Wow: Treasury says Cap and Trade to cost $100-200 Billion in new taxes
I wouldn’t exactly call this a positive development for Obama’s green agenda. Now you know why we have called it ‘Cap and Tax.’
From the Washington Examiner.
Officials at the Treasury Department think cap-and-trade legislation would cost taxpayers hundreds of billion in taxes, according to internal documents circulated within the agency and provided to The Washington Times.
These estimates were made in Treasury memos, obtained by the Competitive Enterprise Institute through a Freedom of Information Act request that sought information related to proposals originated by Treasury involving “cap-and-trade schemes” that deal with “carbon,” “carbon dioxide” or “greenhouse gases.” The memos were given to The Times by CEI.
The House narrowly passed cap-and-trade legislation earlier this year, and now the Senate stands poised to take up its version of the bill at any time, although it has been largely overshadowed by health care reform efforts. The ultimate cost of the bill to taxpayers has been the subject of fierce debate between supporters and opponents of the legislation. CEI, a free-market think tank that opposes the bill, thinks the Treasury documents prove the legislation would pose a significant burden to the economy.
A memo prepared by Judson Jaffe, who works in the Treasury’s Office of Environment and Energy, referenced President Obama’s remarks on energy policy in his State of the Union Address and said, given the president’s plan to auction emissions allowances, “a cap-and-trade program could generate federal receipts on the order of $100 to $200 billion annually.”
Well, we knew all along that the debate over the cost was not really a debate at all. It was one side who knew for a fact what the thing was, and the other side was lying through their teeth trying to control every industry in the country in the name of a hoax. The beautiful thing about it is that it is Obama’s own Treasury Department who came up with the numbers. Now all they can do is spin the issue in an attempt to polish this turd. And we all know that a turd won’t take a shine.
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Now all they can do is spin the issue in an attempt to polish this turd. And we all know that a turd won’t take a shine.
It may not shine, but you can make it blossom. Isn’t that what Karl Rove did for 6-plus years in Washington?
‘Turd Blossom’ was actually Bush’s nickname for Rove. I wonder if he realized that he might be calling himself the turd in that scenario.
In response to another comment. See in context »Yeah, that was clearly the reference…you aren’t very clever, are you?
In response to another comment. See in context »Alright–now this is a real issue! I will say, though, that I don’t understand this: “the other side was lying through their teeth trying to control every industry in the country in the name of a hoax.” The Democrats are trying “to control every industry”? How does that follow? As in, following the money (because, hey, this is supposed to be analysis based on free-market logic, right?), who really benefits from this? Democrats? I’m not seeing it (excepting through campaign contributions from the people who will really gain). The real beneficiaries are the groups that have the money to buy carbon credits and the means to trade them, no? Which is to say: investment banks. Do you not see them as the long-term winners here?
I mean, putting aside this dumb, phony partisan thing, this is a “private industry solution,” in that private banks are now being gifted a whole new industry (carbon credit trading) in which to play. I certainly like to see opposition to these kinds of non-solutions, but a “big government” solution would have been much simpler than this loopy scheme. It would have been a tax – a real one – where the money just goes to the government, end of story.
Well, the government controls industry because they set the amount of the allowable emissions. Favored industries are allowed more, disfavored less. When the government controls that, you have every lobbyist in town, representing every business group, lobbying, and more importantly, donating to, their members of Congress to raise their cap. The bottom lines of all companies that fall under the program are no longer under the control of innovation, efficiencies, and market forces, they are under the control of the government masters.
The real shame is that, in my view, man made Global Warming is a fiction. So you can imagine how much this galls me to have a sweeping, economically damaging government program put in place for literally nothing. The evidence is that the world is cooling. And regardless, there is nothing we do can change the temperature of a planet.
But even if I were a die-hard Global Warmer, there are still two issues that make any sort of onerous new scheme a bad idea. First is that two big industrial countries, China and India, aren’t on board with restrictions on emissions. If they won’t do it, then all we are doing is damaging our own economy and standard of living. Because Global Warming policy has real consequences, you have to have everybody on board, otherwise you have a grossly unlevel playing field. As a side note, for those of us who think Global Warming is a hoax, you can imagine how utterly ridiculous it seems to deliberately shoot ourselves in the foot over nothing. China and India, who must obviously feel like I do on the issue, have to be laughing themselves silly over our folly.
The second issue that should bother Warmers and Deniers alike is regardless of whatever measures we put in place to ‘control’ the problem, there is literally no way to prove that it has had any demonstrable effect on the planet at all. There are simply too many variables. So the whole government program will stay in place in perpetuity, which, I believe is exactly what the liberals want.
I would just throw in this one poll from Britain, where they have had Global Warming laws for years.
.
Other countries have tried Global Warming and Government-run health care and they are abject failures. Why we cannot learn from that and realize, more importantly, that our country has a better economy, the best health care, and the highest standard of living (among large countries) in the world precisely because we have not done the things they have done.
In response to another comment. See in context »Oh, I see. You think global warming is a hoax and that all government-run (and I presume you’re including government-insured) national health care plans are “abject failures.” Well, as one who lived for years in a couple of those “abject failures,” paying around 1/4 what I pay for health care here and getting much better service, I think you’re simply wrong. And on global warming, I don’t have anything to say, really, except that for a minute I thought there was hope for this dialog, but clearly there isn’t.
No dialog on Global Warming because the “science is settled?” Seems like a cop-out to duck the debate. Gravity is settled science. Global warming is not.
As for the health care in other countries, the folks that can afford it come here to get care if they can because we have the best care in the world. That is a fact.
Look, how about we compromise. Anyone that wants to pay taxes from their paycheck into a government run program can join. It’s just like joining Medicare or the VA. As long as it is self-sufficient and those who don’t want in don’t have to pay, would you go for that? I wouldn’t. I’ll keep my Blue Cross thank you.
In response to another comment. See in context »You do know that is essentially the proposal, right?
In response to another comment. See in context »Exactly which proposal allows folks to refuse to buy insurance if they don’t want it?
In response to another comment. See in context »Funny you mention the VA. My recently-retired parents just joined the VA. What a fantastic (and affordable) program. I would join it in a heartbeat if I were eligible.
“As for the health care in other countries, the folks that can afford it come here to get care if they can because we have the best care in the world. That is a fact.”
No, that is a fantasy. It happens occasionally, of that I have no doubt. But anyone who considers himself well-informed on this topic and still believes that is delusional. I’ve seen the talking point all over the place, though, so reading it again feels like coming home. Thanks for that. As I said, I have lived in countries with great health care systems, and trust me: to a man, everyone I ever met there considered ours a joke. I bought insurance in Germany (required for residency permits) and had a choice: one plan that covered me everywhere in the world except the United States for $60/month, or one that included coverage in the US for $250/month. And no, it’s not because our system is better. It’s because our system is a disaster, and the rest of the advanced industrialized world knows it.
As for the “debate” I’m “ducking,” I presume you would point to energy-industry-financed studies that find no link between industrial activity and global warming? OK, great, so what is there to talk about? I live in the real world where these things are, absolutely, settled science. If you don’t live here with me, what is there to talk about?
In response to another comment. See in context »I live in the real world where these things are, absolutely, settled science. If you don’t live here with me, what is there to talk about?
We could talk about taking the ignorance/arrogance quotient to new heights.
In response to another comment. See in context »You said yourself that you are opposed to anti-pollution legislation on the basis that global warming is not real, and cap-and-trade is therefore just a government power grab (albeit one based on the premise that we are impacting our weather, a fact agreed upon by plenty of experts around the world who have nothing to do with the US government…so I guess it’s a global conspiracy against US corporations?). So I ask again: If you are opposed even to the idea that there is a problem to be solved, what ideas could you possibly want to share? What solutions do you think might work to solve a problem you deny exists? Do you see my point?
Anyway, as often happens, I gave you an easy out by putting a snarky comment in there, thus allowing you to address only that, while conveniently ignoring the substance of what I wrote. Presumably, you did this because you have no response. You don’t have any experience of life outside your little bubble, you just make your pronouncements about a wider world that you generally fear. It’s sad. You should actually think about these things. It might help our country.
In response to another comment. See in context »…and by the way, you just said that everyone in the world who isn’t American wants American health care. You generalized, incorrectly, about the entire world, in a blindly xenophobic way. And you call me arrogant? Do you understand how incredibly arrogant your statement was, or does it not matter, because nobody outside of the US deserves respect?
In response to another comment. See in context »[...] course, climate bill opponents are pitching quite a fit over the documents, egged on by a report by a CBSNews.com correspondent, claiming them [...]
Mr. Dupray, this is all complete nonsense. This is entire post is based on an article predicated on a lie; CEI is either run by stupid people, dishonest people, or – as is often the case with wingnuts – stupid and dishonest people. The Treasury numbers as presented by CEI and the Washington Times (such a reputable paper!) in question have little relevance to the climate bills under debate (the House bill passed auctions 15%, not 100%, of carbon credits) or to Obama’s actual proposals (in which most of the auction revenue goes right back to consumers and into long-term investments that lower energy costs), but rather reflect the untrustworthiness of an amoral corporate mouthpiece posing as a “think tank,” a Moonie rag posing as a newspaper, and flat-earther, conspiracy-nut ideologues who buy their bullshit and reprint it online.
What I’m saying is that you should leave these discussions to adults who understand science and are not crazy. But I’m sure there are plenty of “global warming is a communist/liberal/Jew conspiracy to impose a socialist NWO” discussions at FreeRepublic and Stormfront, so don’t feel bad.
[...] course, climate bill opponents are pitching quite a fit over the documents, egged on by a report by a CBSNews.com correspondent, claiming them [...]