|
Here's a comment I made on another forum which tends to agree with sendler's comment above (quoting is broken on this thread):
I'm slightly inclined toward liberty, but protection of the commons (environment) is among the few legitimate roles of federal government. The only thing is, without a collaborative and binding agreement that clearly defines the problem, the reasonable goals needed to avoid the problem for each country, and a method of enforcement, the whole thing is useless other than claiming some sort of moral superiority. If the US drastically reduced fossil fuel consumption, the price of oil would fall at the expense of our economy. Then the temptation to exploit those low prices by other countries would be too great, and their consumption would increase as well as their economy (fossil fuel consumption and economy are linked).
The problem is much worse than getting people to drive EVs (transportation is 19% of energy use). It's much worse than getting even 1 or 2 big countries to take action that would both reduce fossil fuel consumption and slow economic output. It takes collaboration between allies and enemies alike in all the largest countries agreeing and adhering to clearly defined goals with the threat of violence to enforce those agreements. Anything less is ineffective.
I expect the left to give lip service to the issue, and the right to deny/avoid/downplay the issue altogether. It's political suicide to actually implement effective policy.
|