Also please note that a big part of getting bills accomplished, as you obviously are probably having to deal with every day, is getting everybody on the same page, and putting forth the most pertinent points, in a broad based, and appealing way.  This point is also lightly touched on below, but it is worth noting here that I have shared this analysis with a broad spectrum of experts on the matter. Not one mainstream environmentalist has disagreed with it, and not one conservative analyst has taken great issue either, simply because of the large national security, oil reliance ramifications.   The economics has been backed up and supported, as well. And everyone, in terms of actual voters, that I have shared the basic ideas with, have been in agreement as well.

In ‘06, the U.S. was responsible for 6.17 billion metric tons of net greenhouse gas emissions.   Using this figure as the baseline, S. 1200 would, according to the press release, save an amount equal to .00745% — 75/1,000,000 — of our net greenhouse gas emissions over the House (and Stabenow) version,  and .031% — 31/100,000 — of our net greenhouse gas emissions in total. It would also save less than .035%  or 35/100,000 of our total passenger vehicle oil use (using 8 million barrels a day as the base figure), over the House version, and .14% — 14/10,000 — in total.

But even these figures may be overly optimistic.  They don’t appear to take into account that some of the subsidized transactions would occur anyway (and that there are energy costs involved in the production of each replacement vehicle, although that consideration can be exceedingly misleading).  [Editorial update: In hindsight, the bills had a slightly better effect, because a lot of people did choose to use them for  higher efficiency cars than the bills required for subsidy, most notably the now highly reputed Ford Fusion.]

More importantly, they also don’t consider that the subsidized vehicles, unlike those being targeted for replacement, can not otherwise, for all practical purposes, be scrapped a year or two down the road and replaced by far more efficient vehicles as these become available — but will instead perpetuate the status quo for years. These vehicles may also ultimately decrease our future fleet average, if we otherwise come close to achieving our new vehicle sales fleet mpg average target   (35.5 mpg for cars and light trucks combined by 2016, with smaller, incremental increases in earlier years.)

Here are the basics:  The ultimate goal of any pro-Detroit assistance is to create job opportunity and growth.  Other vehicle stimulus packages will have this same macro economic effect. If there is a concern, nevertheless, to help Detroit specifically, there is a way to do this and have this very same bill, with a little tweaking — have not just far more broad based appeal over the House version — but be far more effective.

It is also critical to keep in mind that properly framed — and I have already gotten feedback from people in both political parties outside of the beltway — almost everybody is on board with reducing gasoline usage for one or both of the following reasons:  Decreasing CO2 emissions and moving us toward the necessary greater international credibility on the issue (particularly with respect to nations such as India, and China), and improving our national security by mitigating our needless reliance upon foreign oil — here emphasized for framing purposes.

I will skip the lengthier analysis of vehicles on the market and the necessary restructuring of this legislation in order to meet the same expressed, and desired, ends, and yet at the same time meet them in a way that is more broadly appealing as well.  That needs to be done via separate inquiry and/or in person. But the follow-up proscription suggested below will also give some critical insight into how practical and effective such a measure can potentially be — even with respect to our Detroit based companies.

It may also be far more cost effective than many other subsidy, or technology study programs, to extend a properly constructed reward program with progressively, and aggressively, higher efficiency targets. (And at the same time, be more politically palatable than significantly raising oil based fuel taxes. Note also that at least some of this idea is not dissimilar from S. 247 introduced back on Jan. 14.  But the similarities and differences, and how some of that can be reintroduced while having even more appeal and at the same time more vigorously serve to prompt the market itself to develop, produce, and purchase far more and higher mpg and alternative fuel vehicles — the necessary requirement for us to effect these dual problems of oil and emissions — are subsequent points to make.)

This would not only prompt such vehicle replacements, but shift the development, production, and demand aspects of the market in this direction as well. This, in turn, would also have the critical, and underestimated effect, of altering market parameters in the proper direction and thus rendering further significant market movement and design improvement far more likely and easier to build upon.  This sounds somewhat conceptual, but it is a key requisite element for solving these challenges.

Consider two American candidates for significant cash for clunker type targeting, and compare them in stark contrast to the vehicles that we would nevertheless be subsidizing the purchase, and thus perpetuation (and even increase) of, under the current proposals:  The Chevy Volt, and Ford’s Fiesta ECOnetic diesel. (Note that diesels are not currently popular here merely because there has not yet been a reason for them to be, which as a basic truism of market capitalism, will change when the reasons change.  Emissions aside, they can now also easily be made as clean, or cleaner, than gasoline internal combustion engines. In fact, Volkswagen’s recently introduced Jetta TDi (diesel) has been extremely well received in the U.S. thus far.)

The Volt gets 100+ mpg equivalent its first forty miles after charge — enough to cover most routine commutes and trips — and 48-50 mpg when running via gasoline generator thereafter.  The Ford Fiesta ECOnetic gets 65 mpg. (There is also a Fiesta Van ECOnetic version due out in a few months, that gets in the 70s.  In fact, Fiesta’s full size transit van ECOnetic, which is not available in the U.S., but which requires the correct policies in order to be, gets 32.6 — an enormous improvement over what is on the road in terms of work vans today.)

Replace a vehicle that gets 18 mpg, with one that gets 65, and this would prompt the market to develop even better and more efficient versions of such vehicles; and we would save 482 gallons of gas, and 9352 lbs. of CO2, over a typical 12,000 mile driving year, for that one vehicle alone.  This is the energy and exhaust equivalent of driving a vehicle that gets 35.5 mpg — the new CAFE requirement average for the year 2016 — for 17,110 miles, using air as its fuel, and emitting nothing but air.

What if the vehicle to be replaced was one of the 24 mpg vehicles, say, one year from now; only it can’t, because it is almost brand new. What would the savings have been otherwise, by switching over to the 65 mpg vehicle?  315.4 gallons of gasoline, and 6118.67 lbs. of CO2, over 12,000 miles of driving distance.  Enough, again, in a net emissions and oil usage sense, to fuel that soon to be standard 35.5 mpg vehicle for 11,196 miles, on pure air.

Yet Ford is not currently planning to bring the ECOnetic to America. According to Mark Fields, Ford America President;

We just don’t think [Americans] would buy that many diesel cars.

Of course we wouldn’t, when we are considering the subsidization of replacement vehicles that get 24 mpg, instead.

Tax the crap out of gasoline. Yeah, unpopular; but Dems have the majority in Congress, and tend to support it (as do some moderate Republicans). Just do it, sell it, it’s about national security and getting off of sending billions to hostile foreign regimes.

Do it more as a value added tax in addition to just end user tax. Take all the funds from this tax and use thusly: Give hardship relief, but only on a well communicated sliding scale so that people begin AND CONTINUE to make adjustments themselves. All of this will go right back into the economy while encouraging the market itself to further adjust and create.

Next, bag the tax credit idea and instead do immediate credits for solar penal installation on roofs. Make it a big credit too, so that anyone living in a sunny area is getting some power from the sun, and almost no environmental cost, increasing further development and economies of scale in this industry, and transitioning us over to cleaner, more independent, fuels.

No tax credits; they are abstract, and the full value is never realized.

Tax electricity. That’s right. Electricity, generated from coal. Sounds politically bad? Right now we tax hard earned income. That’s bad. Instead, we will be shifting some of that burden onto a revenue raising program that at the same time inspires the market, and ends the undue non true capitalism penalization of industries and end uses that don’t rely upon excessive externality cost electrical use or production.

Same hardship remuneration applies, while people incrementally, with six month at a time decreases in hardship assistance, learn to adapt with positive change:

We can’t ask what is perceived to be sacrifice of industry (though we are de-facto subsidizing some industries now too, with other ones right now unduly penalized because their lack of harm is not integrated into their price) yet just give handouts to the economically disadvantaged without asking them to learn to adjust also — and there is PLENTY of adjustment that can be made short and, increasingly, longer term, when money is at stake — at the same time.

DON’T pour money into R & D. This is a common call by many, but it is a waste. Let the market do it. Then the money not only inspires the research, but concomitantly the development and implementation at the same time, for no additional cost. It’s a waste to simply give industry money for “research, if they do x or y or promise to look at z.”

Take the same money, and later use for deficit reduction. Right now, trying to bring jobs back, use it for reward. Not as efficient as economic discentive (e.g, a tax on coal fired electricity) but choose broad behavior parameters that are already established, and again, grant immediate purchase and investment credits.

Not for bicycles or stuff like that that also has other uses (cool and helpful as bicycles are), that’s another waste. But for stuff which only serves to produce or use far cleaner energy.

Use the rest for direct stimulus in the way of immediate construction, but smaller scale that also indirectly enriches communities, towns and cities, and DOES NOT further support more fossil fuel based uses or needs. Bike paths can be construction ready anywhere, and have the opposite effect, encouraging biking. Don’t put up electric lights unless they are solar powered. Install solar charging stations, wind or geothermal powered, for local electric vehicles, bike and walking paths, tennis courts, etc.

And those are just a few quick examples.  Everything in such a jobs or stimulus bill needs to be designed to either discourage fossil fuel based behavior while encouraging the opposite, while not regulating people and letting them and the market decide, while inspiring the market further at the same time, all while stimulating jobs and the economy rather than further dragging it down.

If Dems with a solid majority can’t sell that, what can they sell? (Oh, yeah, I forgot:  Apparently nothing. But that can change when they learn not necessarily how to do it, but that they must do it. Who might teach them that?)

Use the market to solve the climate change, pollution and energy security problems all at the same time, without increasing government encroachment, and while creating jobs and spurring economic growth all at the same time.

It is a shame because here we are as a country scrounging around for a few billion more dollars of stimulus to help our unemployed and small businesses — when the biggest stimulus of all is hiding in plain sight. And that is ending our political paralysis and the pall of uncertainty it is casting over everything from the cost of my health care to the cost of my energy to the way our biggest banks can do business.

Are we really being held back because we don’t know what our health care is going to cost?  Because we don’t know the cost of energy? Who is being held back by this.  What legislation would change this.

Energy prices have fluctuated for decades. Setting a bill that helps motivate us toward better alternatives would certainly be good for the environment, good for national security, and probably, in the long run (despite constant presumption to the contrary) good for the economy. But it does not necessarily mean we will suddenly know any better what “energy” costs. This is the nature of the market.

Friedman is sometimes perceptive (and at other times, not so much). But his quoted paragraph above seems like pure babble, that otherwise sounds and “appears” clever; something that there is far too much of masquerading as informed commentary these days.

As for the paralysis that Friedman speaks of, paralysis is not necessarily bad, if it keeps bad legislation from being passed. But he blames both sides for this paralysis on the one hand, while calling the Republicans the party of “just say no” on the other.

He also says the two “sides” should meet in the “middle.”  Why should the two sides “meet in the middle.” What if the “middle”as defined in this fashion is not right? What if the Republicans are right on some things (though right now, it is hard to see what) and Democrats are right on some others (not much easier to see what).  Does “meet in the middle” mean we pass the best bills? Doesn’t articulate the best principles, and reasons why they apply, create the best bills?  And is it really a failure to “meet in the middle” that is prohibiting this?

Democrats have a solid majority of the House, 59 of the 100 seats in the Senate, and the support of the White House. If they put together a good bill, couldn’t they also sufficiently show why it is a good bill to the few Democrats or Republicans holding it up?  (And if Democrats are so worried about a filibuster, maybe they ought to stop letting themselves be bossed around constantly by the minority party. After all, it’s not like they could stop anything themselves when they were the minority party for most of this decade (with bad ramifications, too.))

If Democrats can not put together a good bill, then there is nothing to pass. If they can put together a good bill, and show why it is, and they are still blocked by a few recalcitrant Democrats and almost the entire Republican Party, then maybe the issue is not one of “two sides not being able” to “come together,” but others negatively paralyzing the system.  Others who then lose at the voting booth, if this is 1) the actual case, and 2) once again, effectively shown.

Of course, with Rahm Emanuel, who doesn’t seem to believe in showing anything, leading White House strategy,* it’s up to Democrats in Congress, or the DNC; or maybe once again we will have the “paralysis” that Friedman writes about until Republicans can come back in and start passing things again, just like most of this past decade.

In other words, it comes down to two things, particularly with a significant majority in both houses, and the support of the White House. Putting together a good bill or bills, and effectively showing this, both to the country, and to their fellow Congresspeople: Not, as Friedman says, simply “meeting in the middle” regardless of what the various parties are claiming they want. That leads to more of the same over burdensome special interest favoring legislation that people like Friedman are often complaining about (and often correctly), in the first place.

As for why the rest of the world is starting to view our country as more unstable — the concern driving Friedman’s article — it’s not because we are not passing bills, with possibly the small exception of energy. The reason for the energy exception is that the world knows climate change is a global problem and we are still the leader of the free world, and by far largest per capita contributor to the climate change problem. (A problem that almost half the country seems to have become convinced does not exist, by the way.) And we are not seeming to do much to lead on this issue.

But for the most part, the world is not viewing the U.S. as potentially less stable than normal because of a failure to pass health care or some derivative and market traders favoring cap and Trade system, whereby much of the money that should be going into productive growth and problem redress instead goes into traders pockets;** it is probably because of the massive run up in debt, the recent financial crisis, and all of the heavy rhetoric that continues to emanate out of this country, combined with, perhaps, to some very small degree, what Friedman references; A Congress that can’t seem to get anything done — despite the fact that many think that in general, a Congress not getting anything done is a good thing sometimes.***

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*Emanuel has been routinely credited with orchestrating a masterful Democratic victory in Congress in 2006.  There is little conventional wisdom in an America that is currently chock full of erroneous conventional political wisdom, that is as off base as this.  It is the equivalent of taking over a football game in the fourth quarter, leading 31-0, and squeaking out a 30-28 victory when the ball sails wide right on a field goal try in the waning seconds.   Most people will vehemently disagree with this — particularly those in a media which endlessly parroted this assessment as if unambiguous fact  – but that’s the nature of conventional wisdom that has become entrenched as gospel.  But in 2006 the Bush administration was becoming very unpopular, concern over Iraq and foreign policy strategy was becoming alarmingly high yet the Bush Administration unfortunately was not up for re-election, and there was more anti – incumbent Congressional fervor than at any point in modern history (only to be outdone, yet again, by 2008 of course), and second term majority parties typically lose almost what the Republicans lost in 2006 under normal circumstances.

**On the flip side of this, a cap and trade system does offer some efficiency advantages. By allowing the market to fully determine how it wants to meet certain targets, more effective measures can be accomplished at less cost to the initial polluter in the first place. But in the long run, all this system is doing is rewarding an inherent right to pollute to certain entities, above which threshold they can not go — or must purchase credits from someone else. If an inherent right to pollute does exist where such pollution is contributing to a potentially alarming (and still underestimated) global problem, then everyone should have the right equally. Yet such a system is fundamentally predicated on the opposite principle — past behavior.

In the long run, simply taxing the processes is more efficient and less costly.  (Former Bush economics advisor, Bruce Bartlett, in Forbes, agrees.)  Politically unpalatable as this sounds, it is the most efficient and most “market equalizing” approach to leveling the playing field between harmful and nonharmful production processes. There is no reason that a “tax” should be frowned upon until and unless this country has no taxes; which so long as we have government and not anarchy, is a bit far fetched.  And of the many taxes that are levied, this would probably be the fairest and by far the most productive. Not only does it raise revenue, it avoids having to simply prohibit behavior that destroys the environmental quality of the world for everyone, which behavior some people might otherwise be willing to pay for — which is everyone’s right, so long as that harm is somehow integrated into the marketplace, and marketplace decisions.

Cap and trade does not accomplish this nearly as efficiently in the long run, but instead creates an entire separate market that has no value in and of itself, other than to avoid this more straightforward approach and the politically unpalatable tax word.

Not that some haven’t tried to use the term  anyway, for cap and trade (and, creatively, there is some small truth to it).  But then these “some” — in this case ex half term Alaskan Gov. Sarah Palin, here also argue that the way to getting off of the energy sources that are compromising national security, polluting our environment, and contributing massive amounts of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere via the geologically instantaneous release of carbon that took millions of years to accumulate, is “the answer doesn’t lie in making energy scarcer and more expensive!.” And, of course, if there is one thing that is correctly known with certainty in the otherwise uncertain “art” of economics — and what, essentially, compromises “economics 101,” is that of course the answer, completely the opposite of what Palin insisted, does lie in making the behavior we want to move away from, scarcer and more expensive, relative to the behavior that we want to move toward.

Here, something that is not quite as efficient, but that can speed up the process, and add political appeal, is to take the funds derived from discouraging the energy reliance sources and processes that we need to move away from, and using part of it to encourage production and usage of the (cleaner, non finite) energy sources and processes that we need to move toward.

***The most recent incarnation of the health care bill in the Senate, to many — as much as this country probably needs health care reform to reign in rocketing public and private costs, extreme inefficiencies, and to provide better coverage and care for people — serves as an example of precisely this.

We interrupt this special presentation, with a special announcement, and question, from the Democratic Party.

Thank you very much for your assistance in teaching us how to control Congress with a minority.  We appreciate this very much, and it is truly something that we do want to learn. However, before you teach us this, can you please teach us how to control Congress with a majority and the White House?

Republican Party response: “That was whene we were in power over the past decade.   But don’t worry, if you didn’t take copious notes that time around, your opportunity will come soon enough again.”

Hendrik Helzberg’s recent “Beware of Sudden Downdrafts,” column in the New Yorker serves as a classic example of why Liberals are often horrific at politics. (The other half of the equation is the fact that they think they are good at it, and often tend to be extremely self righteous, defensive, and argumentative about this — usually with far more passion than for actually showing to the country why their policies or position on a particular issue is correct or important, which they far too often take for granted as being “self evident” along with all of the rhetoric that cuts against it “self evidently” irrelevant, when it is not.)

Helzberg:

Whether yesterday’s upset in Massachusetts turns out to be a catastrophe or merely a setback now depends largely on the grown-upness, or lack of it, of liberals in the House of Representatives. I don’t see any way out of the darkness right now other than for the House to tighten its stomach muscles, pass the Senate version of the health-care bill A.S.A.P., and move on to jobs and the economy. The Senate health-care bill, however inferior to the House version, is vastly superior to the status quo. The only alternative I can discern is no bill at all—a political, substantive, and humanitarian failure that would reverberate for a generation.

This is a popular theme. As many leading commentators and “bloggers” have noted, anybody who “knows anything” knows that if this is not passed right now, and with this bill, 1) it can not be passed, and 2) it can not be brought up again, 3) it if is nothing will get done, and 4) it can not be brought up for years (along some version or another of their opponents being able to otherwise irrelevantly say “ha, you tried it and it didn’t work, you can’t try it again.”)

What Democrats, and perhaps, in particular, some liberals, tend to miss is that while it is theoretically possible that this is true, it is only true because of one reason: Democrats allow it to be played out this way, which fits in precisely with how their opponents want it to be played out, and for no good reason.

That is, there is otherwise absolutely no reason otherwise for ANY of the impediments made up above, to be true. That is, if this bill is not passed; it can be passed later. It can be brought up again. Something can be done. The bill can be changed. The bill can be improved. The bill can be more effectively sold. Opponents to the bill can be more effectively framed — particularly if a better bill is passed, and the reasons why it is better focused on, sold, and repeatedly illuminated. (Instead of Democrats simply taking for granted that “everybody knows (or thinks) this” already.)

It all comes down to the reasons why, and more importantly, the reasons that are given and sold as to why.

If there is a need for the bill, which it seems that Liberals and most Democrats (and some Republicans in fact) believe there is — some very very strongly — then Democrats can pass a bill. A good bill. Having a quagmire because of misframing and opponent deception is not a reason to pass a a bad bill or stop and never re take up the process, it is a reason to take control of the debate, make the bill address the issues more sensibly, and sell the bill. If Democrats think it is a good bill right now (those that do), then the same arguments apply. Sell it. If it is a good bill, with a majority in the Senate, you can sell it. Martha Coakley is all but irrelevant.

That’s politics. It’s come down to numbers because Democrats haven’t worked to frame the issue, or control the debate, or concoct a bill that actually addresses the root of the problem, or show why, or address the real concerns that those opposed to reform have, or stop letting Republicans they disagree with dictate to them in Congress, by making a powerful and effective case against them, without simply belittling them as if it is all so “obvious” to everybody.

What is expressed in Helzburg’s column above is pure abject defeatism. And it is exhibit A in why and how Democrats now almost always allow their opponents to control the debate.

Update: From the super popular online Daily Kos website, a recommended front page piece with about 400 recommends, 580 comments (and counting), February 1, 2010.  This title is mostly metaphor, and a little bit of hyperbole; but it’s not satire, and is in support: Ezra Klein: It’s this bill, or everybody dies.