Alarmists Get Their Wish

The bad economy is helping global warming alarmists accomplish their goal of reduced greenhouse gas emissions, says USA Today:

From the United States to Europe to China, the global economic crisis has forced offices to close and factories to cut back. That means less use of fossil fuels such as coal to make energy. Fossil-fuel burning, which creates carbon dioxide, is the primary human contributor to global warming.

A recession-driven drop in emissions “is good for the environment,” says Emilie Mazzacurati of Point Carbon, an energy research company. “In the long term, that’s not how we want to reduce emissions.”

Whether the warmers want to acknowledge it or not, a recessionary economy is how they want to reduce emissions. Whether you limit inexpensive, efficient energy usage or you tax it, you raise costs and therefore inhibit consumption and growth.

Bonus journalistic boner observation #1 from the USA Today article: Reporter Traci Watson writes, “As carbon dioxide builds in the atmosphere, it traps heat and warms the Earth. The result: melting glaciers, rising seas and fiercer droughts.” Why hasn’t that been the case in this decade, Traci?

Bonus journalistic boner observation #2 from the USA Today article: Traci sez, “European nations face a 2012 deadline to cut their emissions under the Kyoto Protocol, a global-warming treaty written in 1997 and renounced by President George W. Bush in 2001.” Why jump to 2001, Trace? What about the Clinton administration (never submitted the protocol to the Senate for ratification) and the U.S. Senate (who voted unanimously that they would not support ratification)?