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oh_synap15 karma

Have you talked with folks doing campaign in neighboring WA on how their conversations with conservative legislators are going? The testimony from a couple of weeks ago had some good talking points http://rameznaam.com/2016/02/21/my-carbon-price-presentation-to-the-washington-legislature/

oh_synap11 karma

With respect, can you elaborate a little more on what you mean here? I think Bob is pointing out that, where we are today, bipartisanship is necessary to enact major change and thus conservatives need to engage. And further, that conservative solutions (internalizing the negative externalities) are regarded by many experts to be more efficient and effective mechanisms to bring about that change than over-regulation that many establishment environmentalists and liberals publicly prefer. Admittedly if we could scrap large aspects of the current system we might be able to set up incentives that moved all of this a lot faster (and based on your first comment, that seems your preferred approach). Certainly there are some very compelling arguments for that approach in my personal opinion too. But the climate science suggests we probably don't have the years it would take to do that and re-stabilize the system and then act to fix the climate.

oh_synap10 karma

Hey Bob, thanks for doing this and the great work at republicEn. Do you see a path to getting free enterprise-based climate legislation back on the national table in the next couple of years? As a proponent for a national carbon tax akin to I-732 being discussed in WA, what do you see as the best opportunity to focus time/energy to increase the likelihood of this getting onto the table? Thanks! -Josh from the Pricing Carbon Initiative

oh_synap8 karma

Pretty sure it's Kasich ;)

oh_synap5 karma

India's emissions are actually relatively low and they have the opportunity to skip straight to renewables in many cases instead of investing in polluting infrastructure. China's plans, while not as economically efficient as they could be (since they are experimenting with cap and trade), are actually in many respects more aggressive than our current national plans here in the U.S. http://www.c2es.org/international/key-country-policies/china See also the U.S. China Climate Change Agreement from late 2014.