Stand Up, Governors

[Valin]

National Review:

The states should resist the EPA’s all-pain, no-gain carbon regulations.

Derrick Morgan

July 21 2014

 

In Washington, the executive branch is overreaching as never before, and Congress seems disinclined to do much to stop the Leviathan. For those who believe in limited government, the last, best hope for resistance appears to be the nation’s governors. They could form a firm line of defense against the administration’s most recent attempted power grab: the Environmental Protection Agency’s all-pain, no-gain, back-door cap-and-trade scheme.

 

Governors and states have stood up to the administration’s excesses before. Twenty-seven refused to set up their own machinery to implement Obamacare exchanges, and 24 still refuse to accept more federal Medicaid money under the law, understanding that they would be on the hook for funding the unaffordable expansion later.

 

Governors and legislators across the country should use the same playbook and resist the EPA’s attempt to coerce them into setting up their own regulatory regime to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. Whatever the variation adopted — be it cap-and-trade, carbon tax, or some other regulatory scheme — the result would inevitably be the same: the destruction of manufacturing jobs, soaring electricity bills, and an imperceptible effect on the environment.

 

(Snip)