Worse now, and likely to get a lot worse

I think that's because Climate Change (I note the recent name change from Global Warming) has been used as an excuse to tax us more.

Numberous tax increases with the weak excuse of helping to slow climate change have led to cynicism in the UK. If this tax money had been ring fenced to invest in 'green' technology then opinion might be different.

How can punitive taxation on fuel and transportation on a population that accounts for 2% of global CO2 emissions actually help? Our fuel costs are virtually the highest in the western world, yet so are our train fares!

We need more carrot and much less stick.

 

For better or worse(definitely worse in your case), cap and trade or any type of carbon tax is dead in the US until at least after 2012. The AGW movement is in fulll retreat politically world-wide. If AGW turns out to be true, the campaign has been massively bungled, politicized and corrupted.

 

You have only your own prophets to blame for the failure of AGW and all of its expensive solutions. People may not be terribly informed, but when a doom and gloom chicken little green venture capitalist, read Al Gore, jets world wide at the drop of a hat to attend AGW conferences, the people see the hypocrisy. When the IPCC finally admits that they have allowed non-scientific opinion to be included in the 2007 report, people see the hypocrisy in that. When your most visible standard bearing scientists are shown by their own e-mail conversations to be small, vindictive people more concerned with supporting their nonsense with non-science, the people see that hypocrisy. When the Copenhagen Conference is swamped by thousands of AGW true believers who arrive in jets and clog the thorough fares with limos, the people see the hypocrisy in that. When the third world countries show up to see what their cut of the first world budgets' will be, the people see the hypocrisy in that. When Micheal Mann's "hockey stick" shown to be a repetitive graph regardless of the data input, the people see the hypocrisy in that. How long does the list have to be? All of the so call scienfic data, if it truly exists, has been drowned out by hyprocrisy and the self serving messangers of this theory.

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me!"

 

I actually agree with your sad conclusion(s). The underlying reality is the kerfuful over he said/she said etc doesn't make the very real problem(s) go away. Deniers like to wish it so, but it doesn't make it so.

As I have stated so many times before,a cap and trade system only opens the door for corruption. A simple, transparent carbon tax, with stated goals and objectives, that is essentially revenue neutral is the proper way to go IMHO.

 

I am in a difficult position on this.
I tend to accept AGW: that it is occurring and must be addressed.
I strongly concur with icarus that cap and trade is a boondoggle waiting to be unleashed, and that carbon tax would be both simpler and more effective.
I have stood for state and local control versus federal or world government.

Now, if AGW is real, even the US government (IF it could do ANYTHING) is not up to this global problem. And politically, the US could not be further from a concensus, and the developing countries will assert their 'right' to be as energy-hungry as the US.

Hard to see a good outcome. Think I'll sell my holdings in Bangledesh and Miami in the next 10 years...

 

If you base conclusions on the popular media (especially if you are selective there) you may conclude that climate change science is in full retreat. OTOH if you follow the science itself you may well come to a different conclusion. It is an effort to do the latter, but not an enormous one and being selective about media (in a different way) can help one do it.

 

in a perfect world, where everyone understood the science, and the science proved man made climate change, and everyone agreed, what could we do about it. no one is going to give up ther car/house/business/ whatever. and taxes or incentives are only going to prolong the agony, not solve the problem. o.k., maybe not a completely perfect world where we would all go back to bicycles and fur coats?

 

So what are you suggesting?

Yea, we don't live in a perfect world, but if we don't do something soon, it will be even harder to solve. Why do people insist that making better/more efficient energy choices (with the requisite reductions in CO2) will require us to "give up our car/house/business/whatever"? It is clear that some fairly simple conservation, cogent energy policy and yes tax policy can have a huge effect. What we don't have, largely due to the denial community (coupled with libertarian/teabag selfishism) is the will to make the hard choices that will inevitably be needed. The longer we wait, (the longer we let these people obfuscate the reality) the more expensive if gets, and the more intrusive the response will have to be. (and the bigger the bill that we will pass on to future generations,,but that is nothing new!)

If you peruse these threads, you will see how in my lifestyle we use ~1/6 as much energy as the average American, with little effect on lifestyle. I won't restate it over and over again, but if we can cut ~80% , clearly as a nation we can cut back 20% with out it hurting too much!

 

you're making my point. we can delay the inevitable, but it is still inevitable. in the end, we're all going to die. sooner, or later.

 

Here in lies the problem, the people trying to bring things to light, are supposed to live like Ghandi in their eyes, otherwise they are hypocrites, yet the problem needs to be addressed worldwide, as much as possible, as far as possible. The problem is being pushed under the rug, because its the see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil attitude of the less informed, and the I don't want to be informed.

The problem will be here before most people will accept it, it will be catastrophic, and it will be very very bad, but hey, all is good, lets ignore it.

Now at this point, you are saying this guy doesn't know anything, how could he know this, its simple, history, its simple, science, its simple, just look at many situations going on now. It will be a massive famine, it could be a new virus, it could be a new ice age, it could be massive forest fires, massive floods, all in areas that are not known to be a problem area, or known to be, but the norm is totally changed. What will happen will be a mass exodus from those places, and where will they go? If you guess the US, assuming we are spared somewhat, you got it, and we aren't prepared to prevent or stop it, why, because we pretended the problem would never develop.

 

again, it's a matter of what we can do. probably nothing because the problem is too overwheling for our tiny minds. and how are we going to get the whole world to agree on anything? an asteroid will probably hit us first and put us out of our misery.

 

i'm suggesting you don't buy waterfront property.

 

I feel sorry for your children,,, and their children.

If you accept that it is a fait accompli then I guess we ARE doomed. I chose not to accept that.

 

Interesting everyone agrees C&T is a scam.
Thank god.
We really dont need it during a depression.
IMO Anything Enron and Goldman Sachs invent and lobby for is a 100% guaranteed rip off scam.
As for the CO2 science,I guess its a direct result of Enron and Goldman pouring money at it.
I used to think George W Bush was Ken Lays buddy.
With a little research I see that Gore and
( my hero) Clinton were Ken Lays first victims.

 

Enron and GS did not invent Cap and Trade.

 

Heres admittedly from a right wing blog.
Show me that its untrue.
Enron: The Godfather of Kyoto

 

This article is referenced in the previous link.The Briefing Room: Investigate Oct 05, The Kyoto Conspiracy

"The gargantuan rents which Enron energetically sought could be realized only if the Kyoto Protocol became established as part of US and international law. Ken Lay, Enron’s CEO saw Enron as not only making billions from sales of the natural gas which was to displace coal as the preferred fuel under the Kyoto commitments, but he realised that as the main if not the only international and domestic trader in the new barter world of carbon credits, Enron could realise hitherto unimagined wealth. Such credits, of course, would only become bankable pieces of paper if governments, particularly the US Government, established and policed a global policy of decarbonisation under which a global tax on carbon was to be enforced.
As the movement to establish the Kyoto Protocol developed momentum, it was necessary for Ken Lay to build up alliances with the green movement including Greenpeace."

 

Enron invented and lobbyed C&T.
After Enron self destructed what happened to all their traders?
My guess is that former Enron traders must be working at Goldman Sachs.
Goldman Sachs is currently the main lobby for Cap&Trade.

 

I'm sorry, but it is a urban myth, perpetuated in large measure by denyist media, that Enron "invented" cap and trade! (largely to bolster BS arguments against global warming!)

Certainly Enron had an interest in the concept, as did (does) much of wall street, but it was invented in the 1960's by Thomas Crocker in an attempt to reduce pollutants.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125011380094927137.html

Personally I think that Cap and trade is a BS way for smart folks to make a lot of money at the expense of the environment ( and others!) and it will do little to solve the issue.

A strict, transparent carbon tax would be the right start.