amazing_live_seamonkeys: When did "Climate Change" become this:

Both sides of the issue have gone batshiat nuts.

Because being stressed out after days of tense negotiations over an international problem is the equivalent of being a backwater religious cultist. Right.

Il Douchey: OK, consider us out of the way.

Except we're not. We basically defanged this agreement and by virtue of our own version to be held in Hawaii, we are going to continue to oppose what the majority of the industrialized nations want- definite targets. What we're doing is actually worse than getting out of the way. We are watering down the agreement and then accepting it- if the US and any that cared to join us did actually get out of the way we would have seen some actual goals set.

Now try to pull off this mass wealth redistribution ponzi scheme without BigDaddy USA to fleece.

this "cap and trade" and "carbon credits" crap reeks of an international game of three card Monty, with America as the designated mark.

Cap and trade is a market based solution to the problem. Just because you do not understand it, that doesn't make it inherently socialist or a "hustle".

/Establishing that it's getting warmer is the beginning of the argument, not the end of it.

You have stated before that you would not accept any solution from the UN and that you do not trust governments. The mere mention of an international, intergovernmental agreement is "the end of it" for you. Please don't present your position as in any way reasonable when you reject all realistic solutions outright and denigrate them as socialist hustles.

Il Douchey: Here we go again...Market based solutions involve voluntary participants interacting for mutual benefit

And that is what an international cap and trade program would be.
they do not judge players based on their ability to pay

Yes, market based solutions certainly can.

they do not coerce participation

Yes, they certainly can.

If "going green" is truly a golden capitalist opportunity, it won't require an entire industry of cheerleaders to whip up fear and guilt to get people into it.

It doesn't. It merely requires short vs. long term risk management assessments.

I have not rejected any reasonable solutions because I have not seen any reasonable solutions.

That is because you reject any UN involvement and do not believe governments are inherently capable of producing a solution despite evidence to the contrary (CFCs, sulfur dioxide).

Spanky_McFarksalot: Dude, do you have a pager or something that alerts you to climate change threads?

I have TF. That means I can see which links are going to post to Fark and which will not. There isn't much going on in any of the other threads I posted in recently (AFI movie selections, 2nd Amendment analysis, best music albums of the year, etc.).

Il Douchey: So for this scheme to work, some "central authority" has to issue excess credits to some (poor) countries

No, it's not that oversimplified and unworkable. Non-Annex I countries can only sell credits if they set up a regulated CDM program. They try to get maximum value out of the credit they can sell while the Annex I countries, who fund the CDM programs in exchange for credits, try to get them as cheaply as possible. This dynamic ensures that developed countries will find the most cost effective way to fund CDMs spurring technological innovation, while non-Annex I countries are encouraged to shift their development towards reduced emissions infrastructure while not having to set definite limits.

Despite all the rhetoric, it boils down to just another wealth redistribution scheme.

It's not a wealth redistribution scheme because the emissions are a product. What you're saying is that a yard sale is a wealth redistribution scheme. If your idea of wealth redistribution is someone voluntarily buying something from someone poorer, then the your definition ceases to make sense in any rational context.

Whoever allocates the initial credits determines who gets a windfall, who gets screwed and how much.

Absolutely not true- Non-Annex I countries don't start off with any credits, only the developed nations do. It is up to developing nations to enact programs that substantially reduce their emissions in order to be able to sell any credits. It's a win-win. Developing countries continue to develop while reducing emissions even though they have no technical obligation to, while developed countries are encouraged to innovate technology and can buy extra credits if they cannot meet their own targets in time.

It's not just saying the US has to dump money into a country like Haiti that does nothing to reduce emissions. In order to have any credits to sell, Haiti would have to create CDMs.

Il Douchey: So, to flesh out your analogy; my poor neighbor is selling the "product" of excess ability to pollute (who gave him this "product"?). I, on the other hand want to pollute more than my limit (who imposed this limit?)

No. Your neighbor can't sell you anything initially. You can essentially subsidize his reduction of pollution until the net reduction of pollution means that combined you are both polluting less- you get to go over your limit, but because you've reduced his so much, there is less total pollution.

Therefore, I buy the dispensation from my neighbor, I pollute, he sacrifices nothing, gets free money and everything's cool.

He's not getting "free money". He's offering the service of reducing pollution that you cannot, leading to less overall pollution. If you reduced your own pollution sufficiently, there would be no reason for your neighbor to be involved at all. You are basically paying him to do something you cannot or choose not to do- nothing free about it.

Let's look at it like this. You live in a big house that runs a coal furnace. You are in a dome that can only tolerate a certain amount of smoke, so your neighborhood has agreed to reduce your total amount of smoke by a certain amount. You could just turn off your furnace, or use it less, but you are worried that you'd become less productive and not bring in as much money. So you reduce some of your use of the furnace, but not as much you've agreed to. Across the street, there is a park where a bunch of people are camped. They aren't planning on camping forever, but they don't have the money to move into a house immediately. They are all burning campfires, but because they're just camping for the time being, they aren't under the same laws that your neighborhood has agreed to. But- if you can reduce enough of their smoke, you can claim that reduction for yourself and thus be in compliance with your neighborhood agreement while reducing the net amount of smoke in the dome. So you basically buy their reduction in smoke by getting them into a house that is solar heated. They benefit, but you claim their reduction as your own. In addition, you're learning how to do this ever more efficiently with ever better technology, leaving you in a better place technologically to replace their solar heaters when they eventually need to be- they will have to buy them from you at that point.

It might seem like they are getting something (the solar house) for free, but that only works if you do not put a price on smoke reduction. Once you understand it as a commodity, you will see how it is a very real thing you're paying for.

Galen_Rasputin: See on one side you have people who truly believe that there is no danger what little damage is being done will be fixed by techonology and that evironmentalist are just busy bodies who want to take wealth from hard working corporations and give it to dirty hippies.

What about the side that understands the very significant consequences at stake and wants to rational work to reduce the chances of it happening. The side backed by science and economics?

SquirrelsOfDoom: What fangs?

Mandatory emissions reductions.

Kyoto is a pipe dream

This is about post-Kyoto, not Kyoto itself.

not a single ratifier has come anywhere close to meetings its goals

See the graph above. Germany is doing quite well, as an example of a Western country making good progress.

Why should the US ratify a pointless treaty that can't be met and wouldn't do any good if it was?

Again, this is really about post-Kyoto. We've basically let Kyoto go.

I think we should apply the principle to the law as well; call 'em Crime Offsets or Moral Credits.

Let's say I want to kill a guy. I simply purchase Crime Offsets from a guy who's already doing life in prison without parole. He gets another life sentence plus a big wad of cash for smokes and drugs and whatnot; I get to commit a penalty-free murder.

How can people that claim to care sop much about the economic realities of something not understand basic cap and trade economics?

Il Douchey: Sorry, JonSnow, but as your analogies get more strained and convoluted, it only solidifies the impression that, so far the proposed "solutions" are shakey and bogus. Some would get something for nothing, some would get nothing for something.

It's a shell game

The only reason you believe this is because you don't seem capable of understanding emissions and their reduction as a commodity. I have no idea why, it isn't a terribly difficult concept. We did it with sulfur dioxide here in the states.

Every so-called "solution" is a shiat sammitch for America.

Again, because you don't seem to understand how emissions credits can be a commodity.

All of the emphasis is on getting us to submit to someone else's rules and conditions; doesn't this give you pause?

It would be part of our rules and conditions- no one can force us to do this.

What gives me pause is people decrying basic market solutions like cap and trade or a pigovian carbon tax as socialist con games. I guess this stems from an inability to recognize that the problem of emissions is real, and that therefore their reduction is a desired thing- a commodity with actual value.

What gives me pause is a further devaluation of the dollar if the EU and Japan create an emissions market without us based on their currencies.

What gives me pause is the idea of waiting longer and longer to do something, ensuring that whatever we do commit to will be that much more restrictive and harder to achieve.

What gives me pause is people weighing in on this issue as if they actually understand it, when they clearly do not, and dismissing already embattled solutions (fought by industry interested in short term profits, and those politicians who have proven loyal to them) when they can't even be bothered to learn the fundamentals of them.

The whole thing, frankly, makes me sad and embarrassed on behalf of my country. That there are still people denying the existence of the problem itself who have internet access and speak English makes me sad and embarrassed on behalf of my species.

I am not saying that everyone should love Kyoto. I am not even saying that cap and trade has to be the solution. I am bashing my head against a wall just trying to get people to understand how a cap and trade system is a market solution rather than a socialist shell game. It's like being in a bizarro universe where someone adamantly believes that ceding means of production to the state is a capitalist con game.

Il Douchey: Emissions and emission reductions ARE NOT a commodity.

If a market is created for them, they become so by definition.

The UN and others are desparately trying to have them treated as such. Because if they succeed, they can establish the value, set the rules, dispense the penalties, award the favors, redistribute the wealth, collect the fees, determine the winners, milk the losers, impose the fines, even the playing field and all other sorts of socialist agendas unrelated to climate change.

Others like socialist-minded US businesses that are participating in a voluntary carbon market in the US like Ford, DuPont, and Motorola?

What is their socialist agenda?