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"Pledged to vote for Woodrow Wilson and support the reorganization of the Democratic Party"

"Democrats in every county in Pennsylvania have been betrayed times without number and to-day trickery and deception walk hand in hand to again mislead them"

"Canidates have been found, who, for a price, are willing to represent the twin-machine traitors."

"Every alert, active Democrat will easily detect the tricksters, and on Saturday, April 13th, 1912, between the hours of 2 PM and 8 PM, will register his vote for the Purification of this Party."

Potentially Big News on Lieberman's Cap-and-Trade Proposal

Posted September 20, 2007 | 05:06 PM (EST)

Recently, one of the most irksome members of the Senate, Joe Lieberman (I-Clowntown) expressed openness to one of the boldest and most effective climate-change policies possible. Some background,

A cap-and-trade system begins by placing a cap on carbon emissions and distributing permits (permission to emit a certain amount of CO2) equal to the capped amount. The notion is that permits will be bought and sold, allowing market forces to determine where emission reductions can be made fastest and easiest. The question is how to distribute those initial permits.

When the EU carbon trading system was established, permits were given away based on emissions, meaning the biggest polluters got the most permits. The idea was that those polluters most needed the money because they had the biggest reductions to make, but in practice it was an enormous financial windfall for their shareholders and prompted very little action on their part to reduce emissions.

The alternative is to sell the permits at auction. This would, in effect, put the proceeds in government coffers rather than in the pockets of utility shareholders. The question then becomes: what should the gov't do with all that money (up to $50B a year)?

The Lieberman-Warner cap-and-trade proposal, released early this year, was widely seen as the "moderate" bill that could get some support from Senate Republicans. One of the biggest criticisms it faced is that it would auction only 20% of the permits -- 80% would be given away to polluters.

But an intriguing item in Politico indicates that Lieberman may be open to changing that:

Lieberman, following a forum sponsored by the Progressive Policy Institute Wednesday, said such a change to his legislation was possible. "We've heard [calls for a 100 percent auction] from some stakeholders and heard that from some of our members. We're thinking about it. Warner and I haven't closed our minds to that. It's on the table," he said.

This could be huge news. The L-W proposal is viewed as the middle of the road. If it moves to 100% auctioned credits, that will effectively sanctify it as the new baseline. The policy and political implications are both huge.

McCain's Emission-Reduction Plan Receives Favorable Review

by: Frank Carlson

Posted August 11, 2008 | 11:43 AM (EST)

As U.S. Senators Barack Obama and John McCain begin their long descent into tit-for-tat rhetorical games, it's easy to forget key issues the two still broadly agree on: federally funded stem-cell research; nuclear nonproliferation; comprehensive immigration reform; faith-based social services; and global warming.

Obama and McCain agree that human-induced global warming exists and even on the system America should adopt to counteract it -- cap and trade, a plan that sets a limit (cap) on the amount of greenhouse gases emitted by manufacturers and power plants, for example, and then hands out credits that polluters can trade among themselves to pull themselves within the legal limits. Heavy emitters of greenhouse gases have to buy credits from low-level emitters. Cap-and-trade plans reward all sides for reducing emissions. Low-level emitters reduce in order to pile up additional credits to sell and high-level emitters reduce in order to spend less on credits.

Where Obama and McCain disagree on the plan concerns the role of the government, specifically how the government should allocate permits to companies. And unlike the current, silly spat over tire pressure gauges, this one matters.

Obama favors a full auction of the credits, which would act like a tax on companies, collecting a great deal of money right off the bat for the government to redistribute. This cash, he says, could go to alternative energy research and projects, then the credits would go to markets.

McCain says he would dole out permits in much the same way proposed by the Climate Security Act of 2007. That act failed in June to receive enough Senate support to even bring to a vote, but the basics are the same: Give the great majority of the permits away, and let the market set the price to support investment.

Here is where conventional political lines become blurred.

If you favor a more free market approach, McCain's plan may be for you because the government would collect far less money from businesses for redistribution. But if you're spooked by special interests, political favors for lobbyists and political corruption--as McCain says he is--then perhaps you side with Obama's strategy.

So what does Richard Sandor, architect of the wildly successful cap and trade system for reducing sulfur dioxide(SO2) and now CEO of the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX), say?

He's for a partial auction of credits like the one McCain is backing.

"If you look at full auctioning of permits, what happens?" Sandor asked reporters during a recent interview at his office near the Board of Trade in downtown Chicago. "The day that they are auctioned, you have a net transfer of wealth from the private sector to the public sector at that moment. What, then, happens to climate change? Nothing has happened. You have just had a transfer of wealth.
Climate Exchange, the first voluntary but legally
binding market for trading emissions in North America.

It's better to let the private sector decide where the money should go, Sandor says, which is why he's against a carbon tax. And, he adds, there is precedent for believing so.

"The program that's worked is SO2," Sandor said. "Some amount of auctioning is, I think, OK. We will implement whatever the government does. We don't have an official opinion, but I'm guided by the SO2 program and how it accomplished its objectives so cheaply that that's the way to do it."

Sandor insisted the CCX is not a policy-making entity and that it will implement any system lawmakers put forth. Much like pilots, he said, the CCX will fly whichever planes the engineers--or rather, politicians--design.

"If you design it wrong," he said, "you may have to go 30 extra miles, you may have some accidents, or crashes, and we really speak to the efficacy of the design and leave public policy to the people who are policy makers in Washington. We're not advocates."

The CCX is currently North America's only voluntary but legally binding platform for trading carbon and other emissions. Even without a mandatory cap and trade system in the U.S., many companies have already begun to reduce their emissions in the hopes of improving their public image and perhaps reaping revenues through emissions reductions.

While Sandor explains why he's against Obama's plan for the full auction of credits, his greatest priority is getting mandatory cap and trade in place, whatever the framework. Undoubtedly, this would be a great boon to the CCX, and Sandor believes it is coming.

"Both candidates, McCain and Obama, have publicly embraced it," Sandor said. "I believe in their hearts that they're committed to reducing global warming and see it as a major threat. Is it inevitable? I think so. Could there be bumps? Yes."

Those bumps, worries Sandor, include a terrorist attack that could dislodge global warming from the political agenda in favor of dealing with more immediate problems.

"And that's the nightmare scenario that I worry about because it's easy to not worry about intergenerational problems when you have immediate security needs," he says. "And I'm not suggesting that they aren't more important. In fact, they are. But the thing that will slip will be the longer-based horizon, and I think that's a danger that we have."As U.S. Senators Barack Obama and John McCain begin their long descent into tit-for-tat rhetorical games, it's easy to forget key issues the two still broadly agree on: federally funded stem-cell rese...

COLMES:...And I want to ask you about something, Ann, that you wrote in your most recent column. You had a very funny line, actually, that it is hard to find a parking spot in New York City. There's no question about it. You've had a pretty good day if you can do that.

But then you said, It's far preferable to fight them on the streets of Baghdad than in the streets of New York, where the residents would immediately surrender. Now, some New Yorkers...

COLMES: Is that what that is? You certainly don't feel that New Yorkers are cowards?

COULTER: I don't -- I don't think -- I think I'd rather have them trying to invade Mississippi or Georgia, Alabama, you know, the states where I want Cindy Sheehan's bus tour to go.

Isn't she the one who surrendered ran away from a PIE that someone hurled at her on a stage?

I encourage all responsible posters on this board to go to the NBC website and drop them a note regarding Coulter's scheduled appearance on Today. I am letting them know that I do not appreciate their promotion of an old, hateful voice. We hae turned the page. Let the media know we are tired of division and name calling. The hateful right has a plethora of media outlets. Coulter can spread her trash talk on them.

I was watching MSNBC last night, and noted that Olberman came up with an excellent question. Coulter has been trying to get an interview in NBC to promote her book (which, by the way, talks about NBC like a dog) and has been ticked off because he was bumped a day back. Olberman's question was if she hates NBC so much and thinks everything out of their mouths is lies, why does she want to be on that network in the first place...Hmmmmm

Then she finally got the interview. As expected, she made a complete fool of herself, most of the time whining about how terrible the network she was appearing on actually was -- all the while trying to sell her latest book. It's amazing what one will do to sell a book. I guess she didn't get a very good response in terms of book sales from the Fixed news viewers.

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/shared-blogs/ajc/politicalinsider/entries/2009/01/07/ann_coulter_on_nbcs_today_show.html

So, just for fun I decided to check out some of her other interviews. Ya gotta love this one:

Thanks, Starcat. Poor souls. That's all they know how to do. Swiftboat others. I suppose everyone has to be good at something. I don't even remotely expect it to stop, and yes, sure looks like I did hit a nerve, otherwise they wouldn't bother to keep trying to discredit me. The way I figure it, the more *Swiftboating* that goes on, the closer I came to exposing the truth, so in a way, their *feedback* is very helpful.

The only reason I posted the second post (which I addressed to Liberals) was that I fully realized how bizarre the whole concept sounded. Who in their right mind could believe something like that could happen here in America, that the lunatic fringe was comprised of so many people? I guess that's what makes it so darn frightening.

You have a nice day now. As for me, I'm going to go check the stock prices for Kool-Aid. Might be time to invest.

She reminds me of a homely stick-thin 5-year-old girl with stringy blonde hair trying to get anyone's attention by showing her panties, singing off key, etc. She just says outrageous things for media attention. She has a small group of fans, but then so does charlie manson.

Okay, I almost laughed myself to death watching these two morons go at it last night. My favorite part of the interview would have to be:

In a stinging blow to the Bush administration, the Supreme Court has ruled prisoners in Guantanamo Bay can challenge their detention in civilian federal courts. The ruling marked the third time in four years the Supreme Court has ruled against the Bush administration concerning the rights of Guantanamo prisoners.

I think the kid just wants Ann Coulter to be his date to the prom.

David Roberts

Potentially Big News on Lieberman's Cap-and-Trade Proposal