Here is an informative article about the carbon cap and trade system that is in operation in Europe, and which politicians and rent-seeking corportions want to implement in the United States.

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/NicoleGelinas/2007/08/26/an_inconvenient_solution?page=full&comments=true

One key thing about the cap-and-trade system that everyone needs to consider is this. Kenny-boy Lay of Enron notoriety had been meeting in the White House with Bill Clinton and Al Gore back in the late 90's. The carbon trading scheme would have saved Enron Lay thought. But the evil Bush got elected, and he refused to go along with Lay, and Enron collapsed. I think Enron deserved to die, and a scheme that would have saved it is probably not good for America.

What is sad is that politicians and their rent-seeker supporters don't care whether or not global warming is happening (which is in doubt because of the way supporters of the hypothesis have an interest in fudging the data that they generate; and they won't let others critique) or whether or not man is a factor. The politicians see opprtunity to ceate more regulations that will permit them to reward their financial supporters and punish those who oppose them. Many corporate leaders see opportunity for profit. They don't care about what happens to the poor people. In fact, increasing the number of people on welfare is a goal of Democrats, and has been since the days of FDR and LBJ. The politicians know that if they can get carbon cap and trade programs in place now, those programs will continue as global temperatures decline in the future (as I expect, and as I think many of the proponents of global warming also expect, which is why they are eager to strike now before cooling becomes obvious.)

I read a lot of goofy stuff by liberals about Oil companies opposing carbon cap-and-trade. That makes no sense because natural gas prices will increase in a carbon cap and trade environment since natural gas will beat coal since it produces less carbon dioxide, and the politicians won't allow building nuclear plants that generate no carbon dioxide. So natural gas prices will increase.

The same thing goes for oil companies and gasoline. Oil companies are not building new refineries because the government is mandating a reduction in gasoline use by increasing gasoline mileage requirements, and mandating the use of ethanol. So the price of gasoline will increase allowing oil companies to make more money off of their existing facilities. Substituting corn-based ethanol for gasoline does little to reduce carbon dioxide, increases the price of food a lot, and is a stupid idea that illustrates why we should keep the government out of markets.