MYTH: The Republican Senators who are trying to cap greenhouse gas emissions are bad for the economic growth of this country—in fact, they are almost as bad as the Frenchies ...

 

Yet staunch and principled diplomacy from the president and his team, combined with Blair's willingness to listen, have resulted in the draft declaration on the subject, as widely reported, endorsing the president's policies rather than any of the economy-destroying Kyoto-like policies embraced by Jacques Chirac and his cronies for decades. Unfortunately, at the very last minute it is possible that Republicans in the U.S. Senate could stab the president in the back by endorsing the Chirac stance for trivial reasons. The president and the American economy deserve better treatment from our most senior elected representatives. (Iain Murray, “Surrender Monkeys in the Senate,” National Review, 6/21/05)

 

Blair, it seems, came to the negotiating table hoping to persuade the President that some form of global mandatory energy suppression was needed to stifle the growth in greenhouse gas emissions. Yet, as the president (and the U.S. Senate for that matter) have long argued, energy suppression is directly harmful to the economy, destroying growth and jobs. (Murray)

 

The U.S. Senate can barely agree to hold up-or-down votes to confirm judges, but no worries — it is about to save the planet. At least that's the conceit of Republican senators proposing to institute caps on emissions of greenhouse gases. (Rich Lowry, “Gassy Senators,” National Review, 6/21/05)

 

If the U.S. had ratified the Kyoto treaty, it would have had to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions to 1990 levels by 2012. Bipartisan opposition sank the treaty, and it wasn't even mentioned in the Democrats' 2004 platform — although its demise is always attributed in the press to the work of President Bush alone. With Kyoto itself off the table, senators have been busy trying to forge a Kyoto-lite. (Lowry)

 

REALITY

Why do Republicans automatically believe that reducing pollution will hurt the economy? What little faith they have in American ingenuity. Talk about pessimism. Maybe they are afraid W will roll-back the tax cuts to fund the environmental causes!

What would happen if the US actually instituted tougher greenhouse gas emission standards? In the short-term, automobile companies that depend on large gas-guzzling SUVs for the bulk of their profits (i.e. Ford Motor Company and General Motors) will probably continue to feel effects similar to those they are experiencing right now as a result of the rise in the price of oil. But in the long-run companies should be able to adjust production and design in order to accommodate tougher emissions standards. In other words, emmisions standards would encourage innovation.  Companies that produce fuel effecient products (like hybrids, and hydrogen cell vehicles) would be rewarded in the marketplace. This would also reduce dependency on foreign oil and Middle East despots, while reducing pollution. Sounds good, right? It gets even better. Cleaner fuels would lead to greater economic effeciency because they produce less external costs. I.e. pollution produces costs that are not typically factored into energy economics, such as health problems and property damage.

Aside from these companies, who else will suffer in the short-term? The real concern should be what is going to happen in the long run. What happens if we have an irresponsible energy policy that continues to encourage people to burn energy like it is going out of style? The problem is that some of our most relied upon energy sources (i.e. oil) are diminishing in supply.  If we continue our drunken binge now, before we have taken steps to transition our economy and industries to non-petroleum based energy supplies, what happens when the world starts to run out of oil? Or the price of a barrel of oil skyrockets? What will happen to our economy then? If higher greenhouse emissions standards cause our use of oil to at least flatten, this will only help us going forward.

Global warming is a very real and very dangerous phenomenon, no matter what the Exxon science monkeys tell you. The Bush administration should step alongside the rest of the world and recognize this as a real problem, and our gas-guzzling SUVs and coal-burning plants are speeding up the global warming process.

The Sierra Club’s website features a wealth of information about the existence and persistence of global warming. In particular they have a report on the effect that SUVs have on global warming. This report cites that “America's cars and light trucks alone produce nearly 20 percent of U.S. CO2 pollution.” As America’s cars get bigger and bigger, the amount of CO2 they produce also goes up. This means there is even more CO2 being spewed into the atmosphere, which will in turn increase the greenhouse effect and lead to even more global warming.

Even the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) admits that global warming is a very real and dangerous problem that the world must face and develop a solution in order to combat. The EPA states that going forward, the “rising global temperatures are expected to raise sea level, and change precipitation and other local climate conditions. Changing regional climate could alter forests, crop yields, and water supplies. It could also affect human health, animals, and many types of ecosystems. Deserts may expand into existing rangelands, and features of some of our National Parks may be permanently altered.”

 

The longer the right denies the realities global warming and how our loose energy policies contribute to its existence, the worse the problem will become.