The View From 1776

The attitudes and energies underlying the proposed Senate legislation to regulate emissions of greenhouse gases accord with the basic conception of the first organized synthesizer of socialist doctrine, Henri de Saint-Simon.  Emile Durkheim, the founder of sociology in France, wrote that the basis of Saint-Simon’s entire theory of the socialist religion was that science should exercise hegemony over mankind.

Saint-Simon’s presumption was that private businessmen and individuals lacked competence to understand and to apply scientific principles to socialized (i.e., controlled by government for the public benefit) management of business.  Only trained bureaucrats, either in government bureaus or placed in charge of business management, had the required knowledge to make business fully efficient and therefore productive of the greatest degree of benefit to the socialized political society.

Unfortunately, what passes for science today is a very weak reed for bureaucrats to lean upon.  It is too often junk science, concocted by self-interested hot shots gunning for large research grants to fuel personal fame and fortune.  Prominent among today’s junk science gambits is the man-made global warming hoax.  Placing too much reliance upon unproved computer models with global implications is a dangerous policy, but precisely what Al Gore and his acolytes propose to do.

One example of worldwide damage inflicted by Congressional dabbling in “science” is the idiocy of government mandating and subsidizing ethanol production.

Carbon emissions control will be far more destabilizing and will sharply reduce the nation’s wealth and reduce available goods and services.

In addition to the specific damage to be inflicted upon society by measures such as the Senate greenhouse gas legislation, there is a more pervasive and equally ominous effect: government intervention retards the advance of knowledge.

A Senate bill introduced by Sens. Barbara Boxer (D., Calif.), Joseph Lieberman (I., Conn.), and John Warner (R., Va.) to control carbon emissions ultimately would allow the Federal government to decide which of today’s private businesses will be allowed to survive.  It doesn’t go that far now, but it would be difficult to find any regulatory salient that has not led to hundreds or thousands of supplemental regulations expanding the scope and authority of the initial regulatory action.  This legislation is the proverbial camel’s nose under the tent.

Of it, the Wall Street Journal observed:

Warner-Lieberman [legislation] would impose the most extensive government reorganization of the American economy since the 1930s.

For those unfamiliar with the 1930s as a baseline reference, that is the era of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal, which imposed a socialist regime upon our nation for the first time in its history.

As a foretaste, reflect upon Congresswoman Maxine Waters’s threat to oil company executives to nationalize the petroleum industry.

Initially the Senate carbon emissions bill is disguised as a sort of free-market system based upon capping carbon emissions and creating a market in emission rights. 

But the basic fact remains: this legislation puts the Federal government on the road to regulating all businesses that use any form of energy, which is to say, every business.

If no one in America’s political system pays attention to the messages delivered yesterday by the executives of the oil firms to the Senate judiciary committee, then U. S. economic fortunes are destined to decline. The politicians are living in a 1960s fantasy world, playing old and mythical Marxist themes on the alleged power of giant oil capitalists to control, manipulate and direct energy markets at the expense of the common man, the consumer.
Terence Corcoran, Financial Post, 22 May 2008.

Even people who stay at home watching TV or using computers will pay a very big price, because almost everything we do uses some form of energy.

Make no mistake about it.  A carbon emissions control program, once enacted, will metastasize like a virulent cancer. 

Hilary Benn, the [UK] Environment Secretary, said: “The Government is committed to building a low-carbon economy, here and around the world. That means a complete change in the way we live... The (UK) Independent, May 2, 2008.

This socialist mindset echoes the pronouncements of Sir William Beveridge, a prime mover in Britain’s socialist Labour government after World War II:

…the State,” he wrote, “ in [regulating unemployment] is not wholly master of events so long as it desires to preserve the freedom of individuals……the State cannot undertake the responsibility for full employment without full powers.

In other words, central planning necessary for imposition of socialism can not become effective without subordinating the rights of individuals to the goals of the planners.

So too in regulating greenhouse gasses.  The government will gradually be compelled to assert full control over all carbon emissions, and the cost will be borne by the little guy, the lower-income groups.

Rebel Labour backbenchers fear that plans to extend higher road taxes for gas-guzzling cars to models registered as long ago as 2001 will infuriate motorists on tight budgets, who bought older cars because they are cheaper, and who cannot afford to upgrade to cleaner engines. The Guardian, May 18, 2008.