National Security Not a Good Argument for Global Warming Legislation

The Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill has engendered tremendous controversy. Concerns abound about the legislation's adverse economic consequences as well as skepticism of its affects on world climate trends. Faced with mounting opposition, the bill's supporters are increasingly making the case that creating a new law is a national security imperative. They are wrong. Indeed, passing the bill would create far more severe, dangerous, and imminent global crises. The problem is that the catastrophic predictions--such as massive sea-level increases and declining food production that would lead to global unrest--are poorly supported by the evidence. To make the national security arguments, global warming legislation advocates must embrace the most alarmist scenarios. Nonetheless, connecting the dots between human-caused global warming and global conflict has become a popular theme as proponents prepare to take up the bill in the Senate. Arguing that the law will make the world safer is deeply flawed. First, there are significant doubts that the cap-and-trade system described in the 1,500-plus-page bill will even have a significant and positive impact on global climate trends. According to climatologist Chip Knappenberger, Waxman-Markey would moderate temperatures by only hundredths of a degree after being in effect for the next 40 years and no more than two-tenths of a degree at the end of the century.[2] EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson concurred, recently saying, "U.S. action alone will not impact world CO2 levels."[3]...Heritage