Now, we truly are alone

Even without US carbon credits to subsidize their failed economy [wasn't it the same US negotiators that insisted on the credits that later we complained about?], Russia now also joins the Kyoto accord. That leaves Bush and his right-wing nutcases alone with a few other developing countries like India and China. It must feel great to know that now not only will we continue to be blamed for global climate change, but our products will over time probably become less appealing to our major export markets--those countries that signed the agreement.

This sort of isolation is a dangerous trend. Economically, energy using US manufactured goods may very well not arrive on foreign markets. Philosophically, this trend to compare our creative potential with that of China and India leads us down a slippery slope because our ingenuity is superior to most other countries and has always kept us and our products in high esteem through the world. Deciding to remain out of this is not like deciding to keep Fahrenheit and miles as our measurement units because it is not merely a matter of convenience (Fahrenheit is way easier to comprehend in a day-to-day weather forecast since 100 is hot and 0 is cold; miles are more convenient if you have longer distances to cover), no this can possibly stifle the creativity necessary to develop new products that are required in the world that we live in today.

To see how this works, consider that the administration adamently insisted during the 2000 campaign that any solution to global warming would require an increase in energy prices. True, in an open market, the only way to persuade consumption trends is to punish those whose behavior is not wanted and reward those whose behavior is (like a cigarette tax). Since the economy is doing so well, the argument was, we should not do anything that might hurt it like raising energy prices. This argument already stands on somewhat shakey grounds, since it's quite unlikely that one would undertake an energy price increase when times are bad, begging the question of when, if ever, would we be able to do anything at all about energy consumption? Barring that libertarian-based inconsistency, we now have the same administration arguing that, though oil prices have doubled over the past 12 months--due partly to flawed US foreign policy in Venezuela, Iraq, and to some degree Georgia--the economy is doing splendidly! This is not entirely true either, but it's OK to say it's not as bad is it could be. Yet. (Since the effects of rapidly rising prices are usually not felt until 6-12 months after the fact, we shall see how well our economy is really doing with $50.- bbl.) Either way, this brings us to the point. A slow, predictable increase in the price of oil sounds like the best way to go about this. It's been proposed that oil prices increase $1 per bbl per year for at least 10 yrs, maybe as much as 20. The increased revenue can fund a lower income bracket tax relief to mitigate some of the regressive nature of a gas pricce increase and also partially fund research into viable energy efficient alternatives. A slow increase will allow both the consumer as well as the industry to react to the changes that they know they will need to make in the future. In my opinion, this is a solution that provides a win-win alternative for both the consumer and our manufacturing industry, and would not be too difficult to implement. Granted, other activities also emit CO2, and they would need to be dealt with differently (coal burning power plants for instance), but even here we can provide for maximum creative flexibility with minimal economic impact. All we need is the vision to do so. Hopefully we will have that epiphany someday soon.