This post notes that the fear of many economists (that cap and trade would turn into a give away that did little to rein in carbon) has come true.
The current legislation is about regulation and special interest exemptions/bribes; it's NOT about addressing climate change and/or reducing carbon output.*
Such a pity. No, actually, it makes me sick. Fuck. Doesn't anyone have a brain or is it just so obvious that the DC-crowd exists to suck in tax dollars/bribes and push out BS. Arg!
Bottom Line: The lower I go with my expectations, the worse I feel when they are exceeded (on the downside). If you want to reduce carbon output, then TAX IT.
* For a fisheries example (via BT), check out the hack they made out of an "auction" to retire crab licenses. When prices didn't work, they just told owners to take it or leave it. They should have used my all-in-auction design :)
2 comments:
This seems to be the pattern in NRCS HQ in Washington as well with the $57 million they just awarded for AWEP - supposedly to conserve water. About $42 million of the total funds went to improve irrigation efficiency in the name of water conservation. Looks purely political with California and Texas getting the lion's share of the projects and funding, but can't prove a thing. We had a proposal in for $3.9 million to permanently retire actually pumped (wet) water from an area completely closed to new appropriations (in the Ogallala priority area) which was overlooked. When's the last time you heard "political power" and "Kansas" used in the same sentence? I think NRCS should as of now change their name to the Natural Resources Cronyism Service. They used to be pretty conservation-minded. How is true water conservation ever going to happen when NRCS continues to pour these kinds of dollars into efforts that in all but a few special situations don't conserve water? I say ARGGG too!!!
@Wayne -- useful background, thanks. And, yes, the politicization of "scientific" funding is ridiculous.
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