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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JPeden – the depletion allowance is not confined to oil. We have a similar setup in Australia, and I daresay that other countries that have substantial resource extraction industries do as well.
The principle is that the mine/oilwell/gas field or whatever is a finite resource – unlike a farm, or a factory. In recognition of the fact that these businesses are very risky and require a lot of capital investment, the value of the asset is allowed to be depreciated at a greater rate than, say, a factory building. It applies across all resource industries, and is certainly not a specific favour to the evil “fossil fuel” crowd.
I was surprised to see Mosher repeating this meme, especially when taxes on fuel of the carbon-based kind frequently constitute more than half of the price for consumers, and outweigh the benefits of tax concessions many times over in terms of government revenue.
@Reich
No tricks.
Kevin M send me a link to scientology Dana, which I ignored, until scientology came up in an unrelated conversation with Tallbloke. So I forwarded Kevin’s link. Anthony must have picked up on that.
Embarrassed by my action — alerting people to unchecked data — I then searched and found that there are three people called Dana Nuccitelli.
I alerted Anthony as soon as I realized that he had copied my mistake.
@richard Toll
Ok! Then it was a honest mistake, I take back ‘trick’. Still wondering about your twitter timeline though (just double checked the time difference), but there could be some technical explanation for that.
Lesson of the day: Check and double-check!
On that note, Richard, I looked at your version 3 of the consensus paper and to me it appears that you used the same graph for Figures S2 and S3 (probably some file mix-up).
@ur momisugly Richard Tol
Sorry (again) for miswriting your last name (stupid spelling self correction features!)
Dana is a very ugly Cnut.
BELIEVE IT WHEN YOU SEE IT, or
CARBON TAX: DAMAGE FIRST, NOTHING SECOND
http://tinyurl.com/ct3bnxh
AUSTRALIA: Federal Minister for Climate Change Greg Combet has confirmed the government will defer $1.4 billion of tax cuts that were supposed to be funded by revenue associated with the carbon tax.
The tax cuts would be deferred until the carbon price recovered, after it was linked with the European carbon.
The tax cuts would be dumped and there would be cuts to clean energy initiatives.
“The clean technology programs were the only programs Labor specifically put in place to compensate manufacturing for the damage caused by the carbon tax”
“Whilst industry and the Coalition were highlighting the damage that the carbon tax would inflict on Australian manufacturing, Greg Combet hid behind the pretence that industry carbon tax handouts were the solution, and now he’s preparing to dump them.”
It is an economic impossibility to tax an item of any sort, with the revenue confiscated by the government, to result in a revenue nuetral situation.
If You can bend the Laws of Mathematics,
Like I can bend the Laws of Physics,
Then anything is possible with Government Accounting.
secret tip – Really I am bending the
the Laws of Perception, and so >>>>
(did you see what I did there?)