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Cato Dispatch for May 4, 2007

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(Links to outside sources were active as of the date of this dispatch; however, not all news sources maintain links to current stories indefinitely. Some links also may require registration.)

Republican Presidential Candidates Debate

"Ten Republican presidential candidates wanting to succeed President Bush embraced a more popular president, conservative icon Ronald Reagan, at every turn in their first debate of the 2008 race," the Associated Press reports. "The world, however, is far different today than it was some 25 years ago when the nation's 40th president relaxed at his retreat in the rolling hills of southern California. Iraq and terrorism now are top issues, support for Bush is at a low point and Republican hopefuls find themselves trying to prove to the party's base that they're conservative enough to be the GOP nominee -- on social matters as well as the economic and security issues Reagan championed."

Michael Tanner, author of Leviathan on the Right: How Big Government Conservatism Brought Down the Reagan Revolution, comments on the GOP field, and the absence of a conservative heir apparent to the Reagan legacy: "The Republican debate in California last night showed that the field of candidates still lacks a Reagan-style small-government conservative among the top tier of candidates. The candidates invoked Reagan's name at least 19 times, but one had to go all the way down to Rep. Ron Paul's quixotic campaign before someone reflected Reagan's commitment to limited government.  None of the major candidates made a serious call to limit the size, scope, and power of government.  While they talked about cutting spending in the abstract, none of them could identify a single government program they would eliminate.  On the other hand, from alternative fuels to a national ID card to government regulation of health care, they seemed all too happy to embrace bigger government.

"There's still a long way to go," Tanner concludes, "before any of these candidates can lay claim to the Reagan legacy."

White House Vows Hate Crime Bill Veto

"A long-stalled bill that would expand the federal hate crime law to cover violent acts based on a victim's gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability is headed for approval in the Democratic-controlled Congress but faces a White House veto threat," reports the Los Angeles Times. "The House on Thursday approved the measure, the first major expansion of the hate crime statute since it was enacted in 1968. Senate approval is expected soon, putting the controversial bill on the president's desk for the first time since it was proposed nearly a decade ago. Under intense pressure from conservative religious organizations to derail the bill, the White House on Thursday called it 'unnecessary and constitutionally questionable,' issuing the latest in a string of veto threats aimed at the congressional Democratic majority."

In "Hate This," Timothy Lynch, director of Cato's Project on Criminal Justice, writes:  "Congress is poised to enact hate-crimes legislation. The basic idea is to punish criminal acts that are motivated by some form of bias, such as racial hatred. The proposal is popular, but ill-advised. Thus, President Bush needs to get his veto pen ready. ... [O]ne should not forget that all of the violent acts that would be prohibited under the proposed bill are already crimes under state law. Over the last few years, there has been a great deal of publicity surrounding the brutal killings of James Byrd in Texas and Matthew Shepard in Wyoming. The individuals responsible for those murders were quickly apprehended and prosecuted by state and local authorities. President Bush knows the Byrd case well, as he was the state governor at the time. Those incidents do not show the necessity for federal action; to the contrary, they show that federal legislation is unnecessary."

China Obstinate on Emission Standards

"China, poised to become the world's biggest greenhouse gas polluter, has gone on the offensive in global warming politics, opposing emissions caps likely to shape contentious negotiations about solutions," Reuters reports. "Beijing objects to much in the draft of the latest U.N. report on global warming being discussed by scientists and officials in Bangkok this week. Analysts said Beijing wanted to protect long-term growth from pressure to cut greenhouse gases. ... China plans fast industrialization for decades to come and its output of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas pollutant, could outstrip that of the United States as early as this year, the International Energy Agency says. So, in the international glare of attention ahead of talks about greenhouse gas rules after the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012, Beijing has gone on the offensive, promising action but fending off international commitments."

In "Live With Climate Change," Patrick Michaels, Cato senior fellow in environmental studies and author of Meltdown: The Predictable Distortion of Global Warming by Scientists, Politicians and the Media, writes: "It's hardly news that human beings have had a hand in the planetary warming that began more than 30 years ago. For nearly a century, scientists have known that increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide would eventually result in warming that was most pronounced in winter, especially on winter's coldest days, and a cooling of the stratosphere. All of these have been observed. ... However, actually 'doing something' about warming is a daunting endeavor. The journal Geophysical Research Letters estimated in 1997 that if every nation on Earth lived up to the United Nations' Kyoto Protocol on global warming, it would prevent no more than 0.126 degrees F of warming every 50 years. Global temperature varies by more than that from year to year, so that's not even enough to measure. Climatically, Kyoto would do nothing."

Susan Semeleer, editor, ssemeleer@cato.org