Many readers know the story of the Viking turned King who was said to be able to hold back the sea, only to realize that he had no such power.
King Canute the Great, the legend says, seated on his throne on the seashore, waves lapping round his feet. Canute had learned that his flattering courtiers claimed he was “So great, he could command the tides of the sea to go back”
I think that’s how SkS political advocate Dana Nuccitelli views his pet climate movement. He thinks that a Carbon Tax is the solution. In a hilariously swivel-eyed op-ed he managed to get published at the Sacramento Bee, Viewpoints: Climate debate is settled; carbon tax is vital where the editorial board didn’t take note of the slow motion discrediting of his claims about the so called 97% scientific consensus, Nuccitelli beams:
One of the most effective solutions – a revenue-neutral carbon tax
The only thing a Carbon Tax will command in California, is a mass exodus of business.
After Obamacare hits business owners hard in 2014 with expected increases up to 146%, many will be stretched to the breaking point. A Carbon Tax would be the final impetus for many to leave the state. That would include my own small business. While we are quoting fables in the context of California business and tax revenue, Dana would do well to read the The Goose With the Golden Egg
ONE day a countryman going to the nest of his Goose found there an egg all yellow and glittering. When he took it up it was as heavy as lead and he was going to throw it away, because he thought a trick had been played upon him. But he took it home on second thoughts, and soon found to his delight that it was an egg of pure gold. Every morning the same thing occurred, and he soon became rich by selling his eggs. As he grew rich he grew greedy; and thinking to get at once all the gold the Goose could give, he killed it and opened it only to find,—nothing.
“GREED OFT O’ERREACHES ITSELF.”
California, once the “golden state” now faces routine economic exodus.
And in the face of world CO2 production, particularly China, what possible difference could a California Carbon Tax make in the face of these numbers?
Source: CDIAC and Harvard, from this WUWT essay: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/06/co2-emissions-china-is-the-big-hockey-stick-in-the-room/
Note, the drop in the green line. It’s the economy, stupid.
California has already reduced emissions due to its own economic decline, with drops over three straight years, with 2011 dropping 22%, but apparently that isn’t fast enough for King Canucitelli.
But sure, let’s imagine we can tax the Carbon Dioxide right out of the air. With workable ideas like this, I predict Governor “moonbeam” Jerry Brown will soon tap King Canucitelli to head up a new program to tax that CO2 right out of the air, and business tax revenue right out of the state.
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Richard Tol (@RichardTol) says:
June 5, 2013 at 10:12 am
Scientologist Dana is a woman. Environmentalist Dana is a man.
…
So that would make e-Dana a Climatologist? Though he does seem to have the same blind conviction that he can control matter, energy, space, and time, in this case via a carbon tax…. Every time I hear the the name Nucitelli it makes me think of Nutella….a lot of nuts with only a little bit of chocolate…
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/699c1f18-8d79-11e2-a0fd-00144feabdc0.html
March 15, 2013 7:02 pm
A least-worst tax
A levy on carbon is an idea whose time has come
Taxes are always a regrettable necessity, but some are less regrettable than others. A tax that strengthens energy security and cuts pollution, while minimising the damage done to employment and investment, is one of the least regrettable of all.
Yet a carbon tax, which has all those characteristics, is struggling to find support from the US administration or in Congress. It deserves much wider enthusiasm.
One of the few uncontroversial conclusions of economics is that it is better to tax “bads” than “goods”. Wages and profits are desirable objectives, and governments have no good excuse for obstructing them. They are taxed largely for reasons of convenience, at the cost of disincentives to wage-earning and profitmaking that are a drag on the economy.
You really need to be looking at the economic data in Australia. Ford Motor Co is shutting down down under. The mining sector is reeling and the manufacturing and construction sectors are in decline. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-03/canary-in-coal-mine-gasps-as-australia-resource-jobs-fall.html In other words, the carbon tax IS working.
So, another revenue NEUTERING proposal?
Only when they confiscate his scooter will he wake up.
“REPLY: well, you wouldn’t since you tend to be in agreement with such schemes. I’ll post opinions as I see fit, tough noogies if that confuses you. – Anthony”
Whether I agree with it doesn’t really matter. You still wasted a whole post debunking a claim he didn’t make.
REPLY: That’s a strawman argument. Again tough noogies for you. – Anthony
Anthony,
Not to get overly argumentative, but “provided he offers an apology for the vitriol and hate (and wishes for my death) that goes on at SkS in their forum” is a bit silly. You are not responsible for the occasional vitriolic (or downright violent) comment that appears here, and Dana is not responsible for the comments other might make at SKS. If he had personally written something vitriolic or hateful toward you, or called for your death, that would be one thing, but holding comments made by others on a forum he moderates against him seems like a bit of a double standard.
Anyhow, the scientologist thing seems like a reasonably innocent mistake. Lets move on to more important things.
REPLY:At WUWT, we do our best to moderate those things out when we see them, because they don’t speak for our views. Well, you should walk a mile in my shoes someday if you think the amount of hate directed at me and requests for an apology is “silly”.
The difference is that it was an insider’s forum, with no moderation and an “anything goes attitude”. One commneter said the lack of moderation was “liberating”. As one of the principals of that website, Dana can most certainly speak for it, and he has. He simply prefers to keep the status-quo there. They are in their comfort zone. One of these days that comfort zone will get somebody hurt, fiscally, physically or both. – Anthony
So much for a “revenue-neutral” carbon tax – quote:
“But a new report from the Congressional Research Service released today illustrates why it’s such an enticing prospect. According to the CRS analysis, a modest carbon tax of $20 per ton that rises 5.6 percent annually could cut the projected 10-year deficit by 50 percent — from $2.3 trillion down to $1.1 trillion.”
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/09/25/903521/20-dollar-per-ton-carbon-tax-could-reduce-deficit-by-12-trillion-in-10-years/?mobile=nc
Liar. liar, pants on fire, Dana!
Scottie says:
June 5, 2013 at 10:38 am
Richard Tol:
Scientologist Dana is a woman. Environmentalist Dana is a man.
How does he do that?
————————————————————————————————————–
Anything goes for a Twoface with a forked tounge…
Dana is using “Gore” tactics. Scare them the hell to death and watch the the coffers fill by people selling or buying. Dana may not actually be making money out of this but he hopes to fill the “kudos” coffers.
I also retract my support of the statement that Nuccitelli is a Scientologist. I should have realised that anything relating – even so ephemerally – to ‘science’ would be beyond his pale. (Although, he and Scientology are definitely reported to be ‘cults’ – according to the Guardian (H/T to the great Bob Monkhouse))
Omnologos says:
“So the people pay
T2=R1+OH1+ OH2”
It is way worse than that. That is just the additional tax we will pay. The increased cost of energy increases the cost of pretty much everything since it takes energy to produce and transport goods sold. A carbon tax will result in lost jobs and a lowering of standard of living for the middle class and the poor. Taxes will have to be further increased to pay for the increased number of people needing to live on welfare.
Proof of what happens when you institute a carbon tax is to observe what is happening in Australia as Sean points out.
Not a pretty sight at all, unless you happen to be a “greenie”.
Anthony says:
California, once the “golden state” now faces routine economic exodus.
============================================================
yep. The famous Prop 13, getting rid of California’s land tax,
killed the “golden state.”
Same thing happened in Michigan 1995. Last economic crash
(2008) GMC fell over.
Delaware is now only state with land tax. How is it doing?
No land tax is bad for business because taxes have to be shifted to
economic activity. As Willis has so clearly pointed out: tax energy, you
tax economic activity. Tax economic activity and business is damaged.
Result: business becomes very sensitive to location. The higher the
burden of non-land taxes, the more business either shuts down or
emigrates. Either choice is bad for jobs and no jobs is bad for people.
The carbon dioxide tax we pay now is revenue neutral. I don’t pay it and they have zero revenue increase because I don’t pay it. That is the best kind of revenue neutral tax.
Dear Sophistry, err, Sophecles
Were you here in California when Prop 13 passed? Do you live here now?
A no to either or both of those questions makes your post nothing but uninformed drivel. There are property taxes in California. Quite high by most state standards. The reason Prop 13 passed resoundingly was that people were receiving tax bills that exceeded their mortgage payment. People were being forced to remodel and rent part of their homes or outright sell them because they could not afford the taxes.
A tipping point was finally reached and government’s ability to steal from the public was curtailed. The failure of the state government here to live within their means has everything to do with promising billions and starting new programs and nannying us all to death. It has nothing to do with protecting homeowners from being tossed out on their ears when they can no longer afford the property taxes.
pbh
If I may….Johanna has a great exposé of the (NOT) Obama tweet about the 97% Crooked paper – http://joannenova.com.au/2013/06/lewandowsky-and-cook-and-the-barack-obama-tweet-that-wasnt/.
Where is the tax scheme? It’s hard to understand how it works. Anybody have a link to the actual plan? I read the article & he only says a few consertives support the plan, but doesn’t give the plan.
Because it utilizes the free market to drive the transition to clean energy. Putting a tax on carbon corrects the distortion in the market that gives fossil fuels an unfair advantage over clean energy. Once that distortion is corrected – by making fossil fuels accountable for their costs to society – clean tech becomes the more attractive option for generating energy.
In a free market you don’t drive anything. You let the market work it’s will. If green enegry was profitable on a large scale folks would be using it. Whom ever makes green enegry usable on a large scale will be giving Bill Gates a weekly allowance. 🙂
He may not be a scientologist, but he is wasting his families inheritance from their tasty chocolate hazelnut spread on his climate nonsense.
Anthony, we left CA 3 years ago and moved to Austin TX. Though Austin is a liberal bastion it benefits greatly from the overall conservative, business friendly Texas. You would be welcomed here with open arms!
Hey, North Nenana just had a 4.0 earthquake. That record ice breakup must have rattled everything!
He may not be an “actual” scientologist, but his ideas have the same credibilty as Xenu:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenu
Or possibly he has been infected by a Xenusian Thetan and is “a person who is able to create his own universe”.
Now that
The hidden agenda for most Warmists is nothing to do with global warming. It’s all about shutting down the fossil fuel infrastructure. They just haven’t thought through the unintended consequences yet.
The leftists will keep coming back to this over and over. And if they ever get it they will then move on to something else, and go after that over and over. Rinse and repeat ad infinitum. Here in the “free” USA they already have succeeded in swamping the citizens with an unholy triad of Ponzi scheme timebombs set to detonate on future generations: Socialist Security, Medicare/Medicaid, Obamacare. There is already no way to massage the numbers of financing these into fiscal sanity. But they are working too slowly for the leftists so naturally they need more. A Carbon Tax fits the bill. As does a VAT. They will press these until you cry “uncle”, and then proceed to the next attack.
The only thing that bothers me is that even today we still have those that want to take some purist view on Climate matters, continually steering the discussion back to an alleged scientific dispute and away from the painful truth. That truth? You have been had. This is politics disguised as Science, plain and simple. Dana Nutcase is nothing more than a leftist useful idiot, as is Mann and Hansen and McKibben and Romm and John Kook. It is yet another form of the old parable: “the greatest trick the devil pulled was convincing everyone he doesn’t exist”. He does exist, and in our timeline his preferred form is that of the totalitarian left.
I am starting to believe that human beings have a normally dormant gene, one that is normally active in other species like ants and bees that causes the critter to be natural born slaves forever seeking domination by a leader, allowing themselves to be a happy worker servant to the hive. This gene is active in probably 1/4 to 1/3 of the population in the USA. Consequently we have two distinct types of people: those that want to be free, and those that don’t and are willing to be dominated. The third possible type of human are those so-called independents who are too cowardly to pick a team and continually insist on trying to compromise the two sides. However there is no compromise between freedom and domination because compromised freedom is domination.
In earlier times that gene was more dominant resulting in Kingdoms and Empires and Feudal societies with more obvious servitude toward the Queen Ant and Queen Bee. Here in the USA we rolled back that structure, at least for a while. It will take a lot of courage from the fickle “free” people here to maintain it. Dana Nutcase and the rest are on a mission to unravel it, and quickly. They have targeted the fickle moderates and have chosen to use “Science” as the vehicle. Don’t fall for it.
Revenue neutral just means that they tax guys they don’t like, and use the money to buy votes.
Canute was the prototypical sceptic and BS-debunker. He should be your model, your hero. His demonstration was staged to deflate and discredit the syncophants around him.