of birds killed each year by a turbine is but I know its extremely high if it is to be mitigated for any project other than wind energy.
How many children are given childhood asthma due to the emissions from coal fired power plants? How many cases of cancer in humans are due to coal fired power plant emissions? How many of the same are caused by wind turbines?
You weigh the positives and negatives of each.
I recall seeing data that coal-fired power plants release more radiation, on an annual basis, than nuclear fission plants.
When you look at it that way, I’m not sure why a person with any care for the future would choose coal.
How about a weekly basis? or maybe over a decade?
Discounting fiscal reality is no way to express concern for future generations btw.
Financial reality is also about calculting the actual cost in the production of electricy from coal, including public health effects, the cost of mitigating the damage from such pollution and other costs not directly borne by the company burning the coal.
Okay, when you factor in the global consequences get back to me because China, India and various countless other countries aren’t going to care.
Thank you Chris, I was hoping you would post on this topic. We cannot continue with business as usual, with the usual being that we just keep ignoring those externalities. The carbon tax is the most realistic and workable proposal we have. Are there lots of little devils in the details? Oh yes. You’ve got to rig this so that the poor and what’s left of the middle class don’t lose big. You will likely have to be willing to take a step or two back for that prospect of ten steps forward. I agree 1000% that more EPA regs are not the way to go.
I asked former SC rep Inglis about when he thought a push to get carbon tax bills to the floor in Congress could start. His answer was after the mid-terms, when Obama was more officially a lame-duck. I’m less optimistic; I think it can’t/won’t start in earnest until the next Presidency, at the earliest.
You mean the incumbent repub Bob Inglis that lost in a 58 point landslide after backing the carbon tax idea? and amnesty? and the rule changes the dems were pushing in the NSA rules to increase domestic spying?
How did that guy lose?
A few details not mentioned by our humble host.
When dems took the house and senate after the 2006 elections they immediately voted to cede the law making aspects of their duty to the EPA. They did not want to face the voters over the coming carbon tax scheme they had been dreaming up to redistribute wealth.
They encouraged a lawsuit by the EPA to be filed to declare carbon dioxide a greenhouse gas and got the Supreme Court to rule the EPA had the authority to make that declaration stand by virtue of their shiny new law making authority given to them by the dem congress.
Nancy Pelosi got her house to pass the carbon tax as one of her first initiatives. In what became a pattern in 2009 and 2010 every dem house member voted for in solidarity. Harry Reid has never allowed a vote in the senate for same. The dem house was destroyed following the display of congressional anarchy in the 2010 mid-terms.
The repub house rescinded the carbon tax bill that was never taken up by Harry Reid when they regained the house in 2010.
As much as Chris wants so desperately to blame the repubs for not completely destroying our economy as quickly as possible, Harry Reid has assisted in the slowdown and deserves liberal’s scorn as well. Thanks Mr. Reid.
It would be really nice, Dan, if you could shed some light on the carbon tax as an idea. Is it a good idea, or a bad idea? Or is this blog post only going to be fodder for each side pointing fingers at each other?
Good idea for liberals wanting to find a way to tax the snot out of people and then offer them some of their money back as ‘basic incomes’ to buy their votes with their own money.
Very bad idea for promoting self sufficiency, efficiency and accommodations to basic human nature.
I’ll leave it to you to guess which side I align with.
So, Dan, are you against taxes in any and all circumstances?
If not, please specifically describe what you see as a reasonable standard for taxes.
And why does the carbon tax (designed both to raise funds *and* to encourage responsible environmental behavior) fail that personal standard?
Some taxes are absolutely necessary and a benefit to society. Property taxes, for example. Yes, I’m a homeowner, and I do pay them, and I feel the pinch like everybody else. (My property taxes, plus my insurance, actually exceed my mortgage payment now–such is the price one pays for living in an area that’s in demand). But imagine for a moment what our cities would look like if there were no property taxes at all. We have enough derelict properties even now, but at the very least, those owners have to pay their taxes. Not paying them is a good incentive for the local government to confiscate the properties and sell them to someone else. Property taxes encourage economic activity.
So pay your taxes. Otherwise any exhortations of patriotism are just hollow. You don’t need to die for America, just pay your share.
The City of Stafford stopped collecting property taxes back in 1995.
you two go burn those strawmen you’ve created, I’ll sit here at laugh at the imaginary carbon load
The city of Stafford is a shaite hole too. You couldn’t pay me to live there.
So, Dan, you prefer to just complain rather than actually to discuss your ideas?
Why am I not surprised?
This blog isn’t about ideas. It is about pushing a leftist agenda by any means necessary. The solutions to every problem discussed on this site involve the same prescriptions to deal with the unfairness of some aspect of the topic of the day. More taxes and subsidies in order to try to control behavior.
Whether its race, pollution, education, immigration or whatever. Name a democrat talking point that doesn’t have at its core an effort to control more and more of the population by economic means.
Sternn, the population of Stafford quadruples during the working day because of people coming to work from surrounding communities. So sales-tax receipts enable those workers and visitors to subsidize Stafford property-owners’ tax burdens.
Are you proposing that such a tax model is generally applicable? Could three times Houston’s entire population slosh in and out every day to work full-time?
Conservatives all too often seem addicted to the marvels of fringe cases without bothering to understand how and why they’re exceptional.
DanMan whines, “This blog isn’t about ideas.”
Well, it certainly isn’t when YOU post, sweetlings. Others tend to offer more useful and interesting content, and actually try to provide constructive suggestions rather than just cravenly carping from the generous cushion of your fat ass.
You’re funny Owl. I was only replying to Anse about a city not collecting property tax. The rest came from your own imagination.
From the Scowl of Bellaire “So, Dan, you prefer to just complain rather than actually to discuss your ideas?”
This is just so awesome. Pay attention now. The dems gave the EPA rule making authority so they would not have to even debate their ideas of redistributing wealth through environmental activism. The EPA is scheduled to release those shiny new rules on June 2 into the Federal Register. That will trigger the standard 60 day comment period, which should close at the beginning of August.
And what are dems doing? Trying their dead level best to have the EPA delay the rules release and increase the comment period to 120 days to try to get the issue pushed to the other side of a certain day in November. And in this article our humble has pushed that to an unprecedented one year comment period.
And here poor owl is spreading his tattered wings only to smash into the wall of reality he is so familiar with. Dems won’t discuss their policies and when they have to…everybody sing along now…they lie!
I believe the GOP, for good reasons, is going to allow only the 60 day comment rule to apply. Let the dem’s stew in their ‘idea’.
Bullcrap. Mr. Ladd goes where no Republican has gone before, me. It’s your duty, as a conservative, to diligently consider the “left.” TR invented conservation. It’s inherent within the word. Con a word of connection, and servo to preserve or maintain. Libero means to set free. I kind of like that. To preserve and maintain and to set free.
With all your ‘perspective’ and going back in history, it would seem that from 2006-2010 the democrats could have put down this model you wish for.
Let’s say they did. and when other countries do not meet their carbon tax, do you think we will punish them and/or not trade with them or offer waivers forever?
What are you smoking dude?
“Let’s say they did. and when other countries do not meet their carbon tax, do you think we will punish them and/or not trade with them or offer waivers forever?”
We’re still the largest economy, and people still want access to our markets. Will it be easy? No. Will those countries bitch and moan and throw tantrums? Yes. Will we actually have to display some spine and make a commitment and follow through? Yes. We don’t have to hold our ground “forever”. We have to hold it longer than them, and we can if we use our brains and show some guts.
managed destruction is going out of style, you may want to see what the elections in Europe just revealed
So basically, it’s the Democrats fault for failing to adopt a Republican policy proposal that the Republicans ran away from. That’s some complex thinking.
You make a passing reference to George Bush and later tie repubs to libertarian economics that led to regulations for a short period.
You saying it doesn’t make it true. Care to enlighten us as to these awesome regs that the repubs have run from that the noble dems are now trying to resurrect?
Um, Dan, those would be *carbon taxes*. Kind of the point of the whole article.
Sometimes when you play stupid it looks an awful lot like the real thing.
okay birdbrain, cite the regs that repubs embraced. You couldn’t get that from my question? wow
It’s been said a million times: good ideas are the antithesis of the anti-government-at-all-costs GOP. Good government would undermine their entire worldview at this point.
There’s plenty of conservative backing for the carbon tax. By conservative I mean that subset who actually use their brains and don’t get the vapors over the word “tax”.
who are they?
They tend to ride unicorns.
okay, there’s two of you now. Name some names. Who are those conservatives backing a carbon tax?
Here are a few. Note that not many of them are elected officials because common sense is not part of the GOP electoral toolkit these days.
http://www.carbontax.org/who-supports/conservatives/
Thanks for confirming my instincts are intact. Not a conservative among them but at least the one economist Arthur Laffer offered this:
” Yet the costs of reducing carbon emissions are not trivial. Climate change may be a serious problem, but a higher overall tax rate would devastate the long-term growth of America and the world.
It is essential, therefore, that any taxes on carbon emissions be accompanied by equal, pro-growth tax cuts. A carbon tax that isn’t accompanied by a reduction in other taxes is a nonstarter. Fiscal conservatives would gladly trade a carbon tax for a reduction in payroll or income taxes, but we can’t go along with an overall tax increase.
Here’s a hint Cuffy. If they advised McCain in 2008 they prolly aren’t conservatives. There’s more than one reason he lost.
Dude, you’re saying that Arthur Laffer is not conservative? A member of Reagan’s economic team, policy chair of the Free Enterprise Fund, and the namesake of the Laffer Center for Supply Side Economics. He wrote California’s Prop 13, for goodness sake. It is a telling measure of how far off the deep end you are that you would question his conservative bona fides. Perhaps it’s because he uses big words that you don’t understand so you assume he must be a liberal.
McCain lost for two reasons: people were tired of 8 years of the Bush administration and McCain argued that his experience was a key reason to pick him over Obama, and then nominated an unqualified running mate. It’s really nothing beyond that.
Note that Laffer considers himself a libertarian. Laffer is best known for his observations on how to get as much money into the treasury as possible and developed his Laffer Curve to demonstrate his hypothesis. He freely admits to voting for dems and repubs.
Danny-boy – how does any of what you wrote make Laffer a non- conservative?.
No, Laffer was interested in the most efficient way to get money into the treasury. There is a huge difference, though not one I suspect you’ll understand.
Cuffy, you want to let us in on his efficient method? And after you tell us, can you explain why democrats have ridiculed him ever since he announced it?
Arthur Laffer is an economist. If he’s a conservative one then he stands out in a crowded field.