Big Boats Gotta Spew, See?

There's so much bad news, I was ignoring this story I kept seeing in my BlueSky feed: "Did U.S. bully tactics kill climate measure?" It was a gift-linked story, which sometimes are wonky when viewed on my phone, and I thought, What's one more climate bad news story from the Trump regime? They're all bad, I know enough, so I didn't click on it.

But then it showed up as a reprint in today's Star Tribune so I read it. (Here's a gift link to the New York Times.)

The climate measure in question was, in effect, the first global carbon tax, and it was all agreed upon except the final vote. It would have fined the worst-polluting cargo ships, heading off the increases anticipated in their output by 2050.

The Trump regime, of course, wants more pollution. None of us are surprised by that at this point, but it's the tactics they used in this case that are notable. 

They threatened primarily poorer and smaller countries — all of which had previously planned to vote for the fines — with revocation of port access for their ships and sailors, financial penalties, blacklisting of diplomats, and revocation of personal visas. Marco Rubio personally called people in several of the countries.

And now, of course, the regime denies the strong-arm tactics they used. Lying cat says...



Here are a couple of choice quotes from the article:

• The regime opposed the fines because "activist-driven climate policies ... would burden American consumers." Unlike, of course, Trump's tariffs. Those don't burden American consumers at all.
• "Chris Wright, the energy secretary, said he and other Trump administration officials were told the approval of the maritime fee was a foregone conclusion, and took it as a challenge. Early on, State Department officials recognized the shipping fee as a winnable battle that would excite Mr. Trump." Exciting Trump — that's the goal of people in our government. Since he is a toddler, as we know.
• The regime dared to release a statement calling the fines a "European-led neocolonial export of global climate regulations." When everyone knows, many of the most important leaders of global climate efforts have been people from previously colonized countries — the ones most in peril from global warming. And the neocolonial United States calling anyone else neocolonial is rich, indeed.
• The Energy Department spat out the phrase "climate alarmists" in one of its victory statements, made after the fine was voted down. I try to wrap my head around those words. How does the word "alarm" which is neutral or maybe even a good word for it get turned into a negative when you put the suffix "ist" onto it?

Separately... but possibly of use in this fight, a group called Oilfield Witness has developed cameras that can see emissions that are invisible to the human eye. Their optical gas imaging (OGI) camera is calibrated to detect hydrocarbons:

I wonder if such a camera, trained on these cargo ships, would help in the future fight to reinvigorate this carbon tax. As well as in fighting the natural gas fracking fields Oilfield Witness intends them for.