Waxman Markey And "Special Interest Giveaways"

On his Atlantic Correspondents blog, Conor Clarke tackles the politics of carbon credit distribution in the House's cap and trade energy bill, discussing whether the bill is, as some have said, chock full of "special interest giveaways":

Sure, the distribution of permits is still very important. When the government gives permits to select recipients, it is rewarding one industry over another, and favoring "incumbent" companies over those that might enter the market in the future. I think that is unfair. But those concerns about fairness are entirely separate from concerns about the environmental effectiveness of the bill. A cap and trade bill that gives all the permits to Donald Trump will be just as effective in reducing emissions as a bill that auctions off all of the permits and uses the revenue to fund an across the board payroll tax cut.