Whats in McCains Plan?
McCain, who previously teamed with Lieberman to draft global warming legislation, supports a cap-and-trade proposal designed to reduce U.S. carbon emissions by 60% from 1990 levels by 2050. He argued that such a system “harnesses human ingenuity in the pursuit of alternatives to carbon-based fuels.” McCain’s two Democratic rivals, Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, support an 80% reduction by mid-century, a recommendation in line with the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The Lieberman-Warner bill supposedly would cut emissions by 70% by 2050. A closer examination of cap and trade reveals the pitfalls of such a system. Even if it works perfectly, which is unlikely, it essentially amounts to a new tax on energy. In its analysis of the Lieberman-Warner bill, the Congressional Budget Office said the legislation would increase federal revenue by $1.21 trillion from 2009 to 2018-money that can best be described as a tax increase. Several studies of the cap-and-trade pr
