WASHINGTON (AFP) - As President Barack Obama tries to green the United States by slapping limits on carbon emissions, Congress was told to ignore his plan because climate change does not exist.

“The right response to the non-problem of global warming is to have the courage to do nothing,” said British aristocrat Lord Christopher Walter Monckton, a leading proponent of the “climate change is myth” movement. The Third Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, who was an advisor to former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, argued before the Energy and Environment Subcommittee that for 14 years, contrary to broadly accepted scientific beliefs, “there has been no statistically significant global warming.”

The House hearing, titled “Adaptation Policies in Climate Legislation,” discussed ways to address President Barack Obama’s cap-and-trade proposal in his 3.55-trillion-dollar budget plan, presented to Congress in February. Obama’s proposal would limit emissions of greenhouse gases for manufacturers, and permit companies to trade the right to pollute to other firms—a similar cap-and-trade system to the European model.

The moves are now subject of intense political opposition in Congress, notably from lawmakers representing US states heavily invested in energy production through fossil fuels. “Adaptation is at present unnecessary,” said Lord Monckton at the hearing. “Mitigation is always unnecessary. It is also disproportionately expensive. “Green jobs are the new euphemism for mass unemployment,” he added.

Addressing the hearing on the “balanced Biblical view” for environment and development issues, Pastor Calvin Beisner—national spokesman for the Cornwall Alliance, a coalition of clergy, theologians and religious leaders—questioned proposed efforts to combat climate change. “I am convinced that policies meant to reduce alleged carbon dioxide-induced global warming will be destructive,” he said.

“The Biblical world view sees Earth and its ecosystems as the effect of a wise God’s creation and ... therefore robust, resilient, and self regulating, like the product of any good engineer.” Beisner argued that policies to reduce carbon emissions would destroy jobs and be prohibitively expensive. “The truth is that no alternative fuels can compete at present with fossil fuels for price,” he said.

See larger video here.

Congressman Joe Barton, from the oil-rich state of Texas, maintained that “mankind always adapts,” and that “adaptation to shifts in temperature is not that difficult.” What will be difficult, he argued, was “adaptation to rampant unemployment and enormous, spontaneous and avoidable changes to our economy if we adopt such a reckless policy as cap-and-tax or cap-and-trade.” Read more here.

By The Institute for Energy Research

When President Obama released his budget plan three weeks ago, it included a whopping $1.6 trillion in new taxes. The plan contained $989 billion in various tax increases and a $646 billion cap and trade tax. As we previously noted, if enacted, this would be the largest tax increase in American history.

But it turns out the Administration’s budget did not reveal the entire truth. A top White House aide told Senate staffers that cap and trade tax would be much higher than the initially reported $646 billion. In fact, Jason Furman, the deputy director of the National Economic Council, told Senate staffers the tax would cost American taxpayers between $1.3 trillion and $1.9 trillion. A $1.6 trillion tax raise is huge-but a tax increase of $2.3 trillion or $2.9 trillion is astonishing. To put that in perspective, that is a tax increase of $7,500 to $9,500 per American. Let’s hope the cost of the President’s budget does not continue to escalate.

By Ian Talley, Wall Street Journal

See in this Wall Street Journal report on the EPA sending the White House a proposed finding that carbon dioxide is a danger to public health, a step that could trigger a clampdown on emissions of greenhouse gases across a wide swath of the economy. If approved by the White House Office of Management and Budget, the endangerment finding could clear the way for the EPA to use the Clean Air Act to control emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases believed to contribute to climate change. In effect, the government would treat carbon dioxide as a pollutant. The EPA submitted the proposed rule to the White House on Friday, according to federal records published Monday.

Business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers warn that if the EPA moves forward on regulation of CO2 under the Clean Air Act—instead of a measured legislative approach—it could hobble the already weak economy.

Coal-fired power plants, oil refineries and domestic industries, such as energy-intensive paper, cement, fertilizer, steel, and glass manufacturers, worry that increased cost burdens imposed by climate-change laws will put them at a severe competitive disadvantage to their international peers that aren’t bound by similar environmental rules. Environmentalists have called for the endangerment finding, and say action by Congress or the Obama administration to curb greenhouse gases is necessary to halt the ill effects of climate change.  (H/T Dr. Benny Peiser, CCNET)

Historic Day: EPW Minority Blog

FACT: EPA’s finding is indeed historic news, for the simple fact that it will enlarge EPA’s regulatory reach to an unprecedented degree, extending it into every corner of the US economy, causing enormous economic damage.  According to Peter Glaser, a national legal expert on the Clean Air Act, an endangerment finding will lead to new EPA regulations covering virtually everything, including “office buildings, apartment buildings, warehouse and storage buildings, educational buildings, health care buildings such as hospitals and assisted living facilities, hotels, restaurants, religious worship buildings, public assembly buildings, supermarkets, retail malls, agricultural facilities and many others.” An array of new development projects could be delayed, perhaps for several years, causing “an economic train wreck.” This conclusion was supported recently by the Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis, which found that EPA’s new carbon regulations would destroy over 800,000 jobs and result in a cumulative GDP loss of $7 trillion by 2029. 

See also here in the Houston Chronicle, how the U.S. climate change laws could create a market for carbon dioxide emissions much like the risky mortgage-backed derivatives market that contributed to the global recession, according to a report set for release today.