"Hey, Look At Me! I'm Pointless!"

Little Matty furrows that oft-furrowed brow and comes up with the sort of pointless observation we've come to expect of him:

The flipside of the Simpson-Bowles document’s unsound aggregate cap on revenue is that they were very uncreative in their exploration of revenue options. For example, what about a tax on greenhouse gas emissions? The mere fact that the conservative movement is currently engaged in a massive fit of pretending that greenhouse gas emissions aren’t a problem doesn’t change the fact that greenhouse gas emissions are, in fact, a problem. Taxing them would reduce the quantity of greenhouse gas emissions and help mitigate the problem. It also creates revenue.

That's not necessarily correct, Matty. At least some producers could (and would) simply pass along the costs associated with the tax to consumers. Others would move their manufacturing facilities to environs less taxing. But that's not the point...

The point is that neither Barack Obama nor Harry Reid could presuade Democratic Senators (such as Ohio's Sherrod Brown) that a similar tax called "Cap-and-Trade" wouldn't result in further flight of manufacturing jobs out of the country.

So why prattle on about how wonderful a greenhouse gas emissions tax would be when you know there isn't a chance in Hell one will become law? Well, in Matty's case, it relieves you of the truly daunting task of trying to come up with policy solutions that could actually be workable.

That would require work!

Note: If this is the very most best the boy can do, then he's a twit.

Note the Second: Prattle, Harvard, prattle. Prattle, prattle, prattle.

Comments

[richard mcenroe]

The greenhouse gas tax is the green equivalent of the "THIS isn't the war we SHOULD be fighting, we should be fighting THAT war over there! No wonder we're not making any progress!" argument... and just as dishonest.

[Pangur]

Matt apparently doesn't get the notion that corporations act as very efficient collectors of taxes imposed on them from above. Sure a well-rounded Harvard man understands that!

[Joe Redfield]

Warmists are the "bitter clingers" of the Left. They'll stick with their greens and government until...their personal lives are slightly inconvenienced, at which point they'll forget the whole thing.

[Randy Rager]

I think you assume too much knowledge on Little Matty Yglesias' part, Dennis.

His avoidance of anything like work is duly noted, but not surprising.

That trait is after all the root of all Leftism.

[Mike C.]

You don't have to be a pro paleontologist to recognize that there's more life in your average Cambrian fossil than there is in Crap&Tax. That dead horse is already a molecular film in the ground - time to go beat on something else.

[aelfheld]

Wouldn't a tax on greenhouse gas emissions disproportionately affect Matty?

[uggs discount]

I want to express my admiration of your writing skill and ability to make readers read from the beginning to the end. I would like to read newer posts and to share my thoughts with you. Yeah

[uggs discount]

My advice can be curl up with this publication over a rainy day, and take satisfaction in the adventures of David Balfour and Alan Breck Stewart for the Scottish highlands.