The Breath Tax

by Joseph C. Phillips

The rationale for the “Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009,” otherwise known as Cap and Trade, is that environmental catastrophe awaits us if we do not control the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) flowing into the atmosphere. This hysteria has been propelled by alarmists using computer models to predict (not to prove) that what-used-to-be-called-Global-Warming-before-it-became-clear-that-the-earth-is-cooling-so-it-is-now-called-Climate Change is caused by man made emissions of carbon dioxide.

The scam–ur uhm–I mean the idea works like this: government will set a limit on the amount of CO2 companies may produce. Companies will then be forced to purchase emissions permits for every ton of CO2 produced. Companies that exceed their limits will be able to purchase or trade for additional permits with companies that emit less than their allotted cap. Waxman-Markey seeks an “80 percent reduction of carbon dioxide emissions by 2050”?  And a “100 percent auction to ensure every ton of carbon is paid for.”

While supporters of Cap and Trade attempt to direct our attention to large-scale carbon emitters in the coal and oil industries make no mistake; the repercussions from this tax will be felt in every American household.

The Congressional Budget Office noted that cutting carbon emissions just 15% would result in customers facing “persistently higher prices for products such as electricity and gasoline. Those price increases would be regressive in that poorer households would bear a larger burden relative to their income than wealthier households would.” This conclusion is echoed by the Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis, which further determined that Waxman-Markey will reduce GDP by $9.6 trillion, increase the federal debt by 26%, kill 1.1 million jobs, increase peak year unemployment to 2.5 million workers and raise the energy bill paid by a typical family by about $1,500 annually.

Of course what is a little economic hardship if it means saving the sky from falling?

Every day new scientific discoveries emerge calling into question the computer models on which this carbon hysteria is based.

Ferenc Miskolczi, an atmospheric physicist with 30 years of experience and a former researcher with NASA’s Langley Research Center realized the models rely on mathematical equations derived more than 80 years ago. These differential equations ignore proper boundary conditions and assume an atmosphere that is infinitely thick. Miskolczi derived a new solution using the proper boundary conditions (the atmosphere is 65 miles thick) and viola no more global warming.

There is also a new study conducted by the university of Wisconsin and the US National oceanic and atmospheric administration, which concludes that 70% of the sharp temperature rise in the North Atlantic over the last 30 years is due to dust blowing out to sea from the deserts of North Africa – A small detail the computer models failed to account for.

What is more remarkable is that, even assuming some human component, if Waxman-Markey meets all its goals of reducing carbon emissions, the EPA calculates that the impact on world temperature would be no more than two-tenths of a degree Celsius at the end of the century. Found here

That is a lot of pain for very little gain.

But Global warming is not about science it is about politics and this administrations choice to ignore facts is about a political means to social control. The President’s own lawyers admit as much.

Three weeks ago Senator John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) produced a white house memo to the EPA that, in his words, repeatedly suggests “a lack of scientific support for this proposed finding” [that greenhouse gases are a danger to public health]. Barrasso then quoted directly from the document, “making the decision to regulate carbon dioxide under the Clean Air Act for the first time is likely to have serious economic consequences for regulated entities throughout the US economy, including small businesses and small communities.” If that’s not change you can believe in I don’t know what is.

There is an old joke that if the government could it would tax the very air that we breathe. As social commentary Waxman-Markey’s assumption that we can save the planet by taxing CO2 – a substance every human being emits with every breath taken–is absurd indeed. It’s also an old joke that is not very funny.


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Posted Jun 1st 2009 at 11:20 am in News, Politics | 62 Comments