The Cap And Trade Market Is The New Wallstreet

The word on the street is that the Carbon Pollution (still only a theory and disproved more and more everyday by observed non-anomilic science) “Cap and Trade” is poised to make certain folks into quick billionaires. GE is one of those companies. There are many others. Here is how this will work.

For some time now a number of companies organized as a group called “USCAP” have teamed up to recommend how cap and trade works. The gist is, based on recommended levels for carbon pollution, companies in the US would be awarded credits. If you are beating the cap then you get credits and if you are exceeding the cap then you need to go out and buy credits due to your credit deficit. Over the course of the next 50 years those credits would be progressively reduced lower carbon pollution numbers (wait for it.) Here is the problem.

1. Carbon pollution is not science nor are the standards. They are manufactured "Caps" (I will explain how these Caps came to be in the next point.)
   
2. The USCAP group is recommending standards that stack the deck in their favor. If the government adopts their recommendation, then since those companies have a head start on adhering to the standard they would be awarded an inequitable number of credits.

As a result many other companies would have to go to them to buy credits. And companies like GE are then awarded in the billions of dollars. Years later after politicians are willing to agree with the current science debunking AGW and proving we are on a new cooling trend, rather than returning all of our money they will only claim we've now solved AGW at a globally and ecologically infeasible speed and now we can stop doing Cap and Trade and energy taxes... wait a minute, WHO AM I KIDDING?

If the government can crank up personal energy taxes, why would they EVER STOP? And if companies can OWN the Cap and Trade system before it even gets going, how hard will they lobby Congress to keep that cashcow alive long after Anthropogenic Global Warming pseudo-science is debunked publicly?

Well, the answer is, they won't stop. This is a new industry they are creating. And we are not talking about companies trading billions based on carbon credit trading alone. Here is where you are I come in.

Carbon Cap and Trade laws would very quickly affect the average American household at the rate of over $3,000 per year. This is already all over the news based on the plan being proposed. If you think you have a tight budget now, imagine finding another $3,000 per year to handle trickle down Cap and Trade economics. If you are single with a roommate renting a home, well then it will only be $1,500+ for you, but I am sure you are now doing the math. As energy costs go up, also due specifically to energy taxes, it is being estimated that people will retire older electronic devices and from who will they purchase those new devices? Two letters: G.E.

This also affects companies and communities. G.E. is not only a major participant in crafting the Cap and Trade recommendations to the US Government but it is the largest manufacturer of the purported consumer AND company AND community level “solutions”. Where will people buy windmills from? New generator? Updated "low polution" arcraft engines? G.E. And this is only one company in the mix.

Let's talk about oil. Since the beginning of AGW theories ExxonMobil has been quit public about disputing the science behind the claims. And while they have not publicly changed their position, they are surprisingly getting involved in USCAP to help shape those policies before they become laws. So they aren't debating the fact that they don't believe in AGW anymore today than they did yesterday. They are only reading the writing on the wall and grabbing a seat at the big table so they can be one of the key families in the new enviro-mafia.

So (like usual) let’s do the math:

Cap and Trade doesn’t solve any problems, it creates a new trade market.

Moreover it creates or IMPLEMENTS a scheduled problem for average Americans to which that same group “creating” the problem will then be the very group providing the solution. The last time I heard a storyline like this I think I was watching the movie “The Godfather.” I am just starting to really understand those funny new “Tea Parties” in the news these days. You know? Those blips in the news where the media tells you that a few people got together to complain about taxes? Well, historically, people got pretty pissed because England wanted to get more money out of the colonies, so while England controlled the tea being exported to the colonies, they saw an opportunity in controlling the taxes associated with them. To be fair, Cap and Trade is just a new Tea Tax. But in this case it isn't tea they are taxing, it is carbon - the most prevelant element in the known universe. Said another way, if America could tax you for breathing, comparitively they couldn't raise as much funding as the AGW carbon "polution" taxation market will be able to do.

So, am I nuts? Where do I get the guts to call Cap and Trade a planned ploy to create a problem and then pimp the only solution? Well, just follow the story for yourself…

OK, be a good American and read these two articles:

If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em: Industry owns Cap and Trade rather than really being about Green Legislation

…and…

Cap and Trade Slumlords: If going green is so altruistic, how did Al Gore go from a net worth of $2 million at the end of his vice presidency to over $100 million in only eight years due to the new green market?

...and if you prefer to watch video instead then check out...

Al Gore Buys Offsets (Good Conservationist?)

The winner in the Anthropogenic Global Warming debate is the conservationist lifestyle (but I am a little more worried about the losers than the winners.)

A poll by the New York Times about fuel taxes implies that Americans are somewhat welcoming to the idea of higher fuel taxes if (and a mostly BIG "if") those dollars go directly to investment in sustainable reasonable fuel alternatives. In other words, the population is willing to consume less and pay more in hopes that they will dodge the doom of a global meltdown. This reminds me of press that seemed to come out at about the time the IPCC and another gentleman won the Nobel prize for their AGW movie and research.

In fact, recall when the IPCC co-won the Nobel prize and the UN that supported it started to more vocally promote carbon taxes as the key solutions, other long time conservationists starting to jump ship from the "global warming" momentum. To date they treat anthropogenic global warming (AGW) like the noisy slightly slow cousin who keeps stirring up the right interest, just not quite in the right direction. I am going to agree with that. I love the idea of promoting conservation through responsible moderation. I however hate it that AGW gets to run wild in the streets dumping its pseudo-science everywhere, fearing-mongering the population into redistribution of wealth through taxation. It's a fundraiser powered by fear that doesn't result in fixing anything.

Well, the first benefactor of these get-financial-redistribution-quick schemes is none other than the individual who was the co-winner of that Nobel Prize, Al Gore.

Some of you might recall that soon after the movie "An Inconvenient Truth" came out it was revealed that Al Gore's Tennesee home consumes 20 times the power as compared to the average American home. His response... I (Al Gore) invest in carbon offsets.

Now regardless of what you are I think about carbon offsets, maybe that is still admirable. At best, carbon offsets are ensuring that while you personally waste, you are paying to ensure that someone else doesn't (or rather bears the burden of maximizing their conservation so you don't have to.) At worst, ideologically, carbon taxes and cap-and-trade and buying offsets equals giving people the right to buy an increase in pollution. ie. "I am beating up the planet, but at the same time I am making donations into the DON'T BEAT UP THE PLANET fund, so we're good, right?"

I wish this story ended there! Recently, it has come to my attention that Al Gore actually buys his offsets from General Investment Management. The problem: Al Gore co-founded General Investment Management (GIM)!

So, do the math. His movie, his prize, his company, and if the laws and taxes are all successful, then his profits!? So his offsets are really an investment in an offset resource company that will make him more money?

For one, you have to admit that this is questionable at best. At worst, he is fear-mongering for cash! And so all of the "settled science" claims, his unwillingness to debate with reputable scientists who would like to discuss the science behind AGW just simply buy time as our government is swindled into forcing American companies to buy his GIM company services because we got into bed with the UN to redistribute wealth across the planet.

The most horrible part of all of that: none of it stops or slows down the "big problem" that is carbon emitions (remembering that just about everything on this planet is carbon-based ... they are setting up a tax plan for the most abundant element in the known universe). Why are we pursuing it? Good question.

But regardless, people intuitively know the right answer to this wrong question. The answer is personal responsibility to own a more conservationist lifestyle. There is no good reason to waste resources or over consume (step one should be changing the advertising monster that roams the planet psychologically demanding that we replace our perfectly good funiture and kitchen appliances with more stylish ones, just because) and so while people are still mostly confused about the science and reality of AGW, they are really hoping for answers that lead to Christian values like "intentional awareness of moderation." The funny thing about that NYTimes poll on rising fuel costs: less than half of the people who said they would be fine with rising fuel costs if it would help said they would continue to be OK with it if the revenue didn't reall help better the situation.

I am hopeful that the world pays attention and learns moderation and reasonable conservative living. I am however afraid that it might be at the expense of allowing a myth to continue and worse yet promote a secondary agenda at the expense of the planet. If you think that the myth is mostly harmless, read this review that anticipates something more like global bankruptcy if we follow through with this and other UN-based redistribution of wealth initiatives.

A few last videos to review:

The Global Warming Debate is OVER!

For each year since 1998 the global mean temperature has gotten colder and since 2002 the Arctic ice shelf measurements show a growth of ice. There has been stints of warming in our more recent history, but no more than has been shortly measurable in other periods of history.

Beyond what I've said here, the reality is that some folks representing a hardline view of AGW would have us believe the debate is over (before it has event started.) The fact is that there are plenty of educated people debating AGW and the issue is far from over:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthcomment/charlesclover/3341068/Global-warming-may-

http://epw.senate.gov/hearing_statements.cfm?id=266543

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24700827-7583,00.html

As thinking American individuals we need to not be lemmings and do the responsible thing, which is to say rightly ignor Al Gore's McCarthy-like statements about the debate being over and flat out disregard the emotional if not completely anti-constitutional / bill of rights violating statement by President Barack Obama to declare that he will bring an end to Global Warming "denial" (meaning he will, what... suspend freedom of speech with regard to this issue?)

As reasonable people, we need to send emails and postal mail to our Senators and tell them they had better start reviewing reasonable and intelligent scientific positions that examine the questionable claims of AGW science. We need to tell them without a doubt that we are not interested in becoming indebted to the United Nation's Carbon Taxes or wealth redistributive policies, goals and objectives.

[NOTE: There is plenty of emotional statements on either side of this issue. I think it is time for people to learn more on AGW, for and against, and then decide for themselves. It makes no sense to me that the New York Times along with other papers are beginning to publish information about the Fed adding Carbon Taxes to every day products and services when Congress hasn't been to date willing to review and hear an actual debate on such an intense topic. It feels like AGW is getting the same knee-jerk response as the Economic Bailout. Because it has been decided that it is a huge issue, the result is to decide that the government needs to be made responsible to solve it and so without much review or speculation, quick expensive decisions are made that pretend to include lots of oversight, but are defined within a Bill that the majority of Congress hasn't even taken the time to read! AGW as well as the economy aren't fast moving machines. We have time for weeks of detailed publically visible debates over these issues. There is only one reason the pressure to pass these measures is so hot!... because they don't want people to truly review those Bills.

There is another solution. Just because Congress decides to spend the money, doesn't mean that it has to get spent, or that taxes have to get enacted. Our state governments could put the breaks on and take responsability to review those bills and their details before signing up to take part in these fiascos. I think it is time for the Government of the State to stand up again.

There is a reason that Congress is still at or below a 30% approval rating. How long would you be allowed to run your employers company with an approval rating that low?]

Global Warming: Educate Yourself

(Video Below)

Ok, so enough discussion from me on the topic. If you have watched “An Inconvenient Truth” or read (parts of) the IPCC Report on Anthropogenic Global Warming (i.e. AGW is Global Warming as caused by human factors) you should be quite familiar with the issues. Likewise you will note the simple and easy break between being interested in responsible sustainable environmentally conscious living and buying into AGW science. Having said that, most of us will continue to depend on scientists for a trusted explanation of facts and opinions and as a result be left to make what I like to call a “second hand” decision (since some of us either won’t understand the issue in its complexities or won’t bother to research it first hand.)

Recently a co-worker told me that he feels I am getting all conspiracy-theory on the topic of AGW. The trouble is that since the 1960s AGW nearly in the forms as it exists today has been pimped by some fringe scientist and viewed as an extreme and unaccepted theory by the scientific community. It wasn’t until “public consensus” got behind it that certain non-scientist public figures declared AGW “settled science.” Oddly enough the thousands of reports generated by 2000+ “scientists” (again the governments of the world appointed individuals to the IPCC team and some of those individuals were not scientists but activist) that went into the IPCC report on AGW were never asked to sign off on agreeing with the conclusions. Their names are bibliographic references but that doesn’t mean these folks a buying into the conclusion of the report (for which only 51 people literally put their signatures to the document as approval of its conclusions—not 2000+ scientists.)

The crazy thing is that I now hear people call AGW science skeptics “flat-earth” people, meaning that people denied the roundness of the earth once upon a time and look how crazy wrong they were. The crazy bit is that a scientist promoted round-earth theories and it was the flat-earth people who called their believes “settled science” (not literally, they actually called round-earth thinkers heritics.) The flat-earth people squelched any debate, study or examination of round-earth theories and socially shunned round-earth scientists who wanted to study the issues more. It sure seems to me that when you look at AGW, their approach is closer to flat-earth than the approach of the scientists who are not convinced and who want to study it some more.

To show that AGW skepticism is healthy and relevant and not a fringe-group of “global warming deniers” who need their perspectives done away with (as proclaimed by president-elect Barak Obama) take a look at the following video. John Stossel has won awards for exposing scams perpetrated on people. He is a major co-anchor for the respected news show “20/20” and he decided to expose the socially manipulative scam that surrounds the concept of “AGW settled science.” It’s not too long and it ran on ABC, a major U.S. TV network. Here it is:



Now that you have watched the video, you can see how some of the most foundational science to do with AGW is questionable at best (what is great is that the presentation doesn’t require a degree to follow. Good job John Stossel.) And following in like mind, this month a report will hit congress from a sub-committee that has 650 signatures formally bringing into question the science behind AGW and it’s proposed conclusions. It ends up the consensus is turning, which is why proponents of AGW are getting aggressively verbal about downplaying new studies that disprove AGW conclusions or badmouthing and socially manipulating the public through stronger language about “settled science.” But the fact remains that this won’t be the first time America (or other countries) brought into question other shenanigans coming out of the U.N., and I doubt it will be the last.

In the end, if you care about the environment, and the most we will see come from AGW science is a new AGW-backed carbon tax, then we are left with the same goals we ever had: personal environmental responsibility.

All of that being said, I am not read to throw it all away. I just want a real debate on the science, which hasn’t happened to date. So far, we have a report that 51 people at the UN consider settled and a non-scientist ex-vice president (who nearly didn’t get a passing grade in science at the college level) running around the planet playing spokesmodel for the new AGW religion. It is time to get serious. According to the AGW we should be in crisis mode. The opponents agree. We only have a few thousand years to figure out if this is yet (or even) a crisis.

Human Global Warming: Bringing Hole-ness

If you've read my blog for a while, you know that I am interested in serious measures that people can take to bring healing to our environment and encourage personal responsibility. I also believe in researching the research that is made available and being comfortable and clear with dealing in the hard questions. I have hard questions as do others and we need to patiently pursue wholeness of understanding.

I preface with that because I have done as much reading on human causes of global warming as I have done on the counter science and I am not yet convinced of the science for human causes for global warming (though i am not dissuaded from pursuing and encouraging personal responsibility.)

Recently MIT revealed a new study that defied an atmospheric menthane environmental trend that was necessary for the theories/science shared in "An Inconvenient Truth" and in the summary to the UN Report. You can read about the MIT atmospheric methane issue here. The very basic idea here is that the global methane atmospheric saturation level should be consistant and any anomoloes should be the result of human causes. But the methane saturation in the northern hemisphere in 2007 defied that science, which basically means... we don't know why that is going on.

Unfortunately, Al Gore was asked about this and he blew it off as a "little report" saying that stuff like this crops up from time to time and we need to stick to what he has called the "settled science" meaning, whether the science is right or not, it is the accepted science and apparently the "little report(s)" can be blown off without sciencific examination. Heaven forbid this become true. I have written previously about my ascertion that Al gore doesn't really understand the science he is pimping, which may be the real reason he is so quick to blow of questions.

The sad thing is that I don't think Al Gore understands what this discovery does to Human Causes of Global Warming. For the next year additional studies are being pursued to attempt to pinpoint the causes of atmospheric methane saturation, but in the mean time, this is a fairly large chink in AGW science. We shouldn't fear that. We should examine it. We shouldn't blow it off. We should look at it.

My logic goes like this. What if the earth is warming up to the degree that it hurts us or the planet? What if it isn't human causes? What if it is just earth cycles and we are about to be phased out like what the iceage supposidely did to the dinosaurs? Could we still attempt to do something about it? Is "settling the science" and focusing on "carbon taxes" really the scientific thing to do? In a global warming scale of mean temperature where "smart" is 44 degrees and "stupid" is 48, Al Gore just scored an idiot's 100. I think it would be better if he just outed himself as the spokesmodel for Anthropomorphic Global Warming, rather than pretending to be a scientist.

Apple Environmentally Friendly?

I am a mac... no wait, I am a PC... hold on,... I am a mac, on a PC, with Vista inside the mac! Yes. I am an OS-X-Vista mac-tel.

More importantly, while I am friendly to mac, is Apple friendly with the environment? Well, according to the EPA, on 23 mandatory and other optional criteria, Apple Computers is in the top 5 companies for EPA environmental friendliness. Cool huh? I think this can be explained by the fact that they have been working with Al Gore to tighten up that score. Way to go Steve and Al! You did it!

Hold on. I believe in equal time. A while back I wrote a blog entry about "green washing" which basically means performing a few tricks to qualify as green, but once under the microscope maybe it ends up only being a green hue as opposed to green through-and-through. Is Apple one of these companies? Well, Al Gore didn't just work with Apple to advize them, he became a board member. And what does that mean? Well, I have no idea, but I am guessing that their might be a small connection between Apple - Al Gore - EPA. At the minimum, Al likely showed them how to qualify as "EPA Green." Is that a bad thing? I don't think so. I encourage it. What do other "green" groups think of it? Well... a well known group called "Green Peace" also makes a list of who is naughty and who is nice, when it comes to being Green. And to be fair they measure everything from recycling to work conditions for employees in factories around the world associated with the computer creation process. On their list, compairing a large list of companies, Apple is DEAD LAST! What? That's right. The EPA says "silver star" Apple... you are green! While at the same time Green Peace says, "Rotten Apple!"

Personally, I find that completely confusing. How does EPA say they are near the top of green with Green Peace claim that they are the absolute worst (not poor or sadly in the middle... the worst!)? I don't know, but I will venture a small guess in the style of the boardgame clue... Al Gore, with an Apple, greenwashing in the bathroom!? On a more serious note, it would be nice to hear more from Apple about their Green Peace score and how or if they intended to deal with some of their recycling and 3rd world production issues.

As a side note: It wasn't too long ago, in the world of the web, that one of the largest opponents of Adobe Flash (then, Macromedia Flash) technology was explaining to the world about how non-user-friendly and clumsy Flash technology was. As a result, and a short while later, Adobe hired that same critique to sit with the designers of Flash and architect a more acceptable future. A version or so later, the world fell in love with Flash and the still-independant opponent of Flash became not a proponent, but rather a friend to the company. In a similar thread, inviting Al Gore onto the bench at Apple is like hiring the hottest baseball player to come play ball for you. Does it ensure that you are a better team? Not necessarily. But one thing is true, they did suddenly score very high on the EPA ranking system. A Silver medal is nothing to bawlk at. The fact is that under Al Gore, Apple created a friendly competition for competativeness to get high scores, but surprisingly Dell and HP received the "Gold" not silver like Al Gore's Apple. Well, that doesn't mean Apple is the worst, but it does reduce all of the buzz to, well, buzz at best. I say that because Dell and HP together had over 200 pieces of hardware under EPA EPEAT review and are both in the top 20 PC manufacturers, as compaired to Apple's 21 pieces of equipment under review. Needless to say, it seems that if you respect Green Peace and the EPA, the real winners are Fuzitsu and HP... if going green is your priority.