Climate Tax Quackery

If cap and trade, read tax, passes, utility costs are going to go up bigtime, especially in the Midwest. We will pay and pay again for climate change quackery. WSJ:

"What you saw when [the Climate Action Partnership] was draping itself in the name of saving mankind, what they were really doing was trying to create the largest earmark in modern history," says Tennessee Republican Sen. Bob Corker of the "allocation" system.

Mr. Corker has been having fun exposing the self-dealing in recent climate bills. Companies aside, he blew an early whistle on Congress's ambitions to use an auction system to enrich itself. During last year's debate on Sen. Barbara Boxer's (D., Calif.) climate bill, he offered an amendment to require rebates of all auction funds to American families. It helped kill the bill, as did a growing awareness among Midwest and Southern Democrats that the legislation would disproportionately hammer their industries and constituents.

Mr. Obama is promising to return auction money to Americans, via a tax cut he proposed on the campaign trail. Mr. Corker calls this a "sleight of hand," since people were counting on a tax cut in any event. Nobody told them they'd have to fund it with higher energy costs. It's also a wealth transfer -- electricity users in coal-heavy Ohio, for instance, will be funding tax cuts for green Californians. Not that congressional spenders have any intention of using this money for tax cuts in the first place.

Ditto for Illinois which will pay through the nose. For that you can thank our Senator Dick Durbin and our President Barack Obama. The snake-oil salesmen of the 21st century.

P.S. The Heartland Institute Climate Conference of skeptics starts next week--attendance is double last year.