OPINION & COMMENTARY

Planet propaganda

CNN's Anderson Cooper revealed the alarmist nature of his ecological special, Planet in Peril, before the much-hailed program even aired. Momentarily pre-empted by coverage of Southern California's wildfires, Cooper used the interruption to claim that global warming is partially to blame for the disaster. "Fire, drought, deforestation," he intoned. "It's all connected." Such inappropriate commentary persisted throughout the next four hours, leaving no question that the documentary's purpose was not to investigate key environmental issues but to engage in environmental tub-thumping. Of course, even if CNN were of a mind to offer a measured view of these subjects, the overstuffed focus of their production doesn't allow them time to. Taking an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink approach, Planet in Peril pushes so many ecological buttons—chemical ingestion, endangered species poaching, pollution—that none is examined with any more depth than a music video. However, the most troubling aspect of the documentary is that it never considers the human cost of the causes it champions....

Senate Climate Bill Would Be Costly, Ineffective

A global warming bill on the move in the U.S. Senate would needlessly slow economic growth and reduce the nation's ability to pursue other programs with bigger payoffs in terms of improved human health and welfare, according to H. Sterling Burnett, a senior fellow with the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA). The bill, titled "America's Climate Security Act," would restrict greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, petroleum refiners, major manufacturers and natural gas supplied to both residential and commercial buildings under what is called a "cap and trade" mechanism. "Back in 1997 the Senate took the sensible position that the U.S. should not adopt any climate treaty that would either harm the economy or that didn't include meaningful participation by major developing countries," said Burnett. "Now the Senate is rushing to adopt a unilateral bill that violates both of those principles." Burnett noted that an analysis of cap and trade proposals in general by the Congressional Budget Office estimated costs to the economy in tens of billions and perhaps hundreds of billions of dollars annually and concluded that the poor would bear the brunt of resulting higher energy prices....

Polar Bear Pandering

Sen. Barbara Boxer of California delivered a speech in the Senate last week in which she linked global warming to the San Diego wildfires, Darfur, the imminent loss of the world's polar bears and even a poor 14-year-old boy who died from "an infection caused after swimming in Lake Havasu," because its water is warmer. Forget arson. Forget genocide. Forget nature. There is no tragedy that cannot be placed at the doorstep of global-warming skeptics. Oh, and there's no need to acknowledge that the regulations or taxes necessary to curb emissions by a substantial degree might damage economic growth. According to Boxer, laws to curb greenhouse gases -- this country would have to cut its greenhouse gas emissions in half over 12 years to meet the latest international community goals -- will do good things for the American economy and create lots of jobs. It's Nostradamus science wedded to Santa Claus economics. It is rhetoric such as Boxer's -- an odd combination of the-end-is-near hysteria and overly rosy economic scenarios -- that keep me in the agnostic-skeptic global-warming camp....

Science vs. Symbolism

Is Governor Tim Pawlenty looking to get a Nobel Peace Prize by following in the wake of Al Gore? Minnesota’s Governor Tim Pawlenty is reportedly planning a spring trip to the Arctic to dramatize the impact of climate change. He is also planning a series of forums across the State to warn about the impact of climate change on Lake Superior. Newsflash Governor Pawlenty: Lake Superior was formed by the melting of a massive glacier about 10,000 years ago, and the last glaciers retreated from Minnesota about 9000 years ago. Global warming started about 15,000 years ago, and without it Minnesota would be a vast desert covered in a mile thick layer of ice. The effect of global warming on Minnesota is pretty obvious: without it there would be no Minnesota to govern. In some ways, it makes sense for Pawlenty to visit the arctic, if he were to take away the real lesson offered there: without the global warming that has occurred over the last 15,000 years, Minnesota and much of the Northern Hemisphere would be as barren of life as the arctic is today....

New Gingrich's Contract with the Earth

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich has a new book out, "A Contract with the Earth," which, Publishers Weekly says, calls for "businessmen and conservationists to form 'compatible partnerships'" on the environment. "Compatible partnerships" between business and "conservationists" usually run along the lines of businesses forking over loads of cash to big-government environmental organizations in exchange for the perception that their company will be put slightly lower on Big Green's hit list. I concede that once in a while the motive is different -- sometimes businesses see a way to profit from new regulations, so they sincerely support Big Green's efforts to get us to pay for them. That sort of sincerity we can do without. At a conservative environmental policy meeting in 1996 a list of complaints on environmental issues were raised about then-Speaker Gingrich. The list, which I believe provides some context for Gingrich's book tour, was published in a contemporaneous National Center newsletter article under the apt title, "Conservatives Ponder What to Do When the GOP House Speaker is on the Other Side"....

Deja Vu: Feds Abandon Another Chance to Narrow NEPA

In the mid-1980s, environmental groups challenged oil and gas leasing proposals by the U.S. Department of the Interior and the Forest Service along the Overthrust Belt in Montana and Wyoming. They argued that the federal agencies had not obeyed the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) because, instead of Environmental Impact Statements (EISs), which often run hundreds of pages, the agencies wrote Environmental Assessments (EAs). After all, the agencies reasoned, there would be no physical impact from the leasing. Later, when the lessees decided where to drill, full-blown EISs would be prepared. In 1987, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit in Denver, ruling as to the Wyoming plan, held that the agencies were right: NEPA did not require them to engage in a purely hypothetical examination of possible impacts at yet to be determined drilling sites. In 1988, however, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco, addressing the Montana plan, disagreed: NEPA demanded that the agencies engage in an intensive examination of the 1.3 million acres of land to be leased even though no one knew where on the 2000-acre leases the drilling pads, which each occupy less than 5 acres, would be located. Oil and gas operators recognized the impact of the Ninth Circuit’s ruling: preparation of full-blown EISs takes years; worse yet, the length and detail of those documents present easy targets for lawsuits by environmental groups, which lead to more studies, delay, and lawsuits....

The Cost of the Biofuel "Free Lunch"

Economics teaches us that there is no such thing as a free lunch. Anyone that tells you differently is probably trying to sell you something. In this case, the “something being sold” is bio-fuels. Bio-fuels, the transformation of corn, sugar, soybeans and other crops into motor fuels, have taken on a new sense of urgency due to, in part, the global warming consensus. Global warming advocates push regulations that mandate ethanol additives in cars, as well as other policies that encourage the U.S. to consume more bio-fuels. Furthermore, these policies are sold as a win-win policy that reduces the country’s overall carbon emissions and its reliance on foreign energy supplies. Not surprisingly, the federal government’s subsidization of the bio-fuels industry has increased. The subsidies and regulations are designed to increase our efficiency, production, and use of bio-fuels. There are serious negative consequences from these policies, however. Subsidizing a favored industry is an old theory in economic development. Bio-fuel subsidies result from excessive lobbying from the bio-fuels industry just as much, if not more, than the true scientific merit of the technology. Consequently, we are missing out on the opportunity to judge whether bio-fuels are actually a viable future alternative fuel, and if so, to what extent. As such, society may be missing out on a more appropriate energy source in the future. Perhaps more importantly, the subsidization of bio-fuels is imposing a real and direct cost on people and the global economy in the here and now. When people’s demand for a product increases by more than its supply, prices rise. The growing subsidies and encouragement of bio-fuels use is increasing the demand for the source materials of bio-fuels: corn, sugar, soybeans and other crops at a faster pace than supply. Greater demand for agricultural goods is driving up food costs around the world. For instance, the price of corn is up 40% this year. The price of soybeans is up 75%. The price of wheat is up 70%. And, it is not just the prices of agricultural commodities. Higher prices for crops are increasing the prices of beef, pork, and chicken....