I had to make a rare foray outside the Beltway to find out where the presidential candidates stand on global warming and energy rationing legislation. Top advisers for the Clinton, McCain, and Obama campaigns appeared together Thursday night at a conference at a fancy resort in Santa Barbara hosted by the Wall Street Journal.
The conference, which was called ECO:nomics, brought together around three hundred business leaders to discuss how to use government mandates and subsidies to turn green into gold. (There were ten or so free marketeers as well.) Naturally, the crowd was very receptive to the promises from all three campaigns to make cap-and-trade legislation a top priority in the White House.
The speakers were Gene Sperling for Clinton, Douglas Holtz-Eakin for McCain, and Jason Grumet for Obama. They were all intelligent, articulate, well-informed, and slightly dull. They agreed that what the economy needs is a good stiff dose of energy rationing, but each claimed that his candidate was more committed to the global warming agenda than the other two. The differences seemed to me to be mostly hair splitting, although Senator McCain favors nuclear power and is the only one of the three who has been a leader on the issue in the Senate.
I asked how the commitment to raising energy prices squared with complaints from the candidates that gasoline prices were too high. The answers were unconvincing, I thought. Jason Grumet said that Obama would pursue a centrist policy on energy and global warming policies that the vast majority of Americans in the middle, that is, between the extremes of CEI on the right and Grist magazine on the left, would support.
The audience was invited to vote on which candidate would be best on global warming. The first vote was Clinton 17%, McCain 41%, and Obama 42%. However, voting irregularities were alleged, so a re-vote was ordered. The second vote tally was Clinton 17%, McCain 42%, and Obama 41%.
The Cassandras of global warming blame President Bush for running a faith-based, not science-based, presidency. But it's Mr. Bush's successor who, by embracing the fight against global warming, will have to make the greatest leap of faith.
The World Food Program is preparing to ration food aid for the world's hungriest poor. Why? Primarily because we're burning food in our automobiles. The rich-country mandates for biofuels have doubled and tripled world food prices in less than three years
Britain's climate change emissions may be 12% higher than officially stated, according to a National Audit Office investigation which has strongly criticised the government for using two different carbon accounting systems. There is "insufficient consistency and coordination" in the government's approach, the NAO said.
Governments of developed countries should play major roles in leading technology transfer and enterprises' financing in global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, a Chinese official said at an international forum here on Sunday.
Disagreements between rich and developing countries came into the open Sunday as the world's top 20 greenhouse gas emitters worked to lay the groundwork for a new deal on climate change.
According the EU's Industrial Commissioner, Guenter Verheugen, France is isolated With its demand to impose penalty duties for climate sinners. At the Brussels summit of the heads of state, nobody supported the suggestion by French president Nicolas Sarkozy, Verheugen said on Friday in an interview with Deutsche Welle. Verheugen said that Sarkozy is standing alone with his idea and didn't attempt to recruit anyone for his plan.
European leaders have pledged to lead a world crusade for a "low-carbon" economy but promised that energy-hungry industries would not be sacrificed on the altar of climate change.
Europe's chances of spearheading a global post-Kyoto climate change accord were jeopardised yesterday when Germany secured pledges that several of its heavy industries could be protected from international competition and exempted from the EU's plan to combat global warming.
Tony Blair on Saturday urged the world's heaviest polluters including the United States and China to agree to binding emissions cuts, saying failure to act on global warming would be "unforgivably irresponsible."
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