As we head to the polls November 2nd, one of the ugliest and most watched global warming battles will get a litmus test by the voters of California. First some background.
California’s Global Warming Solutions Act called AB32 was passed by the Legislature in 2006 and requires the state to cut greenhouse gas emissions (mostly CO2) to 1990 levels by 2020. Proposition 23 on the ballot tomorrow would suspend the law temporarily, until the state unemployment rate fell to 5.5 percent for four consecutive quarters.
Proponents of AB23 say the suspension is needed because California is financially and figuratively broke, energy costs are already the highest in the nation (I paid 40 cents per kilowatt hour for electricity this summer in 100 degree heat), and it will drive more businesses out of California. Relocation has been on my mind as of late, that’s for sure. Many of my business friends are thinking similar thoughts. California is poised to kill the goose that laid the golden state egg.
Critics say the usual emotional talking points we hear regularly; we have to save the Earth and California has to set the example. I’ll point out that California has already set an example on the world stage, and has the toughest pollution restrictions in the USA. But, the greens here don’t know when to stop. For them, environmental legislation is like an addiction. They can’t seem to get enough to satisfy their cravings.
From my vantage point here in California, the battle has gotten pretty ugly and I can’t wait for November 2nd to be over. This is probably the fiercest state election I’ve ever seen. Virtually every nasty attack ad and dirty trick of all sorts have been hauled out of cold storage to be thrust on-air, onto the web, and into print media. The battle over Proposition 23 is particularly tiresome, since the greens have pulled out all the stops, and have reportedly outspent the backers of Prop 23 by a 2 to 1 margin. The New York Times reported on October 11th that:
As of Monday, the No on 23 forces had raised $16.3 million to the Yes campaign’s $8.9 million, according to California Secretary of State records. Over the last two weeks, nearly $7 million has flowed into No campaign coffers while contributions to the Yes effort had fallen off strikingly.
A lot of that money has come from the Hollywood elite, with Titanic Chicken of the Sea director James Cameron donating a million dollars to the anti Prop 23 campaign.
The money is making the battle on television and web ads reach the supersaturation point. Amazingly, Prop 23 ads even made it into the World Series:
In fact, the anti prop 23 saturation is so bad, I’ll bet that in the Google ads below this, you’ll see a Prop 23 “Dirty Energy” ad appear. Like this one:
Of course the premise of the web ad is a lie. Existing air pollution laws in California won’t change, and companies are still free to develop and sell clean energy solutions wherever the market leads them. And when you look at California’s energy supply…
…you have to ask yourself: “where’s the dirty energy problem?” With coal making up only 18.2%, “dirty energy” is really a non-issue.
“Dirty energy” wailing aside, all that will happen is that the Prop 23 (if passed) will put AB32 on hold until such time that California’s wrecked economy recovers and people are back to work and unemployment drops to 5.5 percent for four consecutive quarters. Critics say this is impossible, but when you look at California’s unemployment rate since 2000, you see it is not:
From the suspendab32.org fact sheet:
California produces only 1.4% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, so our efforts to address climate change cannot be successful alone. AB 32’s go-it-alone approach will impose massive costs on businesses that can be easily avoided by relocation across state or national boundaries. Other states and countries are postponing costly global warming regulations. Suspending AB 32 is common sense and protects businesses and families from cost increases that would result from moving forward with AB 32 now.
Of course I’ll probably be labeled an oil shill for even citing this website, but the only dog I have in this fight is one of my own business survival.
And while we are on the subject of money, I want to say that money has turned the Prop 23 issue into a veritable circus here. TV radio and web is being carpet bombed with anti prop 23 ads. It’s so bad that some other political candidates are complaining they can’t buy ad space on radio and TV.
But what is the worst, is the fact the the anti prop 23 crowd has abandoned all pretense of it being about science related to global warming. Instead, they are focusing on making the issues about pollution and what they call “dirty energy”. Then, they tug at emotional heartstrings. For example, have a look at this ad where the American Lung Association prostitutes itself for the anti prop 23 campaign. This ad has been getting constant airplay:
Direct link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eEmXlJ-Gts
The kid with the inhaler is a nice touch, don’t you think? There’s no science here, AB32 it’s about limiting CO2 and other GHG’s, not particulates! Kids don’t need inhalers for 390 ppm of CO2! And I used to think the Lung Association was a straight shooter. With this ad, they’ve reached a slimy low. They are off my list of charities now. They should be off everyone’s.
And it gets worse. This screwball advertising focus on “dirty energy” and “dirty pollution”, problems that have already been mostly solved in California and have little to do with GHG’s like CO2, has been so intense that it’s illegally spilled over into the ballot language itself.
The Sacramento Bee reports:
Ballots printed for the county’s roughly 380,000 registered voters say Proposition 23 would suspend laws requiring “major polluters” to report and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. That language was thrown out by a Sacramento superior court judge, who ordered several edits to the original language drafted by the attorney general’s office, including changing “major polluters” to “major sources of emissions.”
The Proposition 23 campaign has demanded that the county “take immediate steps to reprint the ballots remaining to be sent to vote by mail voters as well as ballots to be distributed on election day.”
“Fresno County is a county of significant size in California and in a close election, its vote, now tainted by this serious error, could call into question the state results and possibly give rise to an election contest and require a new statewide election on Proposition 23,” attorney Colleen C. McAndrews wrote in a letter to the Fresno elections officials.
According to Paul Chesser in the American Spectator:
Officials say it’s too late to do anything about the 140,000 mail-in ballots that have already been distributed, and that they will post signs with the correct language at polling places.
Well la dee dah, what if Prop 23 loses by about 100,000 votes? Do we get a do-over? A month ago, the LA Times reported Prop 23 was in a dead heat.
Now the LA Times says support for Prop 23 is slipping:
Education mattered more than income in the survey. Among likely voters with college degrees, 55% opposed Proposition 23, as opposed to 37% of those with a high school degree or less. But there was no significant difference between those earning more than $80,000 a year, or less than $40,000
But there’s that education issue again. and as pointed out in our recent WUWT profile of the thoughts of Dr. Roger Pielke Jr., the haves versus the have-nots of education are greatly outnumbered:
So it’s still a crapshoot in my book. And that’s why the legal battle over the ballot language could be very important.
There’s nothing good I can say about the debate surrounding Prop 23. There’s been a lot of dirty pool played. I was invited to be in a community leaders debate on Prop 23 by my local Chico State University, but they balked and I was disinvited when I said I wanted to show some slides, even though there were no caveats on presentation style in the invitation. Plus the student debate just a couple of hours before, in the very same room, organized by the very same people, used slides. But I couldn’t?
What would I have shown? Well, in additional to showing the unemployment slide (above) there’s really only two slides and one news story that matter to the faulty science behind California’s AB 32 global warming law.
Here’s what I would have talked about if I was allowed:
1. I would have shown a screencap of this story in the San Francisco Chronicle:
And pointed out or read these pertinent passages:
The pollution estimate in question was too high – by 340 percent, according to the California Air Resources Board, the state agency charged with researching and adopting air quality standards. The estimate was a key part in the creation of a regulation adopted by the Air Resources Board in 2007, a rule that forces businesses to cut diesel emissions by replacing or making costly upgrades to heavy-duty, diesel-fueled off-road vehicles used in construction and other industries.
…
The setbacks in the Air Board’s research – and the proposed softening of a landmark regulation – raise questions about the performance of the agency as it is in the midst of implementing the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 – or AB32 as it is commonly called, one of the state’s and nation’s most ambitious environmental policies to date.
The 340% error really calls the regulatory authority of CARB into question.
2. This graph about CO2 being logarithmic along with this text.
The greenhouse gasses keep the Earth 30° C warmer than it would otherwise be without them in the atmosphere, so instead of the average surface temperature being -15° C, it is 15° C. Carbon dioxide contributes 10% of the effect so that is 3° C. The pre-industrial level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 280 ppm. So roughly, if the heating effect was a linear relationship, each 100 ppm contributes 1° C. With the atmospheric concentration rising by 2 ppm annually, it would go up by 100 ppm every 50 years and we would all fry as per the IPCC predictions.
But the relationship isn’t linear, it is logarithmic. In 2006, Willis Eschenbach posted this graph on Climate Audit showing the logarithmic heating effect of carbon dioxide relative to atmospheric concentration:
We’ve already gotten most of the warming CO2 will provide.
3. And finally this graph and map:
Goodrich (1996) showed the importance of urbanization to temperatures in his study of California counties in 1996. He found for counties with a million or more population the warming from 1910 to 1995 was 4F, for counties with 100,000 to 1 million it was 1F and for counties with less than 100,000 there was no change (0.1F).
I’d ask this question: How does a CO2 molecule know which county to heat the most?
But, as we’ve seen, the argument about global warming, AB32, and Prop 23 isn’t about science, it’s about emotions, icons, power, elitism, and money. Lots of money.
Whatever happens on election day, the issue is far from over. As I commented to Dr. Judith Curry recently, it is like the world’s longest Monopoly game.
Didn’t CA “outsource” it’s power generation, and therefore it’s emissions from energy use, to other states a few years back?
You are brave to bring up the Dragon in the room (AB32). I haven’t looked to see what it’s set to eat next if Prop 23 fails, but I’m quite sure it will be a Freddy Krueger is in town for the Economy Smorgasbord special.
Steve,
head on out here to the Rocky Mountain High. The snow’s not so bad (global warming should end it in a few years), there’s no smog anywhere except Los Angeles East (Denver), and the mountains are just glorious.
I didn’t leave the the wonderful orange groves i used to ride my bike in when i was a kid- they left me. And now, every morning i look up and the most beautiful Pike’s Peak and can’t believe i get to drive to work looking at her every day.
Will:
to correct an error in:
A whole new business model could be developed using this angle…
Anthony, My heart continues to go out to you and the remaining clear thinking left-coasters. Sadly though, I think the die is cast and the Global Warming Industry has pushed to popular vote far-left of reality.
California may become the example the country needs each and every time Global Warming legislation is proposed in both houses in DC or in any state of the union. Anytime it happens all anyone will need to do is point to California, Spain, Denmark, the UK, Germany, etc, etc, etc…
I wish it were not so if for no other reason but you Anthony and your family but the votes seem to be following the massive far-left activist ad campaigns. They will reap what they sow and you will be mulched like the rest.
Maybe the incoming state representatives can set things right and stop AB 32 before it gets started?
BTW: Although to the best of my knowledge and although I am now soundly convinced publicly funded and subsidizes wind farms are a crime against the taxpayer… I so much want the state of Massachusetts to suffer the Mass Wind(Ted Kennedy Memorial) offshore wind farm! Only through pain and suffering will the USA(maybe even the EU one day) be vanquished of these Unicorn & Pixie dust far-left quests.
I work for a mid-sized manufacturing firm. If Prop 23 fails, and Jerry Brown becomes governor, the first talk we’ll have Wednesday afternoon is about how to manage the move, and when. I can’t imagine any manufacturer staying in the state.
Mary Nichols of the California Air Resources Board (CARB), when asked recently about the manufacturing jobs that were sure to be destroyed by AB32… she at first reassured her questioner that all of these jobs would be replaced by “green jobs”. Never mind that other countries that tried that have wound up in financial ruin (Spain, anyone?). The questioner asked again, saying even if there were green jobs, we would lose a tremendous amount of manufacturing jobs. Cornered, Ms. Nichols replied “Well, there are some jobs we don’t need.”
I almost drove off the road. She said this when parts of the Central Valley have 50% unemployment, and the state unemployment is near 15%. Environmentalists here are disgusting, hateful, rich, crazy, insufferably-smug eco-fascist tyrants. They’re determined to make working-class Californians live like North Korean peasantry. It’s like Earth Day every day there. The eco-fascist’s idea of paradise, I suppose.
By “It’s like Earth Day every day there. ” I meant North Korea. Although it’s getting like that in the People’s Republic of California.
Anthony, it’s not nice to copy yourself.
And, yes, I did see a NO on 23 ad.
Unfortunately, CA may just become the (US) poster child of failed socialist ideology, and green hysteria. Perhaps then the truth about Capitalism will be clear to Americans.
I find it hard to believe how quickly California has trashed its economy. Except being in the UK you can see exactly the same thing over here. High taxes, high bureacracy, high regulation, high energy costs; in a never-ending loop.
Hee hee, some transportation (truck) companies have figured out that they can rebuild old, pre-emmissions laws trucks. As long as the frame and differential housing is used they keep the vin# and model year. So they’re putting in new motors (without the emissions cr*p) and new cabs and suspensions and making the old trucks new again.
With the cost of a new tractor exceeding $130k when 10 years ago they were $70k its a smart idea. Wonder how long it will go unnoticed by the soviet state?
It’s as bad in Oz:
(http://www.climatechange.gov.au/en/minister/greg-combet/2010/media-releases/October/mr20101027.aspx)
The Hon Greg Combet AM MP
Minister for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency
Domestic Offsets Integrity Committee open for business
Media release
27 October 2010
An expert panel to assess proposed methods for developing and selling carbon credits has been announced by the Federal Government, delivering the first step under the Carbon Farming Initiative (CFI).
“The Domestic Offsets Integrity Committee will assess the specific methods for measuring carbon credits,” the Minister for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency, Greg Combet, said.
“As we indicated during the election campaign, this will enable farmers, foresters and landholders to receive offset credits for actions that reduce or store carbon pollution. These credits can then be sold, providing opportunities for them to generate income as Australia moves towards a low-pollution future.
“The National Carbon Offsets Standard, introduced 1 July 2010, has established the rules for companies to become carbon neutral or to sell carbon neutral products. The Carbon Farming Initiative (CFI) will set out what farmers, foresters and landholders need to do to generate carbon credits and it will establish an independent regulator to verify carbon credit claims.”
Reforestation, capturing emissions from existing landfill (‘legacy waste’), and better management of livestock manure are some of the ways to generate carbon credits, he explained.
“Once the credits are verified, they can be traded on Australia’s voluntary carbon market and on overseas markets, generating revenue while reducing carbon pollution,” Mr Combet said.
“Offset credits can be purchased by individuals and corporations to compensate for their own carbon pollution. Buyers of offset credits will include businesses that choose to go carbon neutral, and companies that sell carbon neutral products.
“This is another example of Government action to tackle climate change and create new business opportunities in the low-pollution economy of the future.
“I am pleased to announce the appointment of six experts who will form an independent panel, the Domestic Offsets Integrity Committee. They have the important responsibility of assessing the detailed methods which will provide a new income stream for farmers, foresters and landholders, and help the environment by reducing carbon pollution.
“After consultations with interested groups and a period for public submissions, the committee will provide independent advice to me on methodologies that can be approved in advance of the CFI legislation which we plan to bring before the Parliament in the first half of 2011. The committee I am announcing today is an interim body that will be replaced with a statutory committee when the legislation has passed.
“The sooner we get these rigorous measures in place, the sooner investment opportunities and measures to abate carbon pollution will be available.”
Mr Combet said the diverse range of skills and backgrounds represented on the Committee would ensure the methods recommended for approval were rigorous and would lead to verifiable abatement of carbon pollution.
Patrick Davis,
Up here in BC, a huge reservoir is about to be flooded to provide power for export. Likely much of it will finds it’s way into socal. I know during the power crunch in California a few years ago, BC hydro was making a killing selling overpriced electricity down south.
Once upon a time there were these idiots who believed the could warm up and cool down the Earth. They also believed the were born from an Ape.
Their ancestors use to worship a cow. Now they blame the cow for Global Warming.
They even controlled a mighty organization called the UN, NASA, THE EPA and The NOAA. They even brain washed the Democratic Party, Top research institutes and the educational system.
Then, one day they froze their backsides off.
Let’s not ignore the dragon in the room. If China is exporting its pollution, California is pushing CO2 uphill.
http://www.asianews.it/index.php?art=6843&l=en
Being slightly dyslexic, I’m frequently confusing Prop 23 with AB 32. But I’ll sort them out when I vote yes later in the morning.
I’ve spent one year in California in total – half a year in Santa Cruz, half a year in Santa Barbara (besides a few visits elsewhere). So of course I have learned not only about its pleasant weather and sunny beaches but also about the vigorous political activists I met at parties, at universities, and so on.
The unemployment 12% is relatively high. We have around 8% in the Czech Republic – while I do remember that the numbers used to be lower in California.
However, if most of the voters want to support suicidal policies, it’s their right to decide No to 23. There are clearly many sectors of the economy that don’t care about the dropping “real” industry in California – or even benefit from it. The whole Silicon Valley and Hollywood may belong to the category. The whole nation or state obviously loses but those who benefit may prevail even though their overall profit won’t compensate the overall losses.
I still hope that Prop 23 will pass – as a symbol of the end of this hysteria.
The entirely terrifying thing to contemplate for those of us who live here is that the state of California is already on the brink of outright insolvency — and that is without the full rigor of AB32 driving away even more jobs, businesses and tax revenues.
Adding AB32 on top of the rest of California’s economic woes is like throwing a drowning man an anchor.
I will note as well that the dishonesty of the major press outlets in the state has been brazen and spectacular.
It has been quite common for those media mavens to mention the names of various prominent backers of the campaign against Proposition 23, without further identifying them as persons who are heavily invested in “alternative” energy companies.
In other words, 23 would force those companies to compete on their merits, rather than rigging the game in their favor by government fiat, and there’s nothing the investors in those firms want less than to be exposed to the harsh mercies of a competitive marketplace. Hence their lavish support for the campaign against 23, and, hence, the reticence of the media to point out that self-serving connection.
This is a vicious cycle. Once industry starts leaving an area because of the anti-industry rhetoric, the voice of sensible industry disappears allowing the anti-industry voices to predominate.
And as industry exits, the burden of paying to be “green” (whatever fad replaces making things for a living) falls on an ever smaller group of people in the real economy who have less and less say in how much they get taxed how little of the public purse is put into the transport infrastructure, schooling, etc. etc. that they need.
So get out before the rush!
It’s amazing how a scientific fraud can take hold of rational people and destory everything around them?
Am I seeing a hockey stick in that employment graph or is it me. Also it’s not too different from a Solar activity Sunspot cycle plot in reverse. Is the Sun really able to drive human behaviour characteristics, including delusional politics?
Anyway, that’s by the by. I told you colonial chaps & chapesses some while ago you’d be next, & so it comes to pass. Fight it while you can before you go the way of Britain, in the UESR/PDRofEU. The latest lunatic policy is that the French & British armed forces are going to work together as a pre-cursor to the Eurpean Army, what a joke that will be. Now, what happened the last time the British Army fought alongside the French army on mainland Europe, against who was it now? I forget these days, like everyone else in the asylum! As Churchill said, European integration was a good idea so long as Britain remained outside it! Oh for that ever so “special relationship” to return some sanity to these lost shores.
Will the last person to leave California please turn out the lights?
Oh, wait… no would be able to afford to turn them on in the first place. Nevermind.
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Today will be an interesting day across the U.S. of A.
I’m a great fan of your site, Anthony, it’s reasonable, balanced and well-informed. I can imagine how frustrating the political scene must be with this mass of misinformation and heart-tugging populism.
I would disagree with Paul in Sweden’s, amongst others, characterisation of the environmental movement as “left-wing”. The only justification for this view is their anti-capitalist posture. They are in fact deeply reactionary. Their Tolkien-esque desire to return to a pre-industrial state (campaigned for vigorously on their iPhones, computers, and digital cameras — all products of advanced industrialisation) would set back human progress 300 years. Our ancestors had an average life-expectancy of 18 years at that time.
This is not progressive in any way. It’s classic utopianism which would leave the 30% of the world’s population abandoned by capitalism in want and squalor.
As part of the AB32, California is coping to adapt with imaginary threats — the “California Adaptation Strategy”. Or, as Holdren calls it: de-development.
See: http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/California_Adaptation.htm
California’s temperatures correlate with the PDO not CO2.
Let’s hope that California has woken up to the fact that warmists are rabid Malthusians.
Relocation has been on my mind as of late, that’s for sure.
If you leave, I hope you do it soon enough that your property is still worth something. Real estate prices are going to accelerate downwards as more business and industry takes shelter elsewhere. It isn’t the arctic that’s in a death spiral, it’s California. I really don’t see much hope for the place, the infection far too advanced. It’s a damn shame, there is so much that is worth saving, but total collapse seems inevitable. I just hope it doesn’t drag down the entire USA with it. The rest of us need to isolate ourselves from the California Effect, in other words, let it happen strictly without federal assistance. Not so much to use California as an example, but to contain it and limit the spread of the disease. The state must be allowed to crash and burn if the destructive path has been chosen and all other alternatives have been rejected. There’s really not much point in infusing the patient with more perfectly good medicine if he insists on treatment by Dr Kevorkian at every conscious moment, however brief. It’s like watching a slow motion train wreck. And it was 100% avoidable.
49 states, anyone? Ugh. We might not have a choice.
I have mixed feelings, on one side I hope the good guys win, but on the other side I don’t. Reason, what better lesson on the evils of Environmental-socialism than watching California implode.
Well not my country but good luck on the good fight.
Celebrity Ideology is an ever changing religion. The weakest of all religions, where the celebrity preacher says whatever is popular to suit their stature in Hollywood. Constantly changing ideology, meaningless diatribe of the worst kind.
California is broke for just one reason. To quote Margaret Thatcher “They’ve got the usual Socialist disease — they’ve run out of other people’s money.”
Unfortunately, that contagion now seems to be widespread. Half of Europe, the UK, even the US Federal Government is not far off that state. (In the US, the disease seems to have been compounded by a very bad case of cronyism.)
Last night the Danish (public) tv entertained its audience with a Californian debate on legalizing cannabis [or ‘marihuana’ as you call it ‘over there’ :)]. It has been claimed that such a step could reduce the state budget deficit by more than 1 G$/year!
The Danish ‘expert’, however, found that figure ‘somewhat optimistic’.
Go vote today. Get your friends to vote. Hey! Even get your pets to vote. It IS CA isn’t it?
Its quite obvious that some jobs are considered expendable, as was commented on earlier.
Here is what will happen to cement production.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/constructionandproperty/8100211/Green-tax-burden-could-see-cement-firms-quit-the-UK.html
If anyone would like to google ‘redcar UK steel mills’ they will see the UK is busy shutting dow its steel production as well. Both require a great deal of carbon credits or heavily taxed fuel to make and in order to reach its legal targets (the only country in the world stupid enough to have them) we need to get rid of our heavy industry.
The irony-as in the case of the UK Steel industry is that production was switched to India where the Govt get carbon credits for locating production there.
tonyb
I think para 3, 1st sentence should refer to proponents of Prop 32, not “AB23”.
I’d like to think that a similar cause to Prop 23 could attract several million $ worth of support in Australia, but I fear we are a long way behind on such things. By throwing their lot in with the Greens, the current Labor Government has surrendered climate policy to the will of the watermelons for the foreseeable future. Forget climb-downs for now, we have a long way to go. More power to you and your kin, Anthony.
Beg pardon, “Prop 23”, not “Prop 32”. My bad!
tonyb 2:42:
Hi, Tony. As regards to not having heavy industry: Down here in Cornwall a company wanted to restart the defunct South Crofty tin mine. The South West Regional Development Agency objected to planning permission on the grounds that “it is not how we see the future of Cornwall.” (For the benefit of readers unfamiliar with Cornwall it’s a county that’s absolutely full of old tin-mines.) Sometimes you just want to bang your head against a wall.
Phillip Bratby says:
November 2, 2010 at 12:10 am
I find it hard to believe how quickly California has trashed its economy. Except being in the UK you can see exactly the same thing over here. High taxes, high bureacracy, high regulation, high energy costs; in a never-ending loop.
============================================================
Not forgetting the Climate Change Act (2008) pushed through parliament by the new leader of the Labour Party (Ed Milliband) and passed almost without dissent.
This is the most expensive law ever passed in the UK. It commits us to reducing our CO2 emissions by 80 per cent by 2050, at a cost estimated, on the website of his old Department for Energy and Climate Change, at up to £18.3 billion every year for the next four decades. In cash terms this amounts to £734 billion (around $1.1 trillion), which equates to more than £700 (around $1100) a year for every household in the land.
We can’t afford that and nor, I suspect, can California afford AB32.
The Danish (public) radio just informed [sorry to bother you again with more ‘Danish stuff’! :)] that 11 out of 12 GOP Senate Candidates are ‘(A)GW sceptical’.
In the Sacramento Bee over the weekend, they were analyzing the GHG limits set by CARB. Since the recesion cut the amount of economic activity quite sharply, the good folks at CARB decided the limit on CO2 emissions had to be reduced by an additional 5% as it AB32 provisions went into effect.. http://www.sacbee.com/2010/10/30/3144519/recession-cut-level-of-californias.html
I wrote the following in the comments section in the online paper.
When I hear about this cap, how come all I can think about is a boa contrictor tightening around its victim’s chest, ratcheting tighter and tighter every time the victim exhales making it impossible to inhale again, leading to death of the victim from asphixiation.
I can’t get over the American Lung Assoc. ad, it’s unbelievable.
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/carbon-dioxide-in-blood.html
Low blood+lung Co2 levels = (Hypocapnia) = possible death!
Equaly too much blood+lung Co2 = (Hypercapnia) = possible death!
The normal concentration of CO2 in the bloodstream is 40 mm of Hg.
I don’t think 389 ppm by volume is or ever could be a health problem.
“Shevva says:
November 2, 2010 at 1:42 am
It’s amazing how a scientific fraud can take hold of rational people and destory everything around them?”
It’s not the fraud that’s taken hold of them. The fraud is simply a tool used for justification of an ideology, one that says “I get to exert control over XXX”.
That’s why this infection is so hard to kill. If it were simply fraudulent science driving it, it would have been over and done with by now.
We have our own “infection” here near Boston, in the town of Cambridge. As close to Cal as you can get on the East coast. Some wonderful things come out of Cambridge…excellent bio/pharma research, for example, much of which was probably centered in Cal at one point?…not sure on that one, but they really speak a different language there, to the point that it’s difficult to even have a conversation at times.
Get out, Anthony, while you still can, IF you still can. This will have to burn itself out, and there’s no need to be part of that process if you don’t have to.
A favorite quote: “Argue for your limitations…and they’re yours.”
Best to you and yours,
JimB
Well, it’s fairly obvious why the the opponents of proposition avoided the whole CO2 and global warming issue during the latter stages of this campaign, while instead focusing on the fraudulent pollution angle…..
http://www.c3headlines.com/2010/10/california-dreamin-destroyed-by-big-government-politicians-and-bureaucrats.html
oops: too much Co2 is refered to an hypercapnea
Whichever way Jim Cameron says you should vote, I would suggest you all do the opposite. I think/hope/know I am preaching to the converted. 🙂
This state of affairs is absurd. The notion of a ‘green’ economy is B.S. The only way it can compete, is to destroy the old economy first. The old economy is based on cheap energy, we’re still at 8¢/KWH in western Colorado. There is no way a business in California dependent on energy can compete with the same sort of business in Colorado in the national market, and the global market is out of the question.
The new advice:
Go west young man … but not too far west.
Or, alternatively:
Go south young man.
@tonyb “If anyone would like to google ‘redcar UK steel mills’ they will see the UK is busy shutting dow its steel production as well.”
It is as if the Western greenies don’t like the sight of factories and would rather all production was NIMBY, along with high-flying business people who would rather outsource it all overseas anyway, and just reap the profits from IP and high flying financial instruments. Meanwhile the working classes can look forward to generational unemployment and ASBO collecting.
@ Patrick Davis
Exactly so. California imports much of it’s power from coal-fired plants in Arizona, Nevada, and New Mexico, as well as the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station near Phoenix, Hoover Dam, and Glen Canyon Dam. Just off the top of my head, the large coal-fired plants are the Mohave Generating Station in Laughlin, NV, Navajo Generating Station in Page, AZ, Four Corners Power Plant near Farmington, NM.
In medieval times, angry mob went into mayor´s house in Prague and threw some clerks out of the windows. Just sayin’.
A better explanation of Blood Lung Co2 Levels:
http://www.buteykocan.com/about_buteyko/scientific.htm
> In fact, the anti prop 23 saturation is so bad, I’ll bet that in the Google ads below this, you’ll see a Prop 23 “Dirty Energy” ad appear.
Nope! Google et al think I live in Canterbury NH (nope, one town over), so I got a campaign add for Ann Kuster for US rep (she supports Cap and Trade). Her latest ads use Flash, so my flash block have saved them from me, but I checked last night and clicked to see if she has anything new.
BTW, New Hampshire isn’t as friendly to small business as it once was, but we’re craling out of the recession pretty well. I think the unemployment rate is 5.5%. Folks are looking for a route for a 2nd DC powerline from Hydroquebec (flooding indigenous tribal areas seems to be okay politically here). While there are rebates for wind and solar installations, I’ve testified against them at a state house hearing and will give the committee some of Joe D’Aleo’s latest writing on the matter.
We do have RGGI – the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, but given the price of CO2 permits lately it hasn’t been too bad. Plus, the money raised goes back toward various conservation initiatives like assistance for home insulation, so it’s not much more than a bad tax. Generally when home heating oil goes up, there’s a shift to burning more wood, a good negative feedback loop except for asthmatics.
Juraj V. says:
November 2, 2010 at 5:07 am
> In medieval times, angry mob went into mayor´s house in Prague and threw some clerks out of the windows. Just sayin’.
The New Hampshire state constitution, http://www.nh.gov/constitution/billofrights.html includes
[Art.] 10. [Right of Revolution.] Government being instituted for the common benefit, protection, and security, of the whole community, and not for the private interest or emolument of any one man, family, or class of men; therefore, whenever the ends of government are perverted, and public liberty manifestly endangered, and all other means of redress are ineffectual, the people may, and of right ought to reform the old, or establish a new government. The doctrine of nonresistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind.
June 2, 1784
I used to be a Californian. Now I live in Reno and work at a company that moved here from Sacramento. Geographers say I live in a desert, but the grass sure looks greener here to me.
I cast my vote against Harry Reid last week. Early voting is cool.
California has the right to self destruct. I am ready to let it.
Let them pass the pot bill and destroy the economy. The consequences of those actions will be the end of the state.
I will be a curious onlooker to see what happens when a state government collapses. The federal government will step in. Perhaps the smartest things would be to break the failed state up into 3-4 smaller states.
Guess it will depend if voters are “stoned” or not, if so, they will be seeing all “green”. 🙂
If you want to see a shining example of how this works, just take a look at the east coast and the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). After a couple of years of auctioning CO2 allowances, the price per allowance has dropped to the lowest possible legal value of $1.86. In the last auction, all of the allowances for sale were not bought. At that price, it is not encouraging anyone to stop emitting CO2, so this becomes, you guessed it, a tax. The grand schemes for using the funds from RGGI for energy efficiency and environmental programs quickly went out the window when several state governments recently diverted millions of RGGI dollars to the general coffers to compensate for budget shortfalls.
So the low prices for allowances have kept the leakage out of RGGI rather low, terrific. Let’s see, low prices = lower impact to customers and business that also = low impact on deterring CO2 emissions. High CO2 prices = more pain for customers and business = more leakage out of the CO2 control region = low impact on deterring CO2 emissions. This dog don’t hunt. Consider this when voting on Prop 23.
California fell off my list of retirement locations due to the restrictions passed since the late 90s. I was actually looking at property along 49 as I wanted to watch the trees grow. I settled for rural Southeast US for the laid back life style and fewer regulations. Far enough inland to avoid the worst of the extreme weather that is possible near the coast.
Anthony: I agree that you should give more thought to relocation. I could give you a list of states that I considered.
You say “AB32 was passed by voters in 2006”. I thought “AB” stands for “Assembly Bill,” not a referendum. Wouldn’t it be more correct to say that “AB32 was passed by California legislators in 2006”?
for all you manufacturers and retirees – let me point out that Texas has no income tax, good property prices, and the best business climate in the nation!
This is where all the new growth is going to be, don’t stay in socialism’s graveyard, move to where the Future is being made!
@anthony
$0.40/kwh is bad. It’s $0.11/kwh from my electric cooperative here in Texas. There’s no cap on how much you can buy at that price either.
Do you have net metering there and if so how much does the electric company pay you for energy you produce and put onto the grid? Here it’s only about $0.05/kwh and that’s not economically viable. Breakeven is about $0.10/kwh not counting whatever labor it took to keep it all working. If it was $0.20/kwh that would be way beyond breakeven and I’d be buying solar panels like a mofo and be producing a nice supplementary income with them!
On the economic front it’s going to get worse when and if Obamacare kicks in. I have a good friend in San Antonio who started a temporary employment agency 20 years ago and grew it into a multi-million dollar employee-owned business with offices in three major cities. Obamacare is going to force him to provide health insurance to everyone who works there no matter how few hours per week they work. He can’t make the numbers work and will have to shut the business down.
I don’t know how that’s going to fall out nationwide but I suspect it won’t be pretty. For instance my old employer Dell Computer routinely goes through temp agencies for new permanent hires. They fill an open position through a temp agency with a contract which prohibits Dell from hiring that person directly for a period of 6-12 months. So Dell gets to test-drive a potential new employee for 6 months to a year without making any commitments or paperwork hassles. If they like the person then at the end of the temp contract they offer them a permanent position with all the great benefits offered by Dell including health insurance. I know lots of people who got hired that way and Dell is far from the only large company doing it so if Obamacare puts temp agencies out of business it’s going to put additional burdens on large companies who do much of their permanent hiring via temporary employment agencies.
Anthony-
Brad R. is correct. AB 32 was not passed by voters, it was passed by the State Legislature and then signed into law by Gov. Arnold.
REPLY: Yep, my bad, fixed. – A
I presume that California is like the UK, where the most ardent Greens are always tucked up in nice, safe government jobs.
The solution, therefore is simple. Pass the Green law, but only if the government leads the way with 25% job losses across the board. That will concentrate their minds.
.
I grew up in Northern California – lived there until I was 18 (24 years ago). I loved California; the smell of the forests, the gorgeous Sierra Nevada’s, the unbelievable redwoods, the beaches, the desert the rolling foothills, the unbelievable climate. I count myself very fortunate to have had the opportunity to live there.
I considered moving back to California when I finished college, but felt I couldn’t afford to live there. “Maybe someday I’ll make enough money to be able to afford it” I told myself. I pursued a career in manufacturing and it became quickly apparent decades ago, that I would never move back to California – there was no future there for me. Only constant hemorrhaging of jobs under regulations and unnecessary burdens.
I’ve never been able to call anywhere else I have lived “home”. But it is with regret that I have to say that I won’t be disappointed if I never return to visit there – to my home. All my friends have left. The city I grew up in is now a place I wouldn’t want to raise a family.
Alas, it didn’t have to be this way.
Regards
Jack
>>California is broke for just one reason. To quote Margaret
>>Thatcher “They’ve got the usual Socialist disease — they’ve
>>run out of other people’s money.”
How true.
But, like Europe, they (we) have also indulged in a slave economy for the last 15 years, because it made us feel rich, for a while. Our slaves don’t live at the bottom of the road, they live in China, and that’s where all the jobs have gone.
However, just as in Rome’s Slave Revolt, the slaves can sometimes flex their muscles. On this occasion, it is industrial and economic muscles, and they are devastating our economies. But it is not just jobs that are lost, entire technologies and industrial processes have been transported to China, and they may be impossible to retrieve back to the West. The UK, for instance, has not a clue how to produce a whole raft of high-tech electronic goods, so we are no better than Africa in many respects.
$0.40/KW? Really? Here, in Northern Virginia, we paid Dominion Electric $0.088/KWh for this past month of October, all in. I thought that was high.
You are more than welcome to leave California for a state that actually wants to have productive citizens. There are lots of choices available to you.
“wws says:
November 2, 2010 at 6:22 am
for all you manufacturers and retirees – let me point out that Texas has no income tax, good property prices, and the best business climate in the nation!
This is where all the new growth is going to be, don’t stay in socialism’s graveyard, move to where the Future is being made!”
Adding to the above comment: leave your politics in the old state, no need to kill the goose again and screw your new state.
Y’all bring those manufacturing jobs over to Texas. Our attorney general spends his time fighting those silly EPA regulators and revenuers. Heck, our state LOVES industry (something to do with jobs). Just make sure y’all leave your air heads behind.
John Cooper says:
November 2, 2010 at 5:07 am
Four Corners is on hold, the EPA pulled their permits when Obama took office. I live in N.E. Arizona. The SRP coal fired Power plants in Holbrook and St Johns supply power to S. Cal exclusively.
I did my duty for California and reduced my CO2 output by leaving the state in 2007. Last one out turn off any remaining power plants.
I completely agree about the dirty politics, nasty attack ads, and dis-information campaigns in California. The spin from organizations like the American Lung Association is unbelievable and the fact that voters fall for this nonsense is amazing.
However, California voters are unfortunately exposed to some of the most left wing news I’ve ever seen. Voters are denied balanced coverage of the issues and the fact that none of the news sources bothered to evaluate AB32 for its merits (assuming there are any) is absurd.
I have no idea why California wants to enact Cap and Trade when none of the other States are willing to support it. Who do they think they are going to assess other than California based companies? They can’t impose the Carbon Tax on any company outside of California or they will have violated the Interstate Commerce Act. So they are essentially imposing penalties on California Business and Agriculture.
This is the stupidest thing California has ever done. Talk about shooting yourself in the foot.
Five States have already lined up to sue California if AB32 enacts Cap and Trade and guess who will end up paying for the litigation.
What an absurd and wasteful mess!
Your argument seems really inconsistent Anthony – you say there’s no dirty energy problem in CA because only 18% electricity come from coal while simultaneously complaining electricity costs are going to rise. If the electricity sector is not the place to achieve emissions reductions then it going to come from a different sector – probably the transportation sector. As I’m sure you know, vehicle emissions are a key cause of SoCal’s record-breaking ozone levels. So, if you’re the American Lung Association and want to protect inner-city kids from involuntary exposure to harmful air quality – the Global Warming Solutions Act seems like a good proxy to achieve this goal.
Reduced ozone levels are a foreseeable positive externality of reducing CO2 emissions in CA – therefore it makes perfect since for the ALA to oppose Prop 23.
Instead, you call them prostitutes and say we should all stop donating to them. I think you’re way off on this one.
And here in middle of Norway the electricity prices soared to well over a 1 euro pr kw/h for several days during last winter. This lead to alot of people being unable to pay electricity bills.
40 cents per kwh! holy ____ why do you live there? Is it because you like the high prices? Wow at $.40/kwh even stupid things like wind power are almost competitive.
John Doyle,
Are you going to vote for the legal marijuana option? If so, I think it’s a bigger threat to lungs than ozone. And it still seems that AB23 is more about carbon than ozone.
If people want clean air they shove move out of the city. I work in San Francisco and I see it every day. The idiots who live in this sh_thole city want it all ways. They want free housing and food for the homeless, but they want the homeless out of SF. They want to keep all the business, but they don’t want all those nasty cars. They want gays to get married, as long as they stay in the Castro.
Prop 23 will fail because, as I’ve said time and time again, humans are stupid and lazy by default. They believe what they see the most on TV or hear on the radio. If enough people tell them the sky is pink, they’ll start to believe it.
Jack Edwards says:
November 2, 2010 at 6:48 am
“I grew up in Northern California – lived there until I was 18 (24 years ago). I loved California; the smell of the forests, the gorgeous Sierra Nevada’s, the unbelievable redwoods, the beaches, the desert the rolling foothills, the unbelievable climate. I count myself very fortunate to have had the opportunity to live there.”
I hear ya. I lived in SoCal near the coast from 1975-1993 about halfway between LA and Sandy Eggo. Some great years. There were no problemos with Mexico then either and we used to think nothing of driving across the border for just a few hours of shopping and a lobster dinner to a few days in an ocean-front hotel or motel.
Times sure have changed. I never regretted moving to Texas in 1993 though and now more than ever!
“Never mind that other countries that tried that have wound up in financial ruin (Spain, anyone?)”
Financial ruin in Spain isn’t directly related to the “going green” madness, but this madness is already working as a big lock that will prevent economic recovery in Spain for decades to come.
tommy says:
November 2, 2010 at 7:55 am
“And here in middle of Norway the electricity prices soared to well over a 1 euro pr kw/h for several days during last winter. This lead to alot of people being unable to pay electricity bills.”
No doubt. Almost all your domestic supply is hydroelectric and when that’s not sufficient it’s imported from a neighboring country but on the flip side you export to those same countries when there’s an excess of hydro. Prices evidently aren’t well regulated so it’s feast or famine depending on precipitation. I’d be interested in knowing the least you ever pay for electricity since wikipedia says
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_sector_in_Norway
If wikipedia is not accurate or not telling the whole story you should go edit it.
“tommy says:
November 2, 2010 at 7:55 am
And here in middle of Norway the electricity prices soared to well over a 1 euro pr kw/h for several days during last winter. This lead to alot of people being unable to pay electricity bills.”
I hope no deaths resulted from people not being able to afford to heat their homes. That would have pleased the neo-Malthusian eco-fascists.
Electricity @ $0.065 KWh here in Ontario Canada. Not to worry, it’s going to go up…soon. Citizens stopping installation of natural gas plants, government shutting down all coal plants and investing $billions in wind. We are fighting the big bad global warming monster too…..how sad. Good luck California.
Here’s what the idealists in California expect to happen if (and when) Prop 23 fails. The key paragraphs:
Saving California’s economy with AB 32 and the defeat of Prop 23 is supposed to ride on developing and installing the means to provide renewable electricity, more efficient vehicles, and (someday, somehow but nobody knows when or how, exactly), solving that pesky storage problem to make energy cheap. There are those who talk about investments in smart grids, and white roofs, and reflective asphalts, and cool cars (in the hot temperature sense), and recycling all our organic wastes into bio-gas or cellulosic ethanol, and that these cutting-edge technologies will forever make oil and natural gas a thing of the past.
Maybe so. But, California has to exist in the real world, where there are other states, and other countries where low-cost energy powers the factories, homes, vehicles, and businesses. Goods and services provided by the lowest-cost methods are available in the market. While it is true that Californians are afforded the opportunity to help unfortunate producers in remote areas of the world, and pay a premium price for the privilege of purchasing their products, it is not entirely clear that anyone else in the world will return the favor and buy high-priced California products or services as a charitable gesture to encourage the noble use of renewable energy.
http://sowellslawblog.blogspot.com/2010/10/showdown-over-prop-23-and-ab-32-in.html
California has become something resembling an East European socialist republic under the Soviet Union. A gerrymandered political system has given us a government that resembles an entrenched, one-party dictatorship.
AB32 was a power grab by the entrenched green-leftist elite. It basically says that the state gets to review and can veto all development regardless of what local authorities say on the matter. And if they can’t defeat them outright, the state will be able to tie up any and all projects for years.
I will be retiring elsewhere. Kentucky, where I went to college, is just about right.
Flyover country is the last bastion of civilized culture in this country.
“The kid with the inhaler is a nice touch, don’t you think?”
Nice to see the “kid” doing so well after the CFC-using albuterol inhalers were banned at the behest of the environmentalists. The replacement inhalers aren’t quite as good, but we’re saving the planet!
California Assembly Bill 32 passed in 2006 by the legislature and signed by the Governor is simply a state government tax subsidized green market disaster bill which will result in huge free market jobs losses, massive energy cost increases with the imposition of intrusive and burdensome regulations affecting all California’s citizens and businesses. AB 32 is completely impotent and inept at making any reductions in global emissions which are driven and dominated by the burgeoning energy consumption of the worlds developing nations. AB 32 will however hasten the looming bankruptcy of California which may finally cause needed corrective actions to occur.
Wondering Aloud says:
November 2, 2010 at 8:14 am
“Wow at $.40/kwh even stupid things like wind power are almost competitive.”
Aha, you’ve got that then? First increase the price so it is unbelievebly expencive…..then argue that, look, alternative energy is competitive!
Post Modern Logic.
tommy says on November 2, 2010 at 7:55 am
But, but, but, Norway is supposed to be one of those intelligently managed socialist paradises. That’s not supposed to happen there! You must be mistaken or else you are some sort of evil capitalist troll.
For those who want to follow along with the Prop 23 results, minute by minute, this website shows the vote tally.
http://vote.sos.ca.gov/maps/ballot-measures/23/
RE:
Kevin_S says:
November 2, 2010 at 7:11 am
Adding to the above comment: leave your politics in the old state, no need to kill the goose again and screw your new state
______________________________________________
Take serious note of Kevin’s comment. I live in an area of Washington State that used to be semi-rural and politically conservative. People benefited from an abundance of common sense. Then we became a popular place for Californians to relocate because “the weather is great and it’s so inexpensive and and the people are so friendly.”
Ironically, those transplanted Californians’ most common refrain is “but in California we did it this way…..”
Their ever increasing numbers (and votes) have changed our area to what I now call Mini-California North. So Anthony aside, be careful what you wish for, because your state/county/town could be next.
“….until such time that California’s wrecked economy recovers and people are back to work and unemployment drops to 5.5 percent for four consecutive quarters. Critics say this is impossible…”
Of course it is impossible. If you think they’re wrong, wait ’til you see what the legislature passes next. We’re headed for 16% unemployment in California by 2013. This is not unintended consequences of green laws; it’s their objective.
Democrats will take the blame for skyrocketing electricity rates. Toronto, Canada just replaced their liberal mayor with conservative Rob Ford in a landslide partly as a backlash to rapidly rising electricity rates from feed in tariffs from wind and solar projects and other elite green policies.
Patrick Davis, John Cooper,
Quite correct in that we get significant power from our neighbors. But notice that AB32 legislation presumes to regulate that power, even though it originates in other states:
(m) “Statewide greenhouse gas emissions” means the total annual emissions of greenhouse gases in the state, including all emissions of greenhouse gases from the generation of electricity delivered to and consumed in California, accounting for transmission and distribution line losses, whether the electricity is generated in state or imported. Statewide emissions shall be expressed in tons of carbon dioxide equivalents. (emphasis added)
The embargoing of power deliveries by Arizona that was facetiously suggested earlier
this year in a different dispute may well be partially accomplished by California itself.
Well Valero and Tesoro, the two Texas “big oil” bad guys that are the alleged promoters of prop 23 (according to the antis) happen to be two main suppliers of energy to California. And the reason we need to use Texas energy, is the greenies won;’t permit the use of California’s own extensive oil and natural gas supplies.
So T&V have very few jobs in California so neither AB-32 nor prop 23 have much impact on those two companies; who aren’t producing fuel in California; just selling it. Prop 23 has the ear marks of the TEA party; it is mostly a grass roots people effort to save small business and jobs in California.
Hi Tech in California is less and less about making hardware; and more and more about software and both of those can more easily be done in Bangladesh or communist red China; who couldn’t give a rip about California’s enviro-wackos.
And after years of campaigning (and hard work) by both California Senators, Feinstein and Boxer, to protect the delicate fabric and ecology of the desert South West; in just the twinkling of an eye the same people want to give Federal lands amounting to 20% more than the entire Artic National Wildlife Refuge of Alaska to a new breed of land rapists in the form of the silicon goons of Si-valley and their “Green free clean renewable” energy plans. Well actually those programs for 23 million acres are already approved; and unlike in ANWR where “Big oil” wanted to drill on 2400 acres; the desert energy farms will require total human exclusion from the entire area because of their vulnerability to vandalism or terrorism.
California used to be the world’s 6th largest economy; and under the current Sacramento legislature, and girlie man Governors like Schwarzenegger; who sleeps with “the enemy”, we have slowly climbed up to where we now can proudly claim to be the 8th largest economy in the world; or did we reach #9 already. If prop 23 fails, we will climb that ladder very quickly. When AB-32 was passed unemployment in Ca was 4.8%. Prop 23 simply wants to delay the implementation of carbon tax penalties on ALL CO2 emitters (has nothing to do with environmental pollution laws, which haven’t changed) until the unemploymnet level which currently is over 12% and more likely 17%, drops below 5.5% and stays there for four consecutive quarters; in other words till after the current depression.
Most of the job creators in California can do their work anywhere on the planet; they won’t do it here.
“”” Luboš Motl says:
November 2, 2010 at 12:53 am
I’ve spent one year in California in total – half a year in Santa Cruz, half a year in Santa Barbara (besides a few visits elsewhere). So of course I have learned not only about its pleasant weather and sunny beaches but also about the vigorous political activists I met at parties, at universities, and so on. “””
Well sadly, you spent your time in two of the nuttiest places in the entire State of California.
Santa Barbara, is a totally unique place; an absolute magnet for the over-rich Hollywood types and their idle ilk (no I don’t begrudge them their wealth; if folks are dumb enough to pay for their product, why should I care.)
But SB has a very limited space, between the ocean and the coastal mountains, so real estate prices are through the roof.
As a result policemen; firemen, school teachers, and similar essential community employees simply cannot afford to live in the very city they maintain; and they basically have to reside in that pestilence that is the LA north corridor with its impossible commute. I simply refuse to drive Hiway-1 to the LA area; because it is such a pain to get through Santa Barbara’s bottleneck. Hey it’s also a school town; so full of young mushheads who can solve all the world problems.
footnote to my earlier post:
I’m completely uncertain who anyone can educate Democrats in this State but here are the Poll results from Pew Oct. 2010:
Of those believing Global Warming is a Very Serious, Somewhat Serious, or Not Too Serious problem.
Is there solid evidence the Earth is warming [due to human activity]?
Tea Party Republicans: 84% No
Republicans: 71% No
Democrats: 31% No
Independents: 48% No
How serious a problem?
Tea Party Republicans: 74% Not too serious or Not a problem
Republicans: 57% Not too serious or Not a problem
Democrats: 15% Not too serious or Not a problem <– Yikes
Independents: 35% Not too serious or Not a problem
Do scientists agree the Earth is getting warmer?
Tea Party Republicans: 71% No
Republicans: 58% No
Democrats: 32% No
Independents: 45% No
On the plus side, with the Dems getting crushed in the House, and Pelosi getting booted, there won’t be anymore Federal bailouts for California. So they will finally have to live with the consequences of their socialism and not past the bill on to the rest of us.
The future outcome of AB32 is already here in Canada.
http://www.yorkregion.com/news/local/article/896559–skyrocketing-energy-costs-exacts-toll-on-poor-social-services
California democrats should prepare for the coming backlash.
All credit to the commenter upthread who pointed out that we Californians had AB32 inflicted upon us with the enthusiastic support of Governor Schwarzenegger, who signed it into law.
It’s also worthy of note that Schwarzenegger appointed Mary Nichols to head the California Air Resources Board — i.e., chose an arrogant limousine-liberal lawyer with not an iota of technical or scientific background.
(It was on the watch of Nichols that outsiders found a senior CARB scientist was completely unqualified for his position, holding a two-week “doctorate” from a known diploma mill. And this charlatan was then allowed to continue his employment with the Board!)
It would be simpler if all of the enemies of common sense and arithmetic were all concentrated in one political party. Very sadly, this is not the case. Schwarzenegger vividly proves the point.
BOOOO!…You are doomed to be haunted by Big Foot carbon prints and Big oil gas prices and delicious Cap&Trade phantom taxes!
Well, housing and energy prices are a lot lower around here as well as no shortage of fresh water. We have just as much beach front property and like in California most of it is too cold to swim in.
Our politicians are a little bit stupid but usually not as far out as CA. Maybe you should relocate your business. If the warmists believed their own story they’d all be moving to Wisconsin.
The guy who made Predator and the guy who made Aliens are running California!
yah, what kind of idiots keep voting these bobblehead actors into public office? reagan, bono, thompson, schwarzenegger…i really just don’t get it.
The California Air Resource Board (CARB) and some in the CA government are trying to get CA integrated into an international REDD scheme where we’d pay foreign countries huge amounts of money each year to store our carbon. This is nothing but a way to redistribute wealth from the ‘North’ to the ‘South.’ (And what happens to the CO2 when those trees die, does it all go back into the atmosphere? If so and we get connected into this REDD scheme, we should get refunds as those trees die…)
Here’s an opinion from the SacBee that says SB 375 along with AB 32 are going to reshape CA so that we will be ‘encouraged’ by these pieces of legislation to move into high density housing in cities.
http://www.sacbee.com/2010/11/01/3147922/dan-walters-new-big-four-promise.html
It’s going to take a lot more than blogging to stop these greens.
Dear George, just to be sure, I am aware of the high prices in Santa Barbara – and of course, I just lived there as a subtenant in Goleta, in the walking distance from UCSB (and KITP) and I only moved away from the place a few times – and in fact, I have only been to Santa Barbara proper just a few times.
These are pretty places. Santa Cruz had lots of those redwoods – but yes, it was a kind of wild nature, especially because I had to bike to the supermarket miles below the forest of the UCSC campus. 🙂
On the other hand, I think that I met the most obsessed left-wing ideologues in a different place – on a party in San Francisco itself. 🙂
Yes down with the evil coal fired electricity production due to not allowing for proper hydro from all the rivers.
And yes to pot smokers household production of weed for fun and profit.
I confess I had problem seeing the connection but no more, it’s plain as day. Only a weed smoking pothead for hippies could come up with the logic behind refusing river hydro because it would lessen the flow of water to the “medical” gardens, and because everyone knows pot smoke is not so emission-ly bad compared to smoke from evil coal fired power plants better then to smoke weed and not coal. Makes sense to some people obviously which would be the same people who apparently think their “medical” garden solar lamps are powered by the magical buzzing stuff from the wall socket.
Anthony: At least you get the satisfaction that your blog is read by more California voters than the town hall meeting would have reached.
I work for a company of 25 employees and we plan to leave California in about two years. Everybody will get good financial incentive to move with the company, but I expect to take a severe loss on my home sale.
P.S. I forgot, but thank you, Anthony, for a political post on election day (USA). It’s a good reminder to go vote and a nice opportunity for commenters to discuss politics directly and still be on topic :o)
I have been doing my part for the economy of California by clicking on the No on 23 ads and encouraging my friends to do so as well.
🙂
kramer says:
November 2, 2010 at 12:45 pm
The California Air Resource Board (CARB) and some in the CA government are trying to get CA integrated into an international REDD scheme where we’d pay foreign countries huge amounts of money each year to store our carbon.
========
Wow — that comment thru me.
California can not directly enter into trade agreements with other governments. The Constitution grants the federal government the power to enter into treaties and trade agreements and even under a “Fast Track” approval from the White House, Congress still needs to approve or reject the agreements.
Also, CARB is not a governmental agency. It doesn’t have much of any power outside of recommendations and findings which are now highly suspect due to their resent mistakes.
Unless I’m missing something, California does not have sufficient rights under the Constitution to enter into anything other than a promotional agreement with foreign powers. If they attempt to enter into such agreements related to CAP and Trade, they are likely to be quickly overturned by Congress or the Supreme Court.
I pay € 0,0829 + tax € 0,1326 = € 0,2155 / kWh for electric next year. ( 3 % less then now )
Thanks for the right wing government that was elected not so long ago the green movement didn’t get there eco madness made in to legislation.
I still hope the new government has the guts to build another nuclear power plant or two though.
@John from CA,
Actually, ARB is a governmental agency, duly created under California law. It is the Air Resources Board, with purposes to
“1. Attain and maintain healthy air quality.
2. Conduct research into the causes of and solutions to air pollution.
3. Systematically attack the serious problems caused by motor vehicles, which are a major cause of air pollution in the State.”
http://www.arb.ca.gov/html/brochure/arb.htm
ARB’s power is vast, and sweeping in its scope. It is authorized or mandated to not only write air emission regulations, but to enforce them through various Air Districts throughout the state.
“”””” Shub Niggurath says:
November 2, 2010 at 12:08 pm
The guy who made Predator and the guy who made Aliens are running California! “””””
Both totally dumb flicks; specially aliens. I do not watch movies that are filmed in based on a black cat in a cellar at midnight.
If I can’t see your critter up close and personal, I ain’t interested in your movie; even an idiot knows to turn the lights on.
Dan in California says on November 2, 2010 at 1:52 pm
Any hints on what company or area that is so I can watch for the canary to die?
Re, John from CA, November 2, 2010 at 2:21 pm;
Here’s some ARB and related links that talk about REDD and how California is looking at it.
http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/capandtrade/meetings/073010/notice.pdf
http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/capandtrade/meetings/073010/usepapresentation.pdf
http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/capandtrade/meetings/073010/gcfpresentation.pdf
And check out this excerpt from the third link:
Objective: to convene technical experts to develop regulatory design recommendations for incorporating REDD into emerging GHG compliance systems, with a specific focus on options for CA ARB’s Preliminary Draft Regulation (PDR) for Cap‐ and‐Trade.
Clearly CA is exploring the idea of becoming part of a REDD scheme. I suspect the goals to achieve before we get into a REDD system are a national cap-and-trade system and then the US tied into an international cap-and-trade system. But you never know…
Intersting take on Proposition 23 from the BBC:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11654809
All sorts of ‘ballot initiatives’ detailed, like the internationally-significant Multnomah Casino, but a certain Proposition that could have ramifications far away isn’t even listed. Good to see that the alleged new even-handed approach to AGW issues has swept through the Corporation…
*sigh* I think we in California are doomed to be the bad example that sets the rest of the country straight. If I’m the last one, I’ll turn out the lights–er, blow out the candles–when I leave. 🙂
I concure with your assesment of the pac ads.
Watching our local and state election campaines unfold, I saw numerous, very negative adds on TV made by third parties. It occured to me that the negative adds were paid for by establishment types trying to protect their status quo. I’m not particularly fond of the status quo in politics right now so I decided to not vote for the lesser of two evils like the establishment wanted but for the greater of two evils! Honestly nobody can be as evil as the PAC comercials make out the other guy to be. The next person I vote for for president is going to be the kind of person that clubs baby harp seals to death, trips little old ladies as they push their walkers down the isle and eats Sweetbread and Fava beans in front of Hanable Lecter without sharing; at least according to the PACs.
“Djozar says:
November 2, 2010 at 7:16 am
Y’all bring those manufacturing jobs over to Texas. Our attorney general spends his time fighting those silly EPA regulators and revenuers. Heck, our state LOVES industry (something to do with jobs). Just make sure y’all leave your air heads behind.”
Texas is first on our list. I wonder what the unemployment rate in California will be in two years?
“Any hints on what company or area that is so I can watch for the canary to die?”
We employ 100. I’ll let you know after we move. I don’t want our company to be made an example of, Soviet-style.
Atlas is shrugging. California will be one of the first to go down.
Looks like Prop 23 has gone down in green flames. What are them folks in Cafilornia smokin’ these days? {Yes … I spelled it Cafilornia}
I’m planning an escape 2 to 3 years hence. Sooner if I can manage it.
I’d love to hear opinions on great places to relocate (business-friendly climate, decent weather, good scenery, etc).
“California is poised to kill the goose that laid the golden state egg.” (Anthony Watts)
“Killing the goose that lays the golden egg is a viable political strategy, so long as the goose does not die before the next election and no one traces the politicians’ fingerprints on the weapon.” (Thomas Sowell, Applied Economics)
It’s circa 1975 in California. Just as New York City lived in a dream world then, California lives in a fantasy world now. As the state careens towards bankruptcy, its own voters pile on greater energy costs on itself via Prop 23 while at the same time voting itself ever higher taxes via Prop 25. The middle class of the state will flee to Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Colorado and other more welcoming environs. As for the rest, they will beg for Obama and the feds for a bailout. While Jerry Ford said to NYC to “drop dead” without compunction, Obama will tell Jerry Brown and the rest of the California clowns that he cannot help them. Thus reality finally comes to the Fantasy State.
The States have been said to play a role as experimental laboratories of national policy.
Economic seppuku (aka hari-kari) has not yet been tried in a state as large as California. An interesting experiment, this.
Ahh yes. I can already hear the heavy footprints of companies headed for the border and beyond.
I personally was waiting to found an entrepreneurial venture until after the election. Given the outcomes of the elections here, I am proud to announce that my new LLC will call TENNESSEE home. No state income tax, cheap gas and labor and energy, and none of the gazillion regulatory restrictions that have strangled California’s economy to beyond dead.
What was once the promised land is now nothing more than a big promissary note that will never be repaid. I refuse to participate in that futility. Later Gate-ers…
A sad state of affairs for democracy…..
As opposed to making people go out to vote, why not just count the money raised for the campaigns? As is the case with the last federal election, the one with the biggest bank account wins.
Bob.
New Mexico follows Caliornia over the Cliff
http://www.heliogenic.net/2010/11/03/new-mexico-follows-california-over-the-cliff/