A Way Forward on Climate Change

This article by Peter Teague and Jeff Navin is the best thing I've read on the politics of climate change in a long time. Teague and Navin argue that environmentalists are headed for political doom if they don't take seriously just how sensitive Americans are to rising energy prices:

Americans' anxiety over rising energy costs is a serious challenge to anyone seeking a solution to global warming. The anxiety is real, and the vast majority of Americans perceive these costs as causing financial hardship for their families. Proposals that raise energy prices risk triggering populist anger; Americans uniformly reject government efforts to increase the cost of gasoline or electricity as a way of encouraging certain kinds of behaviors.

The authors use the failure of California's Proposition 87 as an object lesson, pointing out that the initiative floundered -- despite initial public support -- when advocates were unable to convince the public that its regulatory mandates would not cause gas prices to rise.

Teague and Navin make the case for a response to the challenge of global warming that goes beyond simply imposing regulations on carbon emissions, calling for an integrated approach involving massive public investment in the development of a clean-fuel economy:

Ultimately, the global warming crisis will be solved by the emergence of a new clean energy economy that is also capable of meeting the needs and aspirations of America's -- and the world's -- growing population. Regulation should be only one piece of a larger set of strategies designed to speed the emergence of that economy, with interlocking investment, tax, and fiscal policies also designed to send the right market signals and prompt private-sector investment and innovation. These policies must both solve the problem of climate change and have the political support to be enacted and sustained.

Good policy is therefore inseparable from good politics.

I haven't read enough of the literature on climate change to know how novel Teague and Navin's argument is. But I have read enough conservative writing on the subject to see its importance. As I've been documenting for a few months, the right's approach to the warming debate has been shifting from straight denial to a more nuanced position, which accepts the reality of global warming but rejects regulatory solutions and argues for letting the market take care of the problem -- call it the "Yes, But" approach. See, for instance, the cover story in last week's National Review, or this AEI paper by Samuel Thernstrom and Lee Lane, or this Robert Samuelson piece. It isn't a uniform shift across the conservative spectrum; there's still plenty of denialism mixed in, as well a sort of hybrid, defeatist mentality that accepts warming but would have us just try learning to live with it. But what all the approaches have in common, the pivot point between denialism and the "Yes, But" approach, is a focus on the costs of carbon regulation. What Teague and Navin understand is the power of arguments like the one made by Stephen Hayward:

Liberals in the 1960s and 1970s never comprehended how damaging "limousine liberalism" was to their cause. They seem even more oblivious to the self-inflicted wounds of "Gulfstream liberalism." Whatever the intricacies of climate science, middle-class citizens understand that Gore wants them to use less energy and pay more for it, while he and his Hollywood pals use as much as they want and buy their way out of guilt, like a medieval indulgence.

I know I've quoted that before, but I'm quoting it again, because it's tremendously important. This is the fatal flaw in any attempt to deal with climate change as a strictly regulatory issue, and it's why the whole notion of purchasing carbon offsets is wildly misguided as a feature of the public debate on the issue. I like Al Gore a lot, but the controversy over his energy bills was an example of the kind of thing that will be tremendously damaging to the environmental cause, and his response fell flat. We cannot afford to wind up on the wrong side of a class conflict when it comes to this debate.

Teague and Navin get this:

The "right-wing populist vs. liberal elite" frame is dropping into place with the help of those calling for the deepest cuts in carbon. The deep-cut mantra, repeated without any real understanding of what might be required to get to 60 or 80 percent reductions in emissions, ignores voters' anxieties. It also reflects the questionable view that these changes can be achieved with little more than trivial disruptions in our lives -- a view easier to hold if you're in a financial position to buy carbon credits for your beachfront house.

Labor has indicated a willingness to support action on climate change, but it won't support deep cuts if working people are the most affected. This will leave environmentalists up against the well-financed business lobby. Good luck holding onto moderate Democrats, let alone Republicans -- even those who are beginning to understand the need for action on global warming.

One of their key insights is that "today energy costs seem to generate the kind of ire taxes did a decade ago." Poll data show strong public support for government investment in a transition to a clean-energy economy -- read the article for more details on what that investment might entail -- while empirical evidence suggests that a strictly regulatory approach, by raising energy prices or even threatening to raise energy prices, triggers a backlash that harms the whole effort to fight climate change. Conservatives are preparing to stoke that backlash, even as they offer a faulty "market-based" alternative approach. Teague and Navin are absolutely right: progressives need to step up their game.

Labels: American Prospect, global warming, Jeff Navin, Peter Teague

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 10:07 AM 3 comments

  Newt Goes Green

If any of you are lucky enough to be on Newt Gingrich's email list, you may have read his latest missive: "We Can Have Green Conservatism -- And We Should." In which the former Speaker announces that "the time has come for the development of Green Conservatism as an alternative to big bureaucracy and big litigation liberal environmentalism."

Now, Newt hasn't been making a lot of sense lately, but the basic point here is fairly clear: Gingrich, as political operatives are wont to do, is trying to develop a communication strategy to deal with a serious policy issue that's hurting his side in the polls. Take this paragraph:

For example, former Vice President Al Gore suggests that global warming is so bad that we could have a 20-foot rise in the oceans in the near future. No responsible scientist anywhere believes that to be true. But if the debate becomes, "Al Gore cares about the earth, and we're against Al Gore," we end up in a defensive position where the average American could end up perceiving conservatives as always being negative about the environment.

What a fuzzy bundle of conservative climate change-related pathologies! Newt's use of Al Gore, Strawman is textbook, as is his misleading opposition of the scientific consensus to that favorite denialist talking point, the 20-foot rise claim. Yet Gingrich seems concerned that demonizing Gore, as much fun as it is, may be counterproductive in the long run.

Far be it from me to doubt Newt's sincere commitment to safeguarding "the health of our planet," but his list of Green Conservatism's "basic values" isn't exactly dripping with substance:

1. Green Conservatism favors clean air and clean water.


2. Green Conservatism understands biodiversity as a positive good.


3. Green Conservatism favors minimizing carbon loading in the atmosphere as a positive public value.


4. Green Conservatism is pro-science, pro-technology and pro-innovation.


5. Green Conservatism believes that green prosperity and green development are integral to the successful future of the human race.


6. Green Conservatism believes that economic growth and environmental health are compatible in both the developed and developing world.


7. Green Conservatism believes that we can realize more positive environmental outcomes faster by shifting tax code incentives and shifting market behavior than is possible from litigation and regulation.

Only the last point seems to mean anything beyond vague watery evironmentalisticallism. But what does it add up to? So far, only two things: cash prizes "as a competitive alternative to the current peer-reviewed process of scientific research," and carbon tax credits. Want more? You'll have to wait.

Newt is a master of political language, and that appears to be mostly what his "Green Conservatism" is all about: language to win political battles as a substitute for actual policy strategy. He even insists that Green Conservatism talk of "conservation," not "environmentalism." We're promised much more to come on this subject. Though at such an inefficient rate of rhetoric to actual ideas, I think it might be more conservationist for Newt to just leave it alone.

Labels: environment, global warming, Newt Gingrich

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 2:20 PM 0 comments

  All Your Reality Base Are Belong to Us

Good piece by Jonathan Chait at the LA Times yesterday: "Why the Right Goes Nuclear over Global Warming." It's a quick look at the dynamics behind the perverse fact that, as evidence for global warming goes stronger, Republican politicians are actually getting more skeptical. As Chait points out, it's a process largely driven by a small number of hard-core denialist ideologues (the very same ones we cover regularly at this blog):

Your typical conservative has little interest in the issue. Of course, neither does the average nonconservative. But we nonconservatives tend to defer to mainstream scientific wisdom. Conservatives defer to a tiny handful of renegade scientists who reject the overwhelming professional consensus.

National Review magazine, with its popular website, is a perfect example. It has a blog dedicated to casting doubt on global warming, or solutions to global warming, or anybody who advocates a solution. Its title is "Planet Gore." The psychology at work here is pretty clear: Your average conservative may not know anything about climate science, but conservatives do know they hate Al Gore. So, hold up Gore as a hate figure and conservatives will let that dictate their thinking on the issue.

Emphsis mine. Once again, culture war trumps all.

Chait notes that several Republican Congressmen who do take global warming seriously - Reps. Wayne Gilchrest, Roscoe Bartlett, and Vernon Ehlers - were recently turned down by the Republican leadership for seats on the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming. Bartlett and Ehlers are research scientists. Observes Chait, "Normally, relevant expertise would be considered an advantage. In this case, it was a disqualification."

So on a critical issue - and at a criticial juncture - we find, once again, Republicans failing in their duty to provide constructive leadership because of the overriding conservative refusal to believe in the utility of science or activist government. The qualified members of their own party are undermined by the ideologues. John Boehner knows which side his freedom toast is buttered on - that's why he turned up at the conservative summit to grovel before the very same "intellectuals" who insist that climate change is a liberal fairy tale. They're driving the movement, and the movement is driving the party.

Still, if you understand conservative dynamics and know how to manipulate them, you can use them to your advantage. Thus, Chait points out, John McCain's efforts to address climate change center on his advocacy of nuclear power. Whatever you think of nuclear plants, you have to admire the political insight here:

In reality, nuclear plants may be a small part of the answer, but you couldn't build enough to make a major dent. But the psychology is perfect. Conservatives know that lefties hate nuclear power. So, yeah, Rush Limbaugh listeners, let's fight global warming and stick it to those hippies!

It's not exactly reverse psychology. Call it perverse psychology.

Labels: conservatives, global warming, John McCain, Jonathan Chait

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 10:21 AM 0 comments

  Right-Wing Think Tank Review: 3/22/07

American Enterprise Institute (Sourcewatch profile here)

Gore on the Rocks
By Steven F. Hayward
Pub. 3/21/07; also pub. in National Review.

Hayward's article attempts to establish the idea that there is a "backlash" under way, in the scientific community and among the general public, against climate change "alarmism." Celebrating the fact that "public opinion has barely budged" on climate change, Hayward uses Al Gore as a foil for various denialist assertions.

He begins by citing William Broad's recent article in the New York Times, which purported to show a backlash against the former Vice President's climate change lobbying "'from rank and file scientists' who 'have no political ax to grind.'" (See here and here for criticism of Broad's piece). Hayward goes on to quote Mike Hulme, a British climatologist who sounds a reasonable note of caution about the dangers of always assuming worst-case scenarios. The article then distorts the sense of Hulme's statement by following it with a quote about "internal backlash" from Kevin Vranes - who is also cited in the NYT piece, and who, critics have noted, has published very little peer-reviewed work on climate change.

Hayward then argues that the recent report of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) "undermines many of Gore's most spectacular claims" [emphasis mine]. Citing, for instance, Gore's warning about the possibility of a 20-foot rise in sea level, Hayward uses the IPCC's more limited conclusions to criticize outlier claims about the effects of global warming, without noting that the report itself affirms extremely strong evidence for anthropogenic influence on climate.

Like a number of other conservative writers, Hayward cites the recent British documentary The Great Global Warming Swindle as evidence of a scientific "backlash" against warnings about climate change. Critics have noted that the program offered little more than the usual debunked denialist claims; one of the scientists featured in the program, meanwhile, has stated that Channel 4 misled him about the nature of the documentary and distorted his opinions.

Hayward and other conservative writers are focusing on examples of extreme rhetoric from non-scientist climate change activists, then conflating the more cautious language of actual scientists with discredited denialist claims, to impute the existence of a "backlash" against warnings about global warming in general. Using certain activists as a straw man, Hayward is attempting to attach denialism parasitically to actual science. As RealClimate.org has warned,

Much of the sensationalist talk in the public discourse (and to which the scientists in the piece, and we, rightly take exception) are not the pronoucements of serious scientists in the field, but distorted and often out-of-context quotes that can be further mangled upon frequent repetition. We have often criticised such pieces (here, or here for instance) and it is important to note that the 'shrill voices of doom' referred to by Mike Hulme were not scientists, but campaigners.

Yet we cannot expect conservative think tanks to make the same distinctions.

Meanwhile, Hayward also attempts to portray a backlash against climate change campaigners among the general public. Again, he resorts to ridicule of Al Gore, criticizing Gore's "profligate energy use" (here we see the synergy of the conservative think tanks and right-wing media/attack operations). At the same time, Hayward mades an important political point - one which progressives should carefully consider:

Liberals in the 1960s and 1970s never comprehended how damaging "limousine liberalism" was to their cause. They seem even more oblivious to the self-inflicted wounds of "Gulfstream liberalism." Whatever the intricacies of climate science, middle-class citizens understand that Gore wants them to use less energy and pay more for it, while he and his Hollywood pals use as much as they want and buy their way out of guilt, like a medieval indulgence [Emphasis mine].

Carbon offsets have a emerged as a way for people to use market-like mechanisms to mitigate the environmental harm caused by their personal energy use. This is a laudable idea, but it has the potential to be politically disastrous. It implies that burdens will not be equally shared, and could allow cultural and class-based resentments to undermine serious efforts at emissions reduction. It structures emissions reduction much as the Union's ill-conceived military draft was structured during the Civil War: theoretically, anybody can buy out of it, but in practical terms, only the wealthy can do so. Carbon offsets are not technically hypocritical, but they are deeply hypocritical on a symbolic level.

[Remainder of post lost]

Labels: American Enterprise Institute, global warming, Right Wing Think Tank Review

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 9:36 AM 3 comments

  Enlightened Self-Interest: A Global Conspiracy?

Kevin Drum points out this WSJ piece, which discusses moves by American energy trade associations to get behind the idea of some sort of carbon emissions limits:

The shift by the groups, which include the Edison Electric Institute and the American Gas Association, underscores their belief that Congress is in a mood to pass some form of mandatory emissions controls, perhaps before the next election in 2008. "We want to be at the table" during the debate, said Paul Wilkinson, a vice president of the American Gas Association, which represents 200 utilities that distribute natural gas throughout the U.S.

Drum calls this "good news" but points out that it mainly indicates that energy companies are "tacking in the wind," given the multiplicity of bills in Congress - as well as state-level efforts - to limit emissions. Industry leaders realize they need to be on board with the idea of emissions limits if they are to have any hope of keeping them relatively watered-down.

Interestingly, the energy associations don't seek to challenge the "cap-and-trade" approach planned by almost all of the various bills - despite the advice of some conservative intellectuals. They do, however, seek to include "safety valve" provisions that would set limits on the cost of emissions credits.

Meanwhile, some conservatives are crying betrayal over such moves. See for instance Mike Franc of the Heritage Foundation, who is shocked at the idea that businesses may be acting out of financial self interest:

Conspiracy theorists believe those splits aren't accidental and point to efforts by left-leaning foundations such as the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, which has convinced 42 large corporations -- including Intel, Alcoa, Georgia-Pacific, Sunoco, Lockheed Martin, Weyerhaeuser and Toyota -- to embrace ambitious global-warming legislation. Pew's president, Eileen Claussen, has even boasted about this divide-and-conquer strategy: "The whole objective was to split the industry so you could get people who were progressive to begin to do something" to advance global-warming legislation.

But the companies climbing aboard are hardly motivated by altruism. "We also believe," Pew's website states, "that companies taking early action on climate strategies and policy will gain sustained competitive advantage over their peers."

Indeed, some of these companies want to force their competitors to shoulder costs they have already borne.

Thus is revealed the Pew Center's secret plan for total world domination.

Labels: global warming, Heritage Foundation

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 3:33 PM 0 comments

  Denialfest 2007: It's On!

I've posted numerous times on what seems to be an emerging shift in intellectual conservative arguments about global warming: from outright denial to a nuanced form of defeatism.

Evidently, though, it's taking some time for the message to filter down to the shouters. Judging by the evidence at conservative movement mainstay Human Events, gleeful stupidity is still the order of the day when it comes to discussing climate change.

R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr. says global warming can't come fast enough.

Doug Patton makes a bid for the all-time Up-is-Downism championship by accusing climate realists (whom he calls "cultists") of being "flat earthers."

Bill Steigerwald conducts an interview with oil-industry-funded denialist Tim Ball.

And Thomas Sowell offers up a rambling three-part epic of denialism.

Keep in mind that these people would also claim, with a straight face, to represent the party of national security.

Labels: global warming, Human Events

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 3:22 PM 0 comments

  Right-Wing Think Tank Review: 2/13/07

American Enterprise Institute (Sourcwatch profile here)

"Good Medicine for the Tax Code"

'Short Publication' by Joseph Antos, "Wilson H. Taylor Scholar in Health Care and Retirement Policy" at AEI.

This article, published in AEI's online magazine American.com on Jan. 25, praises President Bush's "bold" health care proposal, which

would help lower-income people buy health insurance while putting the brakes on runaway health spending. Unlike his last big initiative—the Medicare drug benefit—the new proposal will have the support of conservatives and deserves the support of liberals.

Antos says that the plan would address a "defect" of tax policy: the employer-based health insurance deduction. Many liberals have also argued that the deduction, and the employer-based health care system it supports, is problematic (see for instance this article by Ezra Klein). But Antos goes on to make a surprising claim: that this system is the primary cause of inequality in America:

As a result, the more income workers receive as health care, the more income they get to keep free of taxes.... That differential has led to a shift in employee compensation away from taxable wages, toward non-taxable health benefits. Consequently, workers are not seeing their wages increase despite a booming economy. Most of the increase in labor productivity over the past few years has been eaten up by health benefits.

Your humble reviewer is not an economist, but in an era of skyrocketing corporate profits and massive increases in executive compensation, this seems like a rather brazenly absurd claim. However, if it provides a narrative by which conservatives can simultaneously co-opt the inequality debate and the health care debate, it's worth watching.

Antos goes on to repeat a number of other conservative claims about the Bush plan and about health care in general. In this analysis, the primary issue is cost control, and the best way to control costs is to allow individuals to decide how to spend their health care dollars. Moreover, argues Antos, the plan would be "mildly redistributional, favoring those with lower incomes" (by contrast, the Center for American Progress points out that "most uninsured Americans pay low or no taxes and would get a smaller benefit from this plan than higher-income Americans").

"The President’s proposal," says Antos, "gives workers and firms a new reason to ask whether their insurance is right for them, but it would not impose change from above." This seems to be the conservative position on health care in a nutshell. However, if it appears to lack urgency, liberals should nonetheless be careful to note that it does indicate a developing conservative attempt to seize the agenda in the health care debate.


Manhattan Institute (Sourcewatch profile here)

"Consumerism: A Prescription for Change"

Op-Ed by David Gratzer; originally published in the San Francisco Examiner.

Gratzer celebrates prescription drug programs by Wal-Mart and other pharmacy chains, arguing that they offer a low-cost, free-choice alternative to the "paternalism" of those who agree with Howard Dean that "there is no such thing as an informed consumer of health care." This "revolution," made possible by the internet (which is "empowering people with information and options"), is "potentially transformative."

Echoing Antos, Gratzer says that "one of the biggest problems with American health care is its cost." The reason for high medical costs? "Third-party payership." Gratzer cites Health Savings Accounts as "a step in the right direction" toward fixing this problem.

HSAs, of course, are the centerpiece of the conservatives' emerging effort to address the health care crisis (or, alternately, to prevent the Democrats from addressing the health care crisis). As Fred Barnes wrote a few weeks ago, they've already been authorized and need only to be promoted. See this fact sheet from Families USA for an analysis of how HSAs may in fact represent a step backwards in American health care. If it all sounds suspiciously like "private Social Security accounts" to you - you're not wrong.


Heritage Foundation (Sourcewatch profile here)

"Don't Rush to Judgment on UN IPCC Global Warming Summary" (WebMemo No. 1351)

Article by Ben Lieberman, Senior Policy Analyst in the Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at Heritage

Lieberman continues the conservative effort to put the brakes on the global warming consensus, this time in response to the summary of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report ("IPCC Report"). "It's just a summary," Lieberman cautions, and "the full scientific debate over the report has not yet begun." Moreover, "IPCC summaries are written at the direction of political appointees representing member nations" - thus, presumably, opening the door to an attack on the summary's credibility. This seems to fall squarely within the conservative strategy of asserting controversy in order to muddy the waters and delay action.

While acknowledging that the summary indicates an increasingly solid consensus that human action has been causing climate change, Lieberman argues that

This upward revision in the certainty that mankind has impacted the climate should not be confused with an upward revision in the predictions of consequent harm.

The more important questions have always been the extent of warming, the seriousness of the consequences, and what responsive policies make sense.

Moreover, he suggests that the report has "backtracked" on a number of key claims - for instance, de-emphasizing the "hockey stick" model of recent dramatic climate change, and dramatically revising estimates of future sea-level rise (this post from RealClimate debunks similar claims made by Christopher Monckton).

Lieberman once again returns to the conservative "neo-denial" argument that emissions limits as called for by the Kyoto protocols would be too expensive and would have little effect.


Cato Institute (Sourcewatch profile here)

"Live with Climate Change"

Article by Patrick Michaels, Senior Fellow; appeared as an op-ed in USA Today on Feb. 2, 2007.

Michaels joins in the defeatist conservative neo-denial framing of climate change: yes, it's happening, but "actually 'doing something' about warming is a daunting endeavor." And, par for the course, he pairs this statement with an argument for a solution combining technology development and just getting used to it:

The stark reality is that if we really want to alter the warming trajectory of the planet significantly, we have to cut emissions by an extremely large amount, and — a truth that everyone must know — we simply do not have the technology to do so. We would fritter away billions in precious investment capital in a futile attempt to curtail warming.

Consequently, the best policy is to live with some modest climate change now and encourage economic development, which will generate the capital necessary for investment in the more efficient technologies of the future.

This is a significantly more defeatist position even than that of Samuel Thernstrom and Lee Lane, who at least argue for some government action on R&D and a carbon tax. Michaels, in the best tradition of glib laissez-faire complacency, prefers to let the market take care of the problem.

Labels: Ben Lieberman, David Gratzer, global warming, health care, Joseph Antos, Patrick Michaels, Right Wing Think Tank Review

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 11:54 AM 2 comments

  Warmed Over

Following on the post below...

A few weeks ago, our Right-Wing Think Tank Review analyzed an American Enterprise Institute paper by Samuel Thernstrom and Lee Lane, which indicated a shift in conservatives' approach to the global warming debate. Outright denial is no longer politically sustainable for the right. The new strategy accepts the reality of climate change, but focuses on arguing that technology development (as well as geoengineering and coping strategies) represents the only realistic way to deal with the problem. The main point is to continue the crusade against Kyoto and the idea of CO2 emissions cuts generally - these, we're told, are too expensive and would simply be ineffective.

So I was interested to see this Robert Samuelson piece in the Washington Post, which appears to have been cribbed straight from the Thernstrom and Lane article. Lo and behold, the conservative message machine works its magic again.

It's all there: the argument that "we have no solution" to climate change, the dismissal of CO2 emissions limits, the finger-pointing at the third world, the focus on long-term technology R&D, even the rejection of "cap and trade" programs in favor of a carbon tax (for all I know this last idea may have some actual merit).

Coming soon to Fox News, I assume.

A question: are conservatives the Neville Chamberlains of the War on Climate Change?

Labels: American Enterprise Institute, global warming, Lee Lane, Robert J. Samuelson, Samuel Thernstrom, Washington Post

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 11:48 AM 0 comments

  Everything I Say Is a Lie

I've finally remembered to check out Commentary Magazine's new blog, "Contentions." Commentary has long had its own special brand of high-gravitas loopiness, so I expect great things from the blog.

And there does seem to be some promise. Witness Kevin Shapiro and Max Boot stumbling and tumbling over global warming and the right's standards of evidence.

Boot starts it out almost rationally:

Conservatives like to think of themselves as hard-headed, flinty-eyed realists who draw conclusions based on the way the world actually works, not on the way they would prefer it to work. They deride liberals as sentimentalists who never let facts interfere with their preferred policy prescriptions, whether in favor of the minimum wage or arms control. Yet there are some issues on which conservatives will not let any amount of evidence shake their own faith-based politics. Global warming is a prime example. [...]

[T]oo many on the Right still refuse to acknowledge the basic reality that the climate is changing in potentially dangerous ways due to human activity, and that we need to reduce carbon emissions to address this looming crisis. Skeptics can always dredge up a rogue scientist or two to buttress their case, just as liberals can always find an economist or two to make the case for raising the minimum wage. But why should a few fringe figures dictate governmental policy?

I would think supporters of the invasion of Iraq would be more sympathetic to arguments for preventative action based on the best available intelligence.

Indeed: we don't want the smoking gun to be the climate equivalant of a mushroom cloud.

Sensing a chance to dramatically up the surreality quotient, Kevin Shapiro fires back:

I thought that Max Boot’s analogy between the conventional wisdom on climate change and the pre-war intelligence on Iraq’s WMD’s was an apt one. But I’m not sure why he concluded from this that conservatives should abandon their skepticism about efforts to “fight” climate change by curtailing CO2 emissions. It seems to me that one should logically draw the opposite conclusion—namely, that we ought to be wary of the “consensus” of “experts” on matters where the uncertainty is large, the stakes are high, and political pressures are at work.

Ah-ha! Thus, the neoconservatives' own bamboozlement of Americans - based on manipulated intelligence, shoddy or even faked "evidence," and the testimony of experts who all agreed that they couldn't actually find any WMDs in Iraq - is now used as justification, by those same neocons, for global warming denial.

Shorter version: "The fact that I lied to you proves that I can't trust you to be honest."

Labels: Commentary, Contentions, global warming, Kevin Shapiro, Max Boot

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 11:04 AM 1 comments

  Right-Wing Think Tank Review - 1/22/07

So this may become another regular feature, probably on Mondays. It'll be more limited in scope (and less snarky) than the regular Friday roundup of conservative magazines. I only want to sample some of what is being churned out in the intellectual factories of the right - all the better to recognize the ideas when they reappear in the National Review or the Weekly Standard (and later on Fox News and in the right-wing radio/blogosphere). I'll stick to papers that seem to be seriously about advancing new conservative policies and strategies, as opposed to those which merely repeat old arguments for the record, or which are in danger of becoming quickly irrelevant. Thus, for instance, I won't be commenting on any of the numerous pieces attacking the Democrats' minimum wage bill, since the success of the bill is at this point almost a foregone conclusion. The point is not to rebut, but to observe.

With that, our first piece:


American Enterprise Institute (Sourcewatch profile here)

"A New Direction for Bush Administration Climate Policy"

Article by Samuel Thernstrom, former Director of Communications at the Bush administration's White House Council on Environmental Quality, and Lee Lane, former executive director of the Climate Policy Center.

This article represents a substantially different conservative position on global warming than the traditional denial. Written in anticipation of President Bush's State of the Union - which is expected to include initiatives to limit greenhouse gas emissions - the piece is aimed at encouraging the lame-duck Bush administration to develop climate policies that will preclude Bush's successor "from reengaging, in some form or another, with the Kyoto system."

The authors do not deny the reality of global warming - possibly indicating that the right is shifting to an understanding that such denial is no longer politically tenable. Instead, the point is to develop a conservative approach to dealing with global warming. This approach is twofold:

1. Emphasize the long term.

At least three times, the authors use the phrase "the long-term challenge of climate change." As they say, "a long-term alternative to Kyoto may help lessen its appeal."

"Rapid emissions reductions," such as those called for in the Kyoto Protocol and the McCain-Lieberman Stewardship Act, are criticized as not doing enough to confront the problem - in other words, the argument is that, while global warming is real, near-term emissions reductions would not have enough impact on warming to justify their economic cost. Rather, the authors focus on technology development as the key to solving the problem (though they also mention, more than once, geoengineering or even just trying to figure out how to "adapt" to global warming). They propose a major commitment to clean energy technology research and development - interestingly, they argue that this is an area in which government investment is more appropriate than private-sector efforts.

2. Coopt the emissions debate by proposing a carbon tax as an alternative to emissions trading.

While the primary effort is to recast global warming as a long-term problem to be solved primarily through technological development, in the short term the authors realize that "politics demand action ... [A] 'do nothing until the technology ripens' policy is simply not credible." Thus, the best option is to adopt an emissions policy while conservatives can still count on having a conservative in the White House:

[I]f for no other reason than to cut off momentum toward economically inefficient Kyoto-style emissions trading policies, the Bush administration needs to reconsider its long-standing opposition to mandatory greenhouse gas emissions controls. Federal emissions limits are now inevitable; the only question is which president will craft them.

To this end, the authors recommend a tax on emissions - a carbon tax - instead of allowing a market in emissions trading. This, too, represents an interesting development, since conservatives have vocally opposed a carbon tax in recent years (for more on this, see Tim Noah's piece at Slate). To Thernstrom and Lane,

a carbon tax would apply moderate, even pressure across the economy to limit emissions ather than selectively raising the cost of politically unpopular forms of energy production and consumption, such as automobiles and power plants.[7] A carbon tax may seem anathema to the Bush administration, but as several economists (including AEI’s Kevin A. Hassett) have noted, carbon tax revenues could be used to finance reductions in the marginal rates of other taxes.[8] The net result would be a revenue-neutral tax reform, not increased taxation.

Properly structured, such a tax reform could stimulate the economy, rather than depress it as emissions trading would.

The authors also suggest that, if emissions trading is inevitable, Bush should insist on a "safety valve" provision that would set a limit on the cost of emissions credits.


Hoover Institution (Sourcewatch profile)

"Legislate in Haste, Repent at Leisure"

Article by Stephen M. Bainbridge, Professor of Law at UCLA

Bainbridge's article comes as part of a new wave of conservative attacks on the Public Company Accounting Reform and Investor Protection Act ("The Sarbanes-Oxley Act," or SOX). (To be fair, it isn't only Republicans who have been calling for at least some "reform" of SOX provisions.) His principle criticism is that the Act - and particularly its Section 404, which requires internal control disclosures to be included in corporations' annual reports - is imposing an undue financial burden on firms. In public corporations, Bainbridge argues, directors now have incentive to insure themselves against liability by overspending shareholders' money on "hiring corporate governance consultants, lawyers, investment bankers, auditors, and so on" to advise on SOX compliance. This means that compliance costs - especially auditing - have skyrocketed, a burden which especially affects "smaller public companies."

Bainbridge concedes that many of these were one-time costs taken on to get corporate procedures into initial compliance with SOX, but argues that "many will recur year after year," as corporations work to maintain their internal control paper trails.

Additionally:

On the one hand, SOX has discouraged privately held corporations from going public. On the other hand, many publicly held corporations are going private. SOX thus reduces investor choice, makes many investments less liquid, and in the long run likely discourages entrepreneurship by denying start-ups access to financing in the capital markets. By raising the cost of access to the capital markets, SOX will likely retard economic growth.

[Update: See this piece by Robert Reich at the American Prospect for a contrary view on the "going private" claim.]

Bainbridge's other complaint is that, by federalizing and standardizing laws regulating corporate governance, SOX discourages state-by-state "experimentation" and imposes a "one-size-fits-all" model for internal controls on companies whose own "needs" may differ.

Bainbridge also responds to a defense of SOX by New York Times columnist Joseph Nocera - though Bainbridge does not address all of Nocera's points.

The sustained assault on SOX - which also includes critics who argue that the Act is driving businesses out of American capital markets - seems to be having an effect, as "reform" of the law is widely anticipated, though Reuters notes that the regulatory reforms under consideration may provide some relief for small companies, but are unlikely to reduce costs significantly for large corporations.


Heritage Foundation (SourceWatch profile)

"Congress Should Reject New Taxes and Curb Exploding Entitlements"

Article by Stuart M. Butler, Vice President of Domestic and Economic Policy Studies at Heritage and described by Sourcewatch as "the 'mastermind' of privatisation during the 1980s" and Alison Acosta Fraser, director of the Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies.

This 'Web Memo' is a conservative wish list for the 110th Congress - Congress won't adopt Butler and Fraser's recommendations, but they do help frame the conservative economic platform in the post-100 Hours phase of the new Congress.

The recommendations are:

• Reject tax rate increases and impose no new taxes;
• Reject any increase of the Social Security wage cap;
• Make the Bush tax cuts permanent; and
• Fix and then repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT).

Grappling with the AMT is going to be a difficult but necessary task for Congressional Democrats, and it's worth noting a conservative position on the question. Butler and Fraser argue for providing immediate relief by indexing the tax to inflation, which would limit the number of families falling under the AMT in the upcoming year.

In the longer term, they propose simply abolishing the AMT - a position they share with the liberal Center for American Progress. The difference is that Butler and Fraser oppose any effort to replace the lost revenue - which could cost $1 trillion over the next ten years, severely worsening federal deficits. Is this simply "starve the beast" rhetoric or an effort to stake out a position that will insulate wealthy taxpayers from absorbing the cost of fixing the AMT?

Labels: American Enterprise Institute, AMT, global warming, Heritage Foundation, Hoover Institution, Right Wing Think Tank Review, Sarbanes-Oxley, taxes

  ¶ Posted by Paul Curtis 10:18 AM 2 comments