In each of the past two years, John Cushman, an environment reporter for The New York Times, has written articles so atrociously one-sided and factually wrong that I felt compelled to write to him with friendly advice. Each time, I reprinted my letter in The Heartlander. And each time, John ignored me.
It didn’t take John long to begin 1999 on the wrong foot: His January 3 front-page story, titled “Industries Press Plan for Credits in Emissions Pact,” reveals he still is not paying attention.
John’s article described legislation sponsored by Senators John Chafee (R-Rhode Island), Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Connecticut), and Connie Mack (R-Florida). Their bill would reward companies that reduce their greenhouse gas emissions (primarily carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide) before the proposed Kyoto Protocol takes effect in the year 2008. Companies would receive “credits” for emission reductions dating back to 1991.
Here’s my letter.
Dear John:
I have some questions about your January 3 story on emissions credits. I hope you can devote a few minutes to responding to this letter. Don’t hesitate to call me at 312/377-4000 or send e-mail to jbast@heartland.org.
In the second and third paragraphs of your article you refer to “widespread opposition [to the Kyoto Protocol] from major industries” and “opposition to the treaty among big industry groups.” Nowhere else in the article do you describe or cite opponents–”big industry groups” or otherwise–of the treaty. Since the self-interest of “major industries” seems readily apparent, some readers may conclude that there is no reason other than corporate self-interest to oppose the treaty.
But of course, that would be wrong.
Why didn’t you mention the 16,800 scientists who have signed the Oregon Institute Petition? (It had just 15,000 signers when I last wrote to you in May.) As you know, the petition begins as follows: “We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December 1997, and any other similar proposals.”
Why didn’t you mention any of the scores of think tanks and advocacy groups across the country that do not support the proposed treaty? The Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, Competitive Enterprise Institute, Reason Foundation, and my own organization, The Heartland Institute, have all published detailed criticisms of the treaty. None of them is a “big industry group.”
Why didn’t you mention the widespread public opposition to the Kyoto treaty revealed by opinion polls when people are told that the treaty requires developed nations–but not fast-growing developing countries such as China and Mexico–to cap and reduce their emissions?
From Where Do Windfalls Come?
Later in your article you mention the enormous financial windfalls that some companies would get under the legislation, at one point writing “hundreds of companies, big and small, could benefit from the proposal.” DuPont alone, you write, would acquire credits that “could someday be worth billions of dollars.”
Why didn’t you also report that those windfalls and “benefits” have to be paid for by somebody? Your article never mentions, even once, the cost of reducing greenhouse gas emissions or who ultimately would have to pay it.
The credits would indeed be worth billions of dollars due to the enormous cost of reducing greenhouse gases fast enough to meet the schedule in the Kyoto Protocol. WEFA and CONSAD Research Corporation put the cost at between $177 billion and $318 billion a year in lost gross domestic product. WEFA’s estimate comes to $2,700 per household.
You may think WEFA and CONSAD overstate the cost of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but I’ve read both reports closely and the opposite seems more likely. The WEFA report, for example, does not take into account the cost of reducing greenhouse gases other than carbon dioxide, a cost its authors say “may exceed the cost of reducing carbon through the energy sector.” It also measures only the cost to the energy sector of the U.S. economy, not other sectors; assumes that energy efficiency improves at double the actual rate of the past ten years; and assumes a perfectly operating domestic emissions trading system.
Only Friendly Critics Need Apply
You quote three critics of the proposed legislation: the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, the National Environmental Trust, and the Union of Concerned Scientists. The first was created to act as a public relations firm for the most alarmist voices in the global climate debate. The second was created just three years ago by the first to smear groups and individuals who dare depart from liberal orthodoxy on environmental matters. The third is a notoriously leftist advocacy group better known for its anti-war and anti-nuclear power efforts than its expertise on environment issues.
Don’t get me wrong. Criticisms of the proposed legislation are worthy of reporting: The bill would indeed create multi-billion-dollar windfalls for some companies without actually reducing emissions by a single pound, and there is no agreement on how to distinguish true emission reductions from “phantom paper reductions.”
But all three groups endorse the Kyoto Protocol. Why didn’t you report other, stronger, criticisms of the bill coming from more objective sources?
Fred Smith at the Competitive Enterprise Institute has been a vocal critic of the bill, saying it would implement an unpopular treaty by buying off special interest groups with the general public’s money. Have you read his essay, coauthored with Jack Kemp, in your own New York Times on January 13 (after, I realize, you wrote your article)?
Smith and Kemp write: “[L]arge blocs of corporate America . . . are being seduced by the promise of getting credits” into endorsing the Kyoto Protocol, a treaty that “would create a vast array of bureaucrats, at home and abroad, who would employ vague standards, arbitrary conditions and dubious science to allocate economic rights and privileges.
“Ceding power to unelected global authorities would be a hard sell, even if the science behind Kyoto were compelling,” they continue. “Surrendering power on that scale for the sake of a vague arbitrary promise of modest financial relief doesn’t make sense for any American business.”
My question is, why didn’t you include any criticism of the proposed legislation from either a sound-science or pro-market perspective?
It’s More Complicated than That
I understand you have limited time and resources, and it is easiest to report environment stories as the clash of good guys (environmentalists and liberal elected officials) and bad guys (“major industries”). But the actual debate is more complicated than that.
The best public policies will not be adopted if we allow the loudest and most alarmist voices in the debate to drown out the voices of reason. If even The New York Times can’t get the story right, what chance do we have for an informed and productive debate on this issue, or any of the other important issues of the day?
