Climategate

[steelish]

How is regulating industry outside the constitutional purview?

Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3 of the US Constitution:

"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;...

"To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;"

In any case, it's a matter of national defense. Just because a threat isn't military doesn't mean that the government has no right to defend against it. That'd be an insane and suicidal restriction.

Define "threat" the EXACT same way that the federal government will define it. What you deem to be a threat I'm sure would be a lot more serious than what the feds would define it as. Besides, they're not regulating uniformly across the US. What they're doing is making deals with foreign governments, hoping that the other governments will be honest and follow similar regulations. It WON'T happen! China is already balking and stepping back from the entire issue.

Who is going to police this? Who is responsible for making sure the Cap and Trade regulations are followed? The EPA? I'm sure the other countries are all for the U.S. policing it. (Ha!) Are we planning on using the honor system? We're going to trust that everyone will follow regulations? (Just as we trust that others don't try to build nuclear weapons, or plan attacks, or plot against the U.S.)

Besides, the text from the constitution has been taken out of context (in my opinion).

To break it down:
"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;...

It is my belief that when they wrote; "provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States" they were speaking of GENERAL WELFARE - the United States as a nation, not individual welfare (as in health care, and I realize this thread is not about health care, and I will get to the Cap and Trade thing later).

then they wrote; "but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States" This implies that all states are to be treated equally and the states are to form their own laws/policies. (again, according to provisions in the healthcare bill, some states are treated differently than others)

and now to get to what you were referring to;
"To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes"

The Cap and Trade does NOT regulate commerce! It regulates emissions and carbon footprints! And while we're restricting ourselves and imposing these policies that raise the prices of all our goods to our own citizens, how are we to ensure that other world powers are doing the same? We take their word for it? Are they going to allow the EPA - a U.S. agency - come in and "police" their production facilities?