Nature is Still not a Liberal Plot

Climate change will emerge as one of America's most difficult--and transforming--strategic issues, regardless of who swears to protect and defend the Constitution next January. For presidential candidate John McCain, that reality and his record championing the environment are running into his courting of conservatives. Terry Tamminen, head of New America Foundation's Climate Policy Program, says that McCain's attempts to paint cap-and-trade as the conservative approach to climate change may leave no one satisfied, in the latest issue of The New Republic.

...McCain's economic guru, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, told me that McCain would "consult experts" on such questions, but "probably won't put out a specific bill that keeps up with these developments."

Holtz-Eakin suggests that McCain's approach would essentially be a conservative one. Unlike Newt Gingrich or Rudy Giuliani--who insist that, in lieu of emission caps, Congress should just fund alternative-energy solutions-- McCain favors setting a cap on carbon and letting the market adjust on its own. He's generally disdainful of corporate handouts (save to the nuclear industry, that is)--a hostility that has bolstered many of his environmental positions over the years. Bob Witzeman, an Arizona conservationist who has canoed with McCain, recalls that, "whenever I'd bring up an environmental topic, like mining law or grazing, he'd become cautiously non-committal." But, Witzeman adds, on the subject of pork, McCain's eyes would widen--"it's his favorite topic." Indeed, one Senate staffer who has worked with McCain suggests that the senator's much-lauded opposition to drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge had as much to do with his contempt for Alaska Senator (and arch-porker) Ted Stevens as with any principled concern for nature. Likewise, when McCain helped filibuster the 2003 energy bill, he seemed to be as exercised about its earmarks for an energy-efficient Hooters restaurant in Louisiana as its irresponsible promotion of fossil fuels.

This mindset could, ironically, drive McCain into supporting a strong cap- and-trade regime that doesn't carve out loopholes for corporations. "McCain makes [business] nervous as hell," says Cochran, whose organization has helped corral corporate support for an emission cap. But a strict conservative approach to climate also has drawbacks. "You can't just put a cap-and-trade on smokestacks," says Terry Tamminen, a Schwarzenegger adviser who runs the New America Foundation's Climate Policy Center. "You have to deal with tailpipes, with buildings that are already out there--and with agriculture and forestry, and other components." Emission-curbing steps like boosting public transit, retrofitting homes, and encouraging more efficient land use often require proactive government efforts. Tax credits for renewable power are needed to nurture nascent wind and solar industries. These measures are just as critical as McCain's preferred nuclear fix (even building a staggering 200 new nuclear plants by mid-century would cut emissions by only a fraction of the amount necessary). Yet, twice in recent months, McCain has skipped votes on Democratic bills that would, respectively, shift tax breaks from oil to renewable energy and offer incentives to boost efficiency. Both failed by a single vote.

Continue reading, Grand Canyon, by Bradford Plumer